Notes

Treating All Students Equitably WITH REGARD TO Teacher Attention
It stands to reason that treating all students equitably regarding teacher attention and behavior would raise the academic achievement of the students in general and improve classroom climate; this reasoning is supported by way of a plethora of research. The research also confirms a commonly held view that male students have more attention than female students, whatever the teacher's gender. Racial/ethnic attributes in students may also be associated with differentiated teacher expectations. To conclude this research in broad strokes, the Pygmalion effect is widespread and, ironically, is communicated to students with techniques that would otherwise be effective teaching practices, only if carried out equity.

The next descriptions of teaching practices will undoubtedly be couched in a normal lecture-discussion style of teaching. This will not imply that I present this practice as being the most effective, but I do believe it is a commonly used mode of instruction. Secondly, these practices aren't limited to lecture-discussion; they are trusted in more inquiry and experientially based instruction.

Equal Distribution of Response Opportunities. To put it simply, that is directing questions toward all students, not just the people who volunteer or those who the professor feels preferred in querying. It is my observation that teachers at all levels have a knee-jerk a reaction to call on a student who raises their hand. This is the habit which might be un-learned, and it is a habit one pays to address with the students. I generally utilize the initial meeting of a training course with a comment that goes something like this: "I wish to connect to everyone in this class, not just those who are probably the most eager. T here fore I will be contacting everyone, not just those who increase your hands or volunteer comments. I promise not to attempt to embarrass you or put you down easily call on you and you also are reluctant to respond. However, I reserve the right to help you respond by following through to my initial question with some leading comments. You'll find my behavior just a little unusual, but you'll get used to it.

Delving, Probing, and Correcting. Certainly most of us desire to be adroit enough to check out up a question that confounds our students with one that is simpler to react to, or, in case a student has responded and we want them to expand upon their idea, hopefully to utilize Socratic questioning or something closely akin. Sometimes students response is just off the mark, and we have to gently allow student know that they is certainly going down a fruitless direction. However, because the research cited earlier has generated, we have been not equitable in these practices. It's been my observation in dealing with other teachers and analyzing my own teaching that this is particularly true when a teacher is working with a student perceived as less able. For a number of reasons, we believe that we do not want to embarrass the student involved, but if this is a more able student, we are more prone to pursue our questioning or correct a response. To be equitable, a teacher has to be aware of this tendency and monitor his / her behavior. This does not mean that all initial questions and for that reason their subsequent follow-ups are equally fitted to all our students. One would be smart to address simpler questions to less able students, even though issue of gender should have nothing to do with the issue of the question. Which does not mean that higher-level questions ought to be reserved for the students we perceive because the brightest.

Higher-level Questioning. I'll not discuss the problem of higher-level questioning at length, but I am going to define higher-level questioning as those inquiries which ask the student to exceed factual information that he/she has (or must have) read, seen, heard, or whatever within the preparation for confirmed class session. For example, a brief history teacher might ask his students, "Why did public opinion react so strongly to the Watergate cover-up?" This might be considered a lower-level question if an appropriate response were to be found in the assigned reading. However, were the same question to be asked and the solution needed to be pieced together from several parts of the reading and/or other sources of information and requiring the students' judgment, it could be a higher-level question. I suggest that we direct higher-level questions, especially open-ended ones where a variety of responses might have some validity, to students we perceive as less able. After the student's initial response, one might probe and delve in a fashion that asked the student to compare her or his response with the public's a reaction to Watergate. It really is obvious that one must be careful never to be too apparent in the differing levels of difficulty fond of students of differing abilities lest the students see through this strategy.

Latency. Latency, or "wait time" as it is also known is merely this: a more than "normal" pause between exchanges. The more prevalent kind of latency (type one) occurs whenever a teacher asks a question and chooses a respondent. While research varies concerning the exact length of time a teacher should use, we know that a lot of teachers practice hardly any latency, typically significantly less than or around one second. I advocate that a teacher should wait at the very least three seconds when asking a question, especially an increased level question. Initially, this is very difficult. As a prompt for latency, I identify a part of the physical landscape, a window or a clock if such is put in the rear of the classroom. After I ask a question I look to this feature and focus my attention onto it. While that is initially disconcerting to my students who expect me to be scanning their ranks, it is effective in reminding me to apply latency. In addition, it serves to remind me to be equitable in my selection of respondents together with lessening my focus on the most obvious volunteers, students who have raised their hands or verbalized a response.

The second kind of latency involves the pause in discussion after a student has responded. That is referred to as "type two" latency. If an instructor gets in the habit of letting a student's comments hang in the air for just two or three seconds, this sends a signal to all the students that this response will probably be worth reflecting upon and evaluating. It's been my observation that, when type two latency can be used, students are more attentive to their peers' ideas as the focus is taken away from the instructor. Again, this seems slightly bizarre when one first begins to apply it, nonetheless it does create a more thoughtful and honoring classroom climate. It also helps me in formulating my reaction to student input.

Encouragement. The initial program uses the term "praise" instead of my terminology, but I prefer "encouragement" because it connotes a support of student ideas and work, rather than a Pavlovian reward of same. We are more curt in our encouragement of student responses, according to some of the research. We have been more prone to simply mumble "uh huh" whenever a student of perceived lesser ability responds in an acceptable fashion, however when one of "favorites" responds in a similar fashion we are more likely to become more emphatic, e.g. "You have it!" However, I really believe that a still better practice is that of precise encouragement, another practice to be delineated.

Precise Encouragement. Precise encouragement works well because it suggests why or how the student response has merit. It also fits neatly within the practice of delving and probing. The instructor, if using precise encouragement, might respond in this fashion (after using a few seconds of type two latency needless to say), "I think there is a real good point in distinguishing between arenas of behavior predicated on their "publicness." However, can we explain the whole of this difference based only on this distinction?" If the student seemed perplexed, one might delve by saying, "Aside from the issue of publicness, what other differing circumstances might element in here?"

Proximity. It appears obvious that students that are located nearer the instructor will be more mixed up in discussion and linked to the instructor than students more distantly located. I also use randomly assigned groups quite often, and this leads students to be grouped concerning the classroom in varying patterns. After group work, the groups report from their discussion. Because their seating arrangements have already been varied, this allows different students to be proximus if you ask me on different days, even though I do get swept up in the center of the room. Also, I think it is helpful to stand on the opposite side of the room from the group reporting out. This causes the group to talk with the whole room, not only me, and is more likely to encourage student to student discussion across groups. It's been my observation that I really do have a tendency to gravitate to front center of the room during sessions without group work; by catching myself as of this, I move about more freely.

What exactly constitutes proximity? Proximity is operationally defined at being within three feet or arm's length of a student. I favor to extend this range to about five or six feet, and I imagine this distance to function as space that would allow the student and I to the touch hands, were we to extend an arm to each other. This seems a more appropriate distance for the collegiate classroom where we spend less time dealing with our students on projects and writing assignments in-class and save money time talking with our students about such projects, assignments, and ideas central to the course we have been teaching.

Individual Help. In the event that you asked most K-12 teachers, they might let you know that the large majority of the time they spend assisting students with seatwork and so on is specialized in their less able students. It's been my observation that there are obviously needy students who might capture their teacher's attention, but if the student is not demonstrably needy, the teacher tends to direct his focus on either needy students or students the teacher perceives to be particularly engaged in the duty at hand. While opportunities for individual helping probably exist to a smaller degree at the collegiate level (labs as an exception), you may still find occasions when college instructors, especially those of a constructivist orientation, have students involved with individual or group projects while in class. If their tendency is the same as K-12 teachers, they are likely not be equitable within their attention without assistance. I also think that the bigger up students go within their educational careers, the less likely they're to actively demonstrate confusion and neediness of the instructor's attention. Thus, learning to be equitable in individual helping is of great importance to collegiate instructors.

Attentive Listening. Attentive listening, to define it operationally, is the use of ones body to demonstrate that one is attending to a student's comments, questions, or concerns. It is all too possible for an instructor, his head swimming with the flow of conversation and his instructional objectives, to devote significantly less than his full focus on a student, despite the fact that the instructor wants nothing more than an interactive, conversational classroom climate. It is also human nature to have a tendency to devote more of the sort of focus on students one perceives to be particularly able. As with all of those other practices I have described, the purpose of the effective and equitable instructor is usually to be in keeping with active listening.

Courtesy and Personal Interest. Some of us are very susceptible to share personal comments and conversations with students while others of us take a more aloof stance. The main element here, as earlier, is to be equitable in this regard: either spread such attention around to all or any the students in a class on an equally occasional basis, or refrain from it altogether. Obviously, these practices could be counter-productive during actual instructional time, but I find such relationship-building worthwhile if completed in the minutes before or after the actual session. The main element is to consider something to comment on with all students, or, if students initiate such conversations, not to spend too much time being chatted up by way of a minority of the class.

Jeff C. Palmer is really a teacher, success coach, trainer, Certified Master of Web Copywriting and founder of https://Ebookschoice.com. Jeff is really a prolific writer, Senior Research Associate and Infopreneur having written many eBooks, articles and special reports.
Homepage: https://www.8bitthis.com/aemt-certification-and-re-certification/