All too often, I fall into the trap of assuming that my students will know what I expect of them without me ever explicitly explaining it.
Just last week, I was agonizing over some third graders who still hadn’t memorized their multiplication facts very well. We were playing a basic multiplication game in our computer lab, and I was happened to notice that one particular student struggled to solve 7 x 6, counting it out for about 30 seconds before finally figuring out that the answer was 42. About 2 minutes later, the game again asked this student to solve 7 x 6. She went through the exact same process, struggling for about 30 seconds, then solving it correctly.
All of a sudden it hit me. I had never explicitly told this student that the goal of playing this computer game was to actually commit the answers of unfamiliar multiplication facts to memory.
I had the entire class stop playing their games for a moment, and I carefully explained that memorization of these facts was the goal. I briefly talked about ways the students might stop after difficult problems and actively make a mental note of that tricky problem and its product. A few of the more talented students gave me quizzical looks, as if to say, “You stopped our games to tell us that? How obvious!”
But it hadn’t been obvious to everyone. Within one week, the six students who had been struggling the most with their basic multiplication facts ALL increased their speed significantly on a multiplication timed test.
Amazing. And then I got to thinking about a couple of other things that have frustrated me at times, and what might have led to the problem:
- My students don’t always work smoothly together when in pairs or larger groups. The probable cause? I only briefly mentioned some cooperative work guidelines instead of explicitly demonstrating them.
- When reading, my students sometimes keep plowing through a book without seeking meaning. Probable cause: I never explicitly told the students that the point of reading was comprehending the actual material being read.
From now on, when my students do something that frustrates me, I plan to ask myself: Have I made an assumption here? Is there something I forgot to explicitly teach?
Posted by mpullen 
