Roatan, 2009 (c) Ben Schersten

As educators there is a piece of us that looks forward to vacations. Sure, we love what we do, otherwise we wouldn’t be doing it, but spending the day in a room full of elementary-aged children can be both physically and mentally exhausting. A few days off to recharge our batteries is essential, so a part of us looks forward to vacations.

Unfortunately, many of our students secretly hate them. And worse than vacation is the dreaded “holiday vacation.” It’s the worst.

So, as we approach vacation and our students’ poor decision-making spikes, remember that it may not be building excitement – it may be mounting fear.

1. The holidays bring with them new kinds of stress. As adults we do our best to insulate children from that stress, but we’re not perfect. Kids are good at reading us. They know. Many families struggle to make ends meet as they bring the holidays to their children or try to make that first big heating bill. Kids may not know why their parents are stressed, but kids certainly know that their parents are.
2. Holidays and vacations help to draw clear lines between the haves and the have nots. Who got what gift? Who when where on vacation? Whose parents worked and who had time off? There’s nothing like a major holiday and a week off to remind the have nots that they are have nots.
3. Holidays and vacations are very unpredictable for some students. Home with parents? The usual daycare? A different daycare? At work with parents? School is a stable place: it starts and ends at the same time every day and kids know what they are going to do and when. As adults we look forward to the unscheduled nature of vacation; our students may not. For some, that predictable routine is what gets them through the day.

So, as you watch your students approach vacation and you find yourself feeling more like a behavior manager and less like a teacher, take a moment to think about why. Are your students excited, or terrified?

And that last-day special activity where you break from routine, is that for you or for them?

It’s The December Stretch at school, which for me means Parent Conferences. Five years ago I retooled my conferences and started requiring my students (5th and 3rd grade) to both attend and lead them. At our Back to School night, I took a moment to warn parents that this year’s conferences will be a little different.

Before making the shift I wrestled with the question of why do we have parent conferences, and if I bring kids will I ruin something? I came away thinking that we have parent conferences for a few reasons:

• We want to have face-to-face contact with the parents of our students.
  

  Individual student brainstorming.

• We want to give parents information about what their children are doing in school.
• We want to work with parents so we can support each other to ensure the success of students.
• We want a place to share possible concerns and strategize solutions to ensure student success.

Yea, I think having kids at the table for this will be just fine. Maybe even better.

Preparing for the Student-led Parent Conference

About a month before the conferences are scheduled the students start preparing:

1. We brainstorm a list of all the things we’ve accomplished so far in school.
2. Students begin to select some things they think are important enough that they might want to share them with their parents.
   

   What can we bring to the conference?

3. We look at what materials (such as work samples) the students might bring to the conference to help them show their parents what they are doing at school.
4. I ask the students to select the 10-12 most important things they want to share with their parents, and what they will tell their parents about them. I require that they select at least one from each of the 5 core subject areas (reading, writing, math, science, social studies).
5. Students set a goal to share with their parents about something they want to improve on this year. They also have to come up with an idea of how their parents and I can support them in that goal.
6. We take some time to practice. Students pair up and give their presentation to a classmate. The goal is to have a presentation that lasts 10-11 minutes. Parents will ask questions which will make it a little longer.

The morning of the conference, I have a quick check-in with everyone presenting that day to make sure they’re all set.

The Student-led Parent Conference

What we’re going to talk about.

The conference takes place around a table. Not a kidney or macaroni shaped table I can hide behind, but a round one. This is important; we all equal parties.

The student explains that he/she will share what they are doing and that I will not be participating until they are done sharing. The student then takes off. The parents ask clarifying questions as they go; the students field these questions. I make notes about anything I think the student may not have explained well so I can clear up any parent misconceptions when I join the conversation. The last thing the student shares is their goal.

When I join, I ask the student how they felt presenting in this format. The responses vary. I also ask (if their parents didn’t) what their favorite and least favorite subjects are, and why. In addition to forcing some more higher order thinking skills, this can be very useful information for me as I try to tailor my teaching to each year’s group.

With student and parents at the same table, some interesting conversations can happen. It’s great to tell everyone what going well, and talk about strengths. And if there are concerns, having students at the table is key for a couple reasons. First, everyone is on exactly the same page; we all get to be part of the same conversation. Second, if I want change the student has to be the one to make that choice; talking to parents isn’t enough.

For the last five minutes or so of the conference the student is asked to leave. I always openly joke that, “now we’re going to talk about you behind your back.” It’s clear from before we start that there will be time for me to chat with parents without students present.

But is 5 minutes enough? Yes, it is. It’s December; if I have something that takes more than a few minutes to talk about I should have already contacted the parents about it. Seldom does anything new come up here; more often we just reconnect on the things we taked about when the student was a part of the conversation.

The whole conference usually takes 25-30 minutes.

Final Thoughts

The parent response has been overwhelmingly positive. Parents think it’s great that their kids are preparing and giving an oral presentation. They see the value in the amount of responsibility I give students in selecting what they present. And they like the few minutes at the end without students, just in case they have something they want to discuss with me, sans kid. And since it’s built into the format, they don’t have to ask for that time.

Does it take time during the day to get ready? Absolutely. It usually ends up taking about 6 40-minute academic blocks. I steal time from across the academic areas. The students get a great experience presenting in front of a small audience. They get authentic experiences using higher order thinking skills as they organize the presentation, evaluate what they want to present, make the presentation, and answer questions on the fly. It’s always a joy to watch the conferences unfold.

Sure, it takes time to prepare the students, but it’s definitely worth it.

Like many novice teachers I started my first year with a marble jar. The idea was that when my students did something well, they would get a marble. Once the jar was filled, the class would get a reward. It was what I was taught in my pre-service program, it was the culture of the school I was in (as well as countless other schools), and it served as that thing I could hold over my students head. “You want a marble, don’t you?”

A few years into my teaching career (I was teaching kindergarten at the time) I was at a Responsive Classroom week-long summer training and the subject of marble jars came up. This was the first time that I had ever heard anyone outright challenge the marble jar idea and accuse it if begin a bad thing. I was skeptical at first. How could this be a bad thing? How could rewarding group behavior be a bad thing? The class is working together to achieve something…right?

Over the course of the training, I came to understand that my perception of what was going on was not correct. The marble jar wasn’t about group cohesion, was a bribe; it was the carrot of the carrot and stick. “If you behave, I’ll give you a reward.” I became the all-seeing eye and the ultimate judge of good behavior. My students were following the rules to earn marbles (to please me), not because it was the right thing to do. The rules were important to the class not because they helped us learn (if that’s not the purpose of your classroom rules, you should revisit why you have them), but because they were a method of earning marbles.

That fall I started kindergarten with no marble jar. Honestly, I was a little scared: how would I get the students to listen? Without that bribe, would they be motivated to do the right thing? After a few days of holding my breath and crossing my fingers I realized it was going to be okay. My class would still function just fine. My students would still learn. And since then I have learned that starting kindergarten without a marble jar is the easiest grade to start without one: since the kids are new to school, they don’t  come in feeling like they’re missing something.

Since my kindergarten days I’ve spent some time in fifth grade and third grade. There continues to be no marble jar, only now the class asks about it during the first couple days of school. The conversation goes something like this:

“Do we have a marble jar [or something similar] this year?”

“No, we don’t.”

“Why not.”

“I don’t believe in them. I’m not going to bribe you to do the things you should be doing.”

“But how will we earn stuff like extra recess or movies or pajama day?” [because this is really what that jar is about for them]

“You won’t be able to.”

“What!?”

This is followed by a week where the students go through The 5 Stages of Loss and Grief. It’s always interesting: there are some students totally unfazed by the lack of marble jar, and others are really concerned about it.

Denial: “Wait, really, we won’t have a marble jar? Not at all?”

Anger: “But we have to have a marble jar!”

Bargaining: “If we’re really good today, can we start a marble jar?”

Depression: “So we’re really not going to have a marble jar, are we?”

Acceptance: They stop coming to me to discuss the marble jar.

Eventually it settles down. We fall into our routines. November blankets us in clouds and chilly weather. When that rare nice day rolls around I tell the class I’ve noticed them working really hard and that we should line up to go out an enjoy the weather. Inevitably someone approaches me to bring up the lack of marble jar. “How can we get extra recess if we don’t have a marble jar?” I remind them, “I don’t need a marble jar to tell me when we need to take a break, head outside, and play Four Square.” That’s when they begin to have faith in my lack of a marble jar.

And think of all the important social skills we can practice on the Four Square court! I don’t tell them that last part; I don’t want to ruin it for them.

As educators we want our students to be intrinsically motivated. We want our students to do the right thing, even when we’re not watching. We want our students to truly love being at school. Carrots, sticks, and marble jars won’t get us that.

And don’t get me started on that Elf of the Shelf. That’s extortion at it’s worst!

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Note: Between drafting this last weekend and posting it now we had a class meeting about behavioral expectations (the annual Post-Thanksgiving Pre-December-Holidays Reminder Conversation) and the students brought up the lack of marble jar, suggesting they might stay on task better if it were attached to a pajama day. Apparently we’ve digressed to the Bargaining stage. No, there will be no marble jar.

photo credit: ĐāżŦ {mostly absent} via photopin cc