New conclusions I have drawn from my data

I think I mentioned in a previous entry that I received all new students about 10 weeks into this action research project.  The majority of the data I gathered came from the first group of students I was with.  Within the last month or so, I have been more closely observing my new group of students.  I thought movement was "the thing" to get everyone engaged.  I still strongly believe it is a great tool to get students actively participating with the content, but a recent survey I gave to my students swayed my opinion a bit.  I saw a few comments from kids stating that they don't like the movement.  I am a very social person and I very much enjoy interacting with others, so I sometimes tend to assume that everyone must love interaction.  I haven't been as empathetic as I should be with the students that are very closed off and struggle socially.  I can see how interactive exercises like we do in class that involve lots of interaction would be hard for those kids.  They probably prefer individual based activities. 

This data does will not keep me from continuing to use movement in my classroom.  I have definitely seen more  positive results than negative....by a long shot, but I will try empathize more with the students that are not so fond of these activities.  I need establish a nice balance with the types of activities I do in class in order to work to the strengths of all my students.

Data with new students

I was excited to see how my new students reacted to my style of teaching.  So far, the data I have collected from them has been pretty similar to what I saw with the groups I had during the first trimester.  We did a lot of active learning this week.  One activity in particular allowed us to head down to the lobby of the auditorium, where we worked on learning verb conjugations.  This deals with the memorization of subject pronouns and a verb chart.  We used masking tape to make a chart on the floor.  From there, I quizzed them by asking them to move to particular boxes of the chart.  It helped them visualize things and it was a productive way to use their energy (better than writing the chart on a worksheet).  Of the 100 students I had do this activity, over 90 were actively engaged.  Today, we did a lot of seated work and it was more of a struggle to hold their attention.  I think students have become accustomed to my active style and expect interaction.  I believe this has created some difficulty for me to calm them down and get them to focus during our whole-class lecture time.

In a survey I gave, I asked, "Describe a learning activity we have done in class that has been very helpful."  Some of the responses were:  "the chair game," "when we do actions with the words," around the world," "standing up and doing actions" (there was a lot of this one and the chair game).  I also had a few responses that said "quiet time," "working in our seats."  I had one kid say that he gets bored and doesn't listen if he has to sit for the entire hour."  There is some mixture in the results, but a strong majority prefer the interactive ways.  At the same time, my job is to reach ALL my students, so I need to find quiet activities that cater to the interests of some of the students.

The Impact of my Action Research...

How do I continue what I have learned after I have completed my grad program? 

I have learned a lot through the program and my action research.  I have learned that using movement in the classroom is an effective way to engage students and an effective way for them to learn.  If I care about how much my students learn, which I do, I will continue to implement the strategies I have used since September, and add to them.  Using movement in the classroom can cause things to get a little crazy, but the students enjoy it and I believe they learn from it, so why not keep doing it.  I know giving the students a worksheet is an easy thing to do.  It doesn't take much creativity or thinking on my part and it is very managable, but it also doesn't produce the same results as an interactive activity.  I need to keep in mind what is in the best interest of the students.  If I can maintain that philosophy, I will continue to get better and grow as a teacher.

I want my students to learn a lot of Spanish, but I don't believe that's all that matters when they leave my class.  My hope is that they learn a lot of Spanish, but ultimately have a good experience in my classroom.  I hope they remember some of the fun activities we did and some friends they made in the class.  Movement creates lots of interaction amongst students, so learning how to build a strong community is a great thing I hope they can take away from my class.  Those are the things that impact students beyond the classroom.

Problems...

I am in the midst of starting a new unit with my Spanish 1 students.  Sometimes the new vocabulary and material doesn't lend itself well to active learning, at least not right at the beginning of this unit.  I have to get all of the "input" to the students and it has been hard thinking of active ways to do this, so during the past few days, they have done a lot of listening to me.  These days haven't gone too well.  They have been chatty, easily distracted, and somewhat disruptive.  I can't say that the sedentary learning style is the only reason behind this, but I believe it has a lot to do with it.  The kids in these classes are accustomed to a more active style, so I think they look forward to the interaction they usually get, and not getting it has made them seek out ways to get it, which has been disruptive.  It reaffirms my research, that students need active ways to expend their energy.  It is tough to expect them to sit and listen for extended periods of time.  At the same time, I need to have clear expectations that identify how students need to act in the classroom.  There is no excuse for them being rude and disrespectful.  Just because you have to take notes and listen to lecture doesn't give you the right to act out in a negative way.  Yes, a more interactive lesson would help, but a lack of enforcing expectations by me is partly at fault.

A different kind of movement...

I have focused a lot on doing actual physical movement in the classroom during a learning activity.  This week, I took my classes to the computer lab to do an assignment on wordle.  When working on the computers, there was not movement, but the movement to the computer lab to create a change of scenery was great.  Day after day, they come to my classroom and that is our setting, so going to the computer lab was exciting and different and I could tell it created high levels of engagement.  I took three classes to the lab, so out of the 101 students I have in those three classes, 98 of them did a fantastic job in completing the assignment we went down there to do.  Something as simple as walking to a different room was enough to get them engaged.  Change is good.  As a teacher, you want to have routines and clear expectations, but you don't want to be overly predictable.  Changing things up makes the kids say "I wonder what we are going to do today in class?"  That is a good thing to have kids say when they enter your classroom.  If they know what is going to transpire each day in your class, the levels of motivation and attention are going to decrease.  Keep it interesting and unpredictable. 

What does the data say?

I have tabulated the results from a few of the surveys I gave to students.  I asked the question, "How much did you learn during the first trimester?"  The chioces were tons, a lot, some, not much, almost nothing.  Out of the 55 surveyed, 0 students responded with "not much, or almost nothing."  50 out of the 55 said they learned "tons" or "a lot."  I was pretty happy to see this.  I believe the movement had a lot to do with it.  The movement forced students to participate and when one participates, one learns.  Do they have a deep understanding of the material?  That is something I need to investigate further. 

Inner outer circle activity is successful again

I have new students and am teacher the same thing I taught in trimester 1.  Spanish 1 is just beginning and getting into phrases you would use when meeting someone for the first time.  I took my classes down to a large open area near the auditorium and had them form 2 circles, one inside the other.  They conversed on assigned topics and rotated in order to switch partners each time we did a different piece of the conversation.  They did a fantastic job and ALL were actively participating.  It was also nice to leave the room and learn in a new setting.  Today, I had a student ask if we could do that activity again and she said, "I learned so well when we did that activity."  She actually called it a game, meaning she had fun doing it. 

This continues to prove to me that movement is a great tool one can use in the classroom.  The kids are full of energy and it is an effective avenue to allow them to utilize their energy for learning.  At the same time, too much of it could hamper their interest of those types of activities, so I think using a variety of activities is important.