When students are distracted by things other than school, it can make the classroom unmanageable and make the whole school day frustrating. Right before winter break, many students become antsy and eager to not be in school. They may doodle and not listen to lessons or they may talk and interrupt. Here are five ways to try and reign in students when they are ready for break or are just having an off day.
1. Combine breaks and lessons. Depending on what grade you teach depends on the average attention span of your students (Fulton, 2019), but when winter break, or any other large break or exciting event, is right around the corner, all students seem to have a shorter attention span. Consider brain breaks to help keep students engaged with lessons (Best, 2020). These could be short competitions, arts and crafts, story time, or any other break that you can think of.
2. Utilize software and popular culture topics that interest your students. Talking to your students about what they are interested in can help them feel appreciated, but utilizing these topics in class can help with engagement (Best, 2020). Check out our article “Social Media Uses for Teachers” for many uses of social media in the classroom, including how to incorporate your student’s interests.
3. Have students move around. This can occur during a brain break, but it can also be incorporated into a lesson. You can have students go to the white board and show work or brainstorm, or you could have class discussions where students go to different sides of the room based on their opinions and/or answers (Best, 2020). You could also let them choose a spot in the room where they want to do work/read from. The important part is that students are up and moving and able to get some energy out.
4. Consider randomizing class decisions. Letting class decisions up to fate can help students feel like they are on the same level as their teacher, and it can help vary the monotony of a classroom. Randomizing the classroom could include groups being assigned by random drawings of names, topics being chosen with rolls of dice, or grading practices being determined with a pick from a hat. Check out our article “Randomizing Classroom Decisions: Breaking Up the Monotony” for more on these topics.
5. Make lessons into stories. Your field of study affects how to implement this, but making lessons into stories or intermingling stories into your lessons can help keep students interested (Fulton, 2019). If you’re in a math field, you could create stories that have word problems mixed in them. For history, tell a story from the perspective of the people who are a part of the event you are teaching. You could make up your own based on your knowledge of the event, or you could find a first-hand account.
Teachers need breaks too. When that winter break is right around the corner, burnout may be strong. Varying lessons and pushing for extra engagement with students can help keep students focused and help save you a headache, but varying the classroom can also give you opportunities to be creative and a chance to keep yourself entertained right before you get to relax.
References
Best, J. (2020, June 18). 20 Student Engagement Strategies for a Captivating Classroom. 3P
Learning. Retrieved November 1, 2021, from
https://www.3plearning.com/blog/20-student-engagement-strategies-captivating-classroo
m/.
Fulton, J. (2019, July 11). 10 Teaching Strategies to Keep Students Engaged in the Classroom.
Classcraft. Retrieved November 1, 2021, from https://
www.classcraft.com/blog/teaching-strategies-to-keep-students-engaged-in-the-classroom/.