In Students Taking Charge: Inside the Learner-Active, Technology-Infused Classroom, author Nancy Sulla uses practical examples and step-by-step guidelines to create an environment where students WANT to learn, while focusing on incorporating technology into the learning process. Read below to see how you can teach your students how to schedule their own time to can take control of learning.
Student Schedules
In the Learner-Active, Technology-Infused Classroom, students take responsibility for scheduling how they will use their time. The amount of forward-looking activities students can manage will depend upon their grade level, the amount of time they have experienced your classroom, and the number of years they’ve studied in such classrooms in the school.
To schedule time, students need an activity list and a blank schedule. The importance of having students indicate start and end times for their planned activities cannot be overemphasized; it is the foundation of time management. If students merely determine the order in which they plan to complete activities, an activity that should require twenty minutes of attention could take forty minutes, and the student will be left believing that the teacher has assigned too much work. By scheduling start and end times, students can reflect on their ability to work productively and schedule realistically: two important twenty-first-century skills.
Teaching Students to Schedule Their Time
If you are teaching students that have previously attended classes in which the teacher tells them what to do and when to do it, scheduling their time will be an unfamiliar act. Sometimes, even the best activities, if unfamiliar, can cause students to be resistant. In this case, you’ll want to ease students into scheduling. At first, provide them with a completely filled in schedule and let them know that you want them to be aware of the order in which you are going to offer and assign instructional activities. This schedule may, for example, indicate that you will start with a five-minute reflection written on the board, then offer a fifteen-minute lesson, have students complete a pairs activity for twenty minutes, and regroup for wrap up for five minutes.
After a few days at this level, you might introduce some flexibility. Tell your students that the order in which they complete two activities doesn’t matter and allow them to fill in those blanks. Offer them choices as to three ways to accomplish the same learning and allow them to select the best fit for them. Keep in mind that if students attend your class or tackle a subject for forty-five minutes or less, you do not necessarily want to parse that time period into too many segments. Rather, you may have them schedule activities over two class periods. Twenty minutes is a good rule of thumb for the brain to remain engaged in an activity. Students who are engrossed in an activity may prefer to work for forty minutes; students who must accomplish a relatively simple task may need only ten minutes. Avoid, however, the temptation to divide the class period into three fifteen-minute segments asking students so switch activities every fifteen minutes. This approach could end up reducing productivity. The more fluid the schedule, the better.
Once you think students are succeeding at this level, open up the schedule even further and provide them with a primarily blank schedule, except for your required benchmark lessons, and allow them to complete the rest, referencing the activity list. It is important to then approve students’ schedules, applying your insights into the project and students’ work habits. You may recognize that a student has not allotted enough time to complete an activity or has selected an activity that is too easy or too hard. In these cases, advise the students accordingly.
Nancy Sulla will be presenting in the Student Motivation track during Eye On Educations's online conference Eye On School Success. Learn more about Nancy's presentation titled "Students Taking Charge."