http://edward.uniblogs.org/2006/10/24/the-skeleton-in-the-closet/ Just another Uniblogs.org weblog Tue, 02 Dec 2008 09:06:50 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=wordpress-mu-1.2.5 http://edward.uniblogs.org/2006/10/24/the-skeleton-in-the-closet/#comment-13 Delbert Wed, 25 Oct 2006 22:15:19 +0000 http://edward.uniblogs.org/2006/10/24/the-skeleton-in-the-closet/#comment-13 Ed, I couldn't agree with you more here. One of the biggest challenges in the classroom is to give interesting and engaging lessons in the face of unruly students. All the research seems to suggest that in the case of the horse preceding the cart, the poor teaching strategies precede the bad behavior. I do beg to differ. What I notice is that on days that I clamp down on unruly behavior, it is most effectively done by resorting to the tried and true traditional approaches that you mentioned. Before anything productive takes place in a classroom, teachers have to have the classroom environment under control and that is easiest done with some of the type of work students sometimes dread. Once students realize that there are as many alternatives ways in which their learning can take place in the class, the behavior moderates to allow them to participate in the more creative and enjoyable alternatives. Ed,
I couldn’t agree with you more here. One of the biggest challenges in the classroom is to give interesting and engaging lessons in the face of unruly students. All the research seems to suggest that in the case of the horse preceding the cart, the poor teaching strategies precede the bad behavior. I do beg to differ. What I notice is that on days that I clamp down on unruly behavior, it is most effectively done by resorting to the tried and true traditional approaches that you mentioned. Before anything productive takes place in a classroom, teachers have to have the classroom environment under control and that is easiest done with some of the type of work students sometimes dread. Once students realize that there are as many alternatives ways in which their learning can take place in the class, the behavior moderates to allow them to participate in the more creative and enjoyable alternatives.

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