Matt Sheick January-March 2012 TE 803/Meeks Case Analysis Step 1: Propose and Describe your Case My focus student

will be a 9th grade male student in my focus biology class. This student comes to class on time nearly every day. I feel that I have a solid working relationship with this student, but he is certainly an attention seeker. He seeks out the attention of his peers in both positive and negative ways. He gets along really well with one student in the class that sits at another table. On occasion, he will get up in the middle of class and go borrow a pencil from him or ask a question. Most of the students in the class consider him annoying and are visibly annoyed by his presence. Not surprisingly, he has become a little disengaged. During the last few weeks, he has began sitting at the table with his back to the board, combined with the fact that he does not take notes in class (preferring to keep everything in his head, which of course, does not result in the highest test scores) results in a general lack of attention to the biology. He is a bright student but often doesn't turn work in or perform very well on the tests and so has a D grade heading into the final exam (but is certainly capable of a B or higher). I chose this student in particular because he and I have a positive relationship and he comes regularly to school. This should serve as a starting point for intervening activities this upcoming semester. The reason for his behavior or how I am going to address the issue is not clear yet. I do know that he is disruptive when he is around people he doesn't get along well with, but is also disruptive when he sits next to his friend. The current classroom activities do not seem to engage him, but when we do hands-on activities, he is excited and fully participates (but sometimes doesn't turn in the accompanying paperwork). My goal for this semester is to reignite his interest in science and to incorporate him into the very friendly classroom environment that I have worked hard to foster. References Weinstein, C.S., & Novodvorsky, I. (2011). Middle and Secondary Classroom Management, Lessons from Research and Practice, 4th Edition. New York, NY. McGraw - Hill Step 2: Analyze the Situation Martin* (a psuedonym) is a 9th grade male who consistently comes to class on time. He is friendly with one other male but doesn't get along with many of the other students who find him annoying. He does little things like repeatedly kick other students' stools, or throw pencils at other students. Most of the things that he does that annoys others, are physical in nature, rather than spoken words. Many days I battle with him to sit facing toward the front of the room, this will change when I return to school though because we are implementing a new seating chart where he will have more space and hopefully will be less distracted. I've come up with a few competing hypotheses for his behavior.

HYPOTHESIS 1: Low expectancy for success One possible explanation for this student's behavior is low expectancy for success. According to Brophy, motivation can be defined as expectancy for success x value of the task (Brophy, 1998). Based on conversations I have had with this student, he does not seem to expect much success and was quite satisfied when he realized he had a solid D grade. Like the fictional "Defensive Dave" character, Martin tends not to vocalize his failures and often tries to direct attention away from his performance (Stipek, 1993). He loves to talk about sports with me as he comes in the class (on time). Like Defensive Dave, Martin often copies the work of others, possibly in an attempt to avoid failure. This failure avoidance behavior is obviously self-destructive, but perhaps he only sees the short-term goals HYPOTHESIS 2: Learning style differs from current class set-up A completely different hypothesis is that Martin is simply not interested in the subject as it is currently being taught. In his other classes, my mentor teacher relies heavily (almost solely) on lecture to simply tell the students information. I find myself constantly fighting this trap. Perhaps Martin does not enjoy (value) learning this way. Or, his learning style may not align with the current set-up of the classroom. Looking at the list of Gardner's Multiple Intelligences, the Bodily-Kinesthetic type of intelligence is leaping off the page. Martin is a student who often moves around on his stool, fiddling with pencils and seems much more engaged while doing hands-on activities (compared to taking notes from a lecture). If he is a bodily-kinesthetic learner, this could explain why he is using his body to be disruptive (kicking stools, throwing pencils, etc). HYPOTHESIS 3: Attention seeker A third possibility is that this student is an attention-seeking student. Attention seeking students often do not care if the attention received from adults is positive or negative (Albert,1996). By not turning in work consistently, deliberately turning his back to the front of the room and disrupting other students, he could be displaying attention-seeking behavior. Attention is a basic human psychological need, perhaps when I verbally reprimand him for throwing pencils, tapping other people's stools or not taking notes, I am giving him exactly what he wants. According to Linda Albert, the silver-lining in attention seeking behavior is that this shows the student wants a working relationship with the teacher (Albert, 1996). This is certainly the case with Martin, he seems to like me and enjoys talking to me (he even interrupted his first semester final exam to try to talk to me about the recent signing of Prince Fielder to the Detroit Tigers).

References Albert, L. (1996). Cooperative Discipline. Ags Publishing Brophy, J. (1998). Motivating students to learn. Boston: McGraw-Hill. Stipek, D.J. (1993). Motivation to learn: From theory to practice. 2nd ed. Boston: Allyn and Bacon.

Weinstein, C.S. (2003). Middle and secondary classroom management: Lessons from research and practice. 3rd ed. McGraw-Hill. Step 3: Consider Alternative Solutions The focus case student seems to have a great deal of difficulty in sitting down and staying focused if we do any type of lecture style lesson. One very real possibility, as I discussed in the previous blog post, is that his learning style does not match that of the current classroom set up. When we do activities that are more hands-on (inquiry or application) he seems to be much more emotional and intellectually involved. Therefore, to respond to this student, I could try to get creative and incorporate more hands-on activities tailored to his perceived kinesthetic style of learning. Doing this would help make lessons more interesting for everybody. There are some drawbacks to doing a great deal of hands-on lesson/activities. The first question that comes to mind is how will I be able to assess a students understanding of a concept if it is a hands-on activity? I could use hands-on demos or activities in conjunction with written work, some type of written assessment question, perhaps this would be enough movement for Martin to stay engaged. Another drawback is that some of the concepts in biology are not as conducive to movement oriented learning as others. If his behavior is driven by a low expectancy for success, there are a few strategies I could implement. One strategy is to make assignments manageable but chunking them into smaller segments. This could help maintain motivation and provide lots of opportunities for little victories. These little victories can serve to raise self-confidence in this student. Chunking larger assignments into smaller, more manageable sections can help the whole class to approach an assignment with optimism rather than procrastination and anxiety. This student has very sloppy handwriting. Whether this is related to his problem or not, I cant be certain. However, if he shies away from writing homework because he doesnt have confidence when it comes to writing, perhaps I can make accommodations for this. More verbal/presentation assessments or assignments done on the computer could raise expectancy for success. He often asks to use a netbook, so I know he enjoys computer work. In the past, Ive had to prod him to do the assignment rather than look up sports scores, but as he gains confidence, I hope to increase his engagement in the biology material. A drawback to having more verbal presentations or doing internet/computer assignments is that the netbooks often give us trouble. Despite being nearly brand new, many have problems with booting properly or surf the internet unbearably slowly. While using the netbooks, I find myself troubleshooting computer issues more than helping students with the assignment or asking questions about the content. There arent really any serious risks with doing these types of assignments and there is no risk that I can think of when it comes to chunking assignments. Or, if Martins behavior is driven by a need for attention, one solution could be to acknowledge him and praise him when he is doing what he is supposed to. Today he had me read a poem he wrote for another class. There were numerous marijuana references and he began asking me about whether or not I have tried it, etc. I can think of no reason he would want a teacher to read that other than he is looking for attention. A bonus to attention seekers is that they do want approval and attention; therefore they havent completely shut down. This seems to be true with

Martin. He is not overtly disrespectful but I currently find myself looking his way quite often because he can be disruptive. If his behavior is driven by a need for attention, doing this would only give him that attention. Therefore, giving him attention while he exhibits inappropriate behavior only increases the frequency of that behavior. In Cooperative Discipline several tactics are suggested. I have not tried one of the tactics in particular, and that is to use I messages. In this technique, I respond to the undesired behavior in 4 steps, name the behavior, say how it makes me feel as a teacher, state how it affects the class and lastly, state that it needs to stop. His feelings have been hurt in the past when Ive called him out in front of the class, so a conversation like this should be done more privately, or at least when the rest of the class is working on something. When I consider all of the alternatives, I think his behavior is most likely driven by a desire for attention. Therefore, I will try to give him random praise when he is behaving in a way that allows the class and him to learn best. I will also try to not give him attention (Refuse to Respond in Cooperative Discipline terms) when he is misbehaving. Additionally, when he behaves in a disruptive manner and he interferes with his own learning and the learning of others, I will try to use the I message technique. Step 4: Evaluate When it came time to implement my plan, I decided to focus on aligning the classroom activities with his perceived learning style of bodily-kinesthetic learning. I deliberated a great deal before implementation about whether to focus on this or to try to understand the attention seeking behavior. I eventually decided to focus on changing some activities to allow him to move around more. I felt this would help the rest of the students in the classes as well. To help him move more and still learn, I planned several lessons during the DNA Technology and Photosynthesis/Respiration units with student movement in mind. One lesson involved students walking in the class to a mock crime scene. They were instructed to walk around the roped off area and make observations which would serve as evidence. One student was allowed to bag up the probable murder weapon and deliver it to the lab (the front of the room). From there, we did a gel electrophoresis to confirm whether or not the suspect in custodys DNA matched the DNA found on the scissors. Another activity involved doing a simple lab, but staging it in the greenhouse. This allowed students to walk in the hall for a bit and get out of the classroom as we walked together toward the greenhouse. I wanted them to be reminded that science was not just something done in that classroom, but everywhere. I even had the focus student carry some materials to help make him feel more important. All of these things were helpful and I did notice some improvement in his engagement of the activities. However, when it came time to hand in certain work, he did not hand in the assignments. We just took the test over the photosynthesis and respiration unit, so I do not know how he did yet, but he got a 92.5% on the DNA technology test, a large improvement from previous tests. His overall grade this semester is still rather low (50% due to his missing assignments) but will increase this week as he turns in some work that he says he has done. I feel optimistic about the current situation with this student. I need to do more of the techniques to address attention seeking behavior like catching him being good and will continue to work

on this issue throughout the remainder of my placement. I have learned that it is impossible to slap a label on a student and open up some resource book and try something that instantly works. There are days when it seems like I am making no progress with a student, then suddenly, they do something that totally catches me by surprise, like earning an A on a test. I constantly find myself reminding myself that these things take time and at the basis of any improvement that may be achieved by addressing attention seeking behavior or learning style is the relationship fostered between student and teacher. There are so many varying degrees of behavior and issues to address not just in the class but in the hallways, cafeterias, streets, neighborhoods, home, etc. which all manifest themselves in behavior in a classroom.