Category Archives: Teachers

Education Policy, Homework, Student Success Podcast, Students, Teachers

The Late Work Game: teachers, do you want missing work, late work — or no work at all?

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Welcome back to the late work game!

First semester is up and teachers and students across the country are recovering from that last minute freak out: get that missing work in!

Stressed kids near collapse trying to dig something out, anything to get the grades up. Desperate teachers giving up all pretense of syllabus rules and pushing, pulling, and excusing the kids across the finish line. Vice Principals peering over their shoulders, demanding mounds of paper work to justify failing this and that kid. Now into the new semester and it’s starting all over again. Continue reading →

High School, Teachers

Teaching or learning: teachers, which would you prefer? If you want it, sell it!

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I hate my teacher!

Teachers, I can’t tell you how much I hear from kids that they’re ready to learn, but their teacher keeps getting in the way.

Yep, we hear it all the time, “I hate my teacher!” But if we listen behind the angry words, what kids are really saying is that they’d rather like than hate their teachers. Continue reading →

Articulation, Learning Skills, Students, Teachers

Teaching it twice: ask your teachers to explain it again & in a different way

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Can a teacher really expect you to learn it the first time?

Teachers forget that what they’re teaching they already know and that it’s usually the first time you’ve ever heard it.

This is why when a teacher is making sense to you it’s probably because  you already know it. At the A+ Club we call it, “PK” for”Prior Knowledge.” Learning is the process of turning new information into PK, and it takes explanation, practice, and application.

And you need to build that knowledge in steps, turning each new thing into the Prior Knowledge you need to understand the next.

Some teachers are good at engaging students in this process; others not so good. But don’t depend on good teachers alone: please, please don’t let your teachers get in the way of your learning. It’s your grade, not theirs, so don’t just accept “I don’t get it.”

The Most Important Thing in the World (to a teacher)

Teachers love their subjects and speak its language. To them it’s the most important thing in the entire world, and you’d better know it, too, or else your life will be ruined, or worse.

They forget that you have six other subjects and personal interests that have nothing to do with their subject. And you ought not forget that you don’t pay their salaries. You’re not going to get your teacher fired, and your not going to reduce their pay if they’re not doing a good job.

What you can do is take control of the teacher yourself.

Take control of your teachers!

As Master Teacher Liddy Allee-Coyle, reminds us, teachers need to be reminded that students don’t always follow what they’re saying.

By the time you’re hearing it, the teacher may have taught it three times that day, or if it’s the first, the teacher may not yet have figured out the best way to present it. Either way, teachers are going to do what they always do, and if that isn’t what you need, then you need to speak up.

Here are some things you can do to get in control of your teachers:

  • Insist that  your teacher explain it slowly, clearly, and in different ways. Say,
    • “Please repeat that, only use different words this time.”
    • “Can we practice that together before we move on?
  • Ask your teacher to allow the students to explain it to each other.
    • Maybe your neighbor gets it and can say it in a way you’ll understand.
    • If you can’t explain it to someone else, then you don’t get really it yourself.
  • Insist that your teacher allow you to learn it and not measure you on that learning just once on a quiz or exam.
    • If it’s so important, don’t they want you to really learn it?
    • Remind them.
  • Above all, ask them to explain it again, and differently, this time

Remember, it’s your education, your grades, and your future at stake here. Don’t give in to not knowing.

Just ask your teacher to say it one more time.

– Michael

The A+ Club from School4Schools.com LLC, based in Arlington, VA, is dedicated to helping students across the U.S.A. meet their goals and find the academic success the want and deserve. Contact us here or call now to (703) 271-5334 to see how we can help.

Assignment Reporting & Teacher Feedback, Procrastination, Student Success Podcast, Studying Skills, Teachers

Scaffolding students out of procrastination: teacher interview with Mike Cahir

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Scaffolding students out of procrastination: teacher interview with Mike Cahir

Student Success Podcast No. 16
Feb. 10, 2014, recorded Feb 8, 2014

Today’s Guest: Mike Cahir, Teacher and Department Chair, English Department, Archbishop Carroll High School, Washington, DC

In this interview, Mike rejoins us to discuss procrastination from the point of view of a high school teacher. I ask him about his take on procrastination, and then I review some of the ideas that we are learning from Dr. Pychyl of the Procrastination Research Group at Carleton University. Mike processes this new information through delivers his own experiences and offers ideas and advice for both students and teachers. Continue reading →

Homework, Learning Skills, Procrastination, Students, Studying Skills, Teachers

Why homework matters: top five (5) reasons you probably should do your homework

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Sorry, but homework really does matter.

Annoying, yes. Boring, usually. Important for your academic success? Very much so.

See below for some important reasons why you probably should be doing your homework. Continue reading →

Assignment Reporting & Teacher Feedback, Education Policy, Students, Studying Skills, Teachers, Technology

Agenda books and schools: making good little secretaries

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agenda-book_msclipartWhy are we teaching kids to use 1970s technology?

Ever hear of Day Timer? Yes, the personal agenda book still exists, but only for a few old school types. Except in schools, where the kids are supposed to use agenda books, and it’s all their damned fault if they don’t.

Seriously. At the A+ Club, we hear from teachers all the time that Johnny “just needs to do what all the other students do and write down the assignments in his agenda book.”

If it were up to me, every kid would have exchange email and  Outlook working seamlessly on their computers, tablets, and phones, and everything they need to do would be posted there automatically. Continue reading →

Articulation, College, Grades, High School, Homework, Students, Studying Skills, Teachers

What do teachers really want?

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apple-for-teacher_msclipartBribery?

Maybe, but flattery will work better. Seriously.

The highest and most effective form of teacher flattery is asking a teacher for help. The next highest is actually doing your work. You meet teacher expectations, you get an A. Easy enough.

Well, let’s start from there, anyway.  So what do teachers really want? And how can the student figure that out? Continue reading →

Grades, Students, Teachers

Teachers are people, too (sort of) & how you should take advantage of it

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toaster_ms-clipart

  • My teacher is a toaster?

Heh, students, here’s a little inside information you should know: teachers are people, too. Shocking, I know. But true.

When my daughter was in my school, I’d bring her along to the watering hole we teachers escaped to on Fridays. She’d sit at a nearby table and enjoy bar food and a soda. After a few weeks she started inviting friends from school to sit with her, which seemed fine — until I learned that what she was doing was bringing her friends to listen to us do what teachers do on a Friday: complain about our students.  “Oh my God,” my daughter told me, “I didn’t realize that teachers have a life!”

Yep, and like you, they complain a lot. Make that all the time.

So, students, what’s in it for you?

Your teachers are actually more than a toaster that spits out lectures, homework, and grades. If they were machines, we’d could sure use better engineers.  Actually, thank God they’re not all the same model.

Instead, we’ve got a different personality, a different mood, and a different perspective in every classroom. Some we like, some we don’t, some are good, some not so much. All of them, however, set our grades, so we’d better be careful about who we’re blaming for what. We hear it all the time, “That teacher is soooo boring!” You know the routine, and you also know you can’t change classes just because you don’t like the teacher.

You can blame the teacher all day long, but it’s still up to you to do the work, figure out what the teacher wants, and do well on the tests. The best students can do all that and still hate the teacher. Annoying, yes, but a lot more productive than to do poorly because you don’t like the teacher.

But we can do a few simple, little things, meanwhile.

Salesmanship

If the purpose of the teacher is to give you a grade, and your not getting the grade you want, then, truly, it’s up to you and not the teacher. So what can you do?

A first step is to get the teacher on your side. You do it with simple, easy salesmanship.  Your teacher is your education provider, and your job is to get the highest grade possible out of each teacher. If what you’re doing is not working out, then let’s figure out a couple easy strategies to get that teacher on your side:

  • Smile and say “good morning” on your way in to the classroom. Can’t hurt. And maybe that will change your teacher’s vision of you from an unconcerned or detached underperformer to someone who not only needs but wants help. Suddenly, your teacher is seeing you as an individual, not as a malfunctioning machine
  • Ask a question or two. You may not feel up to it in front of class, but you can always ask a question before or after class, or write it on a paper or send an email later on. Your job is to make your teacher think of you outside of your grades and to worry about you as a person and not as a student. You will be amazed by how your teacher will suddenly be concerned for you if you ask for help.
  • Seek out your teacher before or after school. No need to suck up, but just by showing up for extra help — and not the last week of the quarter — your teacher is now seeing you as someone he or she can help, which means your teacher will now care about you more.

These are simple human interactions. The best salesperson doesn’t care who or what the client is, and just focuses on the sale. Your sale is your grade. Focus on it. Worry about it, not your teacher. Your best sales tool is communication. You will get out of your relationship with your teacher exactly what you put into it. The more you become a partner to the classroom, the more likely your teacher will perceive you as a partner to him or herself personally. Then you got ’em.

Teachers are people, too (sort of)

As with any relationship, honesty, kindness, and care will work with these fellow human beings we call teachers. Ultimately, teachers have a job to do, and it will guide their decisions and grades more than anything else. But if you can perceive them as individuals who are trying to do their best, but who have flaws and ticks and their own ways of being and doing things, maybe you will open up a new opportunity for yourself.

Think of how you are with those teachers you like and respect, and how beneficial that relationship can be for you. Then, maybe you can do that with the rest of them, and get similar, positive results.

– Michael

The A+ Club from School4Schools.com LLC, based in Arlington, VA, is dedicated to helping students across the U.S.A. meet their goals and find the academic success the want and deserve. Contact us here or call now  to (703) 271-5334 to see how we can help.