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Author of "Good Kids, Difficult Behavior" and "Discipline Works: 5 Main Things" http://www.thehumanconnection.net Volume 21 April 2004 |
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Note from the Editor: Dear Educators and Friends, Welcome to our new monthly newsletter. For all of you who have the capability to receive graphical E-Zines (HTML) you can see the new look to the monthly newsletter. We are proud of our new design and believe that it will make it more interesting, easier to read and pleasing to your eyes. We at The Human Connection want to take time to thank Cathie for all of the excellent work she has done, not only with the monthly newsletter, but all the contributions she has made to the company. As you will remember from last months newsletter, Cathie mentioned that she is going back teaching full time. Her students are very fortunate to have someone who cares so deeply about her young students and in helping them learn and grow. We will miss her but wish her the very best as she goes back to her teaching profession. Allow me to introduce myself; my name is Mark and I have agreed to fill-in as your temporary newsletter editor. I also maintain the website and have incorporated many of the recent changes you see on our site, so if you have any comments please do not hesitate to send them to me at mark@thehumanconnection.net It is my goal to continue to make the newsletter as informative, educational and interesting as it has been. I will be incorporating some new changes so I would appreciate feedback from all our readers about what you would like to see more or less of in this monthly publication.
Check out "Ask Joyce" below for her answer to an educator's question. What
would you like to ask Joyce? See how to send in your own question below! We
look forward to hearing from you during this school year. Please let us know
how it went if you try some of Joyce's suggestions. Joyce really wants to be
a help to you. |
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Information on how to receive (or stop receiving) our newsletter and
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Happy Easter!
Mark @ The Human Connection |
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Special of the Month for our E-zine Subscribers |
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"Good Kids, Difficult Behavior" Buy the Creating Safety video at $39.95 and get a FREE copy of Discipline That Works: 5 Simple Steps free. Order by credit card at our website (BOOK STORE) or by check/purchase order /credit card by calling/faxing/mailing your order in to the office; just tell us you saw our ad in the newsletter. The free book will not be part of your order form at the website but will be sent with your order. Contact info is at the end of the newsletter. |
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| Ask Joyce: | |
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As Joyce travels and works with educators all over the country, she is constantly being asked--- "What do you do when...?" questions. She has the greatest respect for "what do you do when questions" because usually the questioner is genuinely seeking new information and the teacher is willing to be a student. Each month, Joyce will answer one or more of the most common "what do you do questions". Feel free to send one of yours. She'll do her best to answer it. Keep in mind, her answers may be different from the customary response but they are tried and true strategies for getting students to do what you are asking them to do. Give yourself permission to try something new! Email Joyce at joyce@thehumanconnection.net with any questions or situations you would like input on. Let us know if we can show the question in a future newsletter or if you prefer to keep it private. We are hoping Joyce can help address situations you encounter and by sharing these questions/answers others can benefit as well.
FROM Joyce: Many of you are either looking forward to or fondly back on your spring break. I sincerely hope you will/did make it an opportunity for renewal and refreshment of your energy supply. The coming months can be the most energy draining of the school year if you are not careful to take care of yourself well. One way to do that is to try new strategies for responding to the same challenges you have faced during the school year. There is, however, a tendency when true fatigue has set in, as it has for many of you, to believe that you have “tried everything” with certain students. Perhaps this is true. If so, then give yourself permission to acknowledge that your efforts were sincere and diligent even if the results were not all that you had hoped. If a new idea sounds appealing, read on. The following are suggestions, which come in response to specific questions from educators who have read the books, listed below or attended the workshops I presented in different areas of the country. Question: How do you motivate the high ability student who has good behavior but just doesn’t work hard enough---in other words, is being lazy? Answer: It is so easy for very bright students to become complacent and appear to be lazy. They have not yet developed an internal need to compete with themselves and they do not have to compete with their peers. Without that internal need to do our absolute best, which comes naturally for some, or is fostered by some parents, it becomes necessary to create external means to prompt above average performance. Interesting, fun, or challenging and immediate incentives for performance can help create an external need to achieve. This can go against the grain for some educators but it can also be quite effective. Most of us are highly motivated by the external incentive of a paycheck. BEWARE: Good grades, or the teacher’s or a parent’s approval or pleasure is NOT an incentive for the type of student we are discussing. Good incentives must be concrete and achievable in the here and now as opposed to at a later time. “Later” does not even exist in the brains of many of today’s students. I have used and heard of many types of individual or group incentives to get children and teens to push themselves a little further than they are naturally inclined to go. Here are some: The age old “treat” concept works pretty well. Treats can be anything from a box of silly but fun gadgets, and gizmos, much like what is found in gum ball machines, to healthy edible snacks, to puzzles, games etc. It is amazing how kids will work to get the silliest little thing. One teacher has a weekly auction. Kids can bid on stuff the teacher has collected. All through the week, they earn bonus bucks to be used at the auction by accomplishing all manner of tasks and behavior expectations. She sets it up so every student can earn some “bucks” and participate in the weekly auction. With the low achieving, but very bright students, bucks or tokens could be earned for getting a higher grade, or achievement at the next level. Incentives can be customized. One teacher, found that her class of high school seniors had never read some of the classic children’s books. She offered to read these classics to her students every day after the entire group had completed the daily classroom assignment. It worked beautifully for her and them. Even big kids like to be read to. Giving a student opportunity to read to younger children in lower grade levels is a good incentive for low performing students. It gives them the opportunity to get out of class and feel the pleasure of doing something good for someone else. Time to work on an individual extra credit project can also work. Allow your student to develop an extra credit project in an area of personal interest (hopefully subject related, but not necessarily) and let them earn time to work on the project. Make sure the project is especially challenging. Let them build something or design something---anything hands-on usually gives more satisfaction to these students. Time on the computer, is a good incentive for many unmotivated students. Of course, the computer work has to be appropriate and educational and contingent on above average achievement. Other good incentives can be:
MAKE IT FUN. MAKE IT SOMETHING THE STUDENTS WANT OR ENJOY. IF IT DOES NOT MEET THIS CRITERIA, IT IS NOT AN INCENTIVE. Keep in mind that incentive programs put a great deal of control in the student’s hands. It is up to them to get what they want. Many classroom teachers use different methods of reverse incentives. Traditionally, these teachers make a public notation of some sort when a child does not perform properly. These systems usually depend entirely on the teacher to decide, at a given moment, that a student deserves to loose something, or receive a public warning against further negative behavior or performance. These systems tend to backfire with the highly unmotivated student. It works much better to keep them focused on achieving or gaining what they want rather than losing something that they may or may not care much about. Finally, many feel strongly that motivation must come from an internalized sense of pride in achievement and therefore it is counter to the well-being of students to do what they considered “bribing” a student to do what they should be doing in the first place. My response to this position is to remind these folks that an internal need to achieve and self-motivate is a learned process. Many children do not have the necessary home environments of constant contact with highly motivated adults to help them learn this very important process. It is a worthy goal for educators to assist in the development of a child’s sense of satisfaction in achievement by providing many opportunities for the sense of reward and satisfaction to take place on a regular basis. |
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Inspiration:
If we are to have real peace, we must begin with the children. - Mahatma Gandhi
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Personal Energy Saver: Take care of your energy supply. “When you feel harried, slow down. Deliberately slow your breathing, your speech, and your movements.” From “Be good to yourself therapy” By Cherry Hartman |
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Just For Fun:
Father: “I’m worried about your being at the bottom of the class.” Son: “Don’t worry, Dad, they teach the same stuff at both ends.”
(From - www.schooljokes.com ) |
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Editor's favorite link of the month:
Sites for Parents is a list of the best parenting
web sites on the net.
http://www.sitesforparents.com |
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| Contact information: | |
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The Human Connection 125 Highgreen Ridge Peachtree City, GA 30269 Phone (In Georgia): 770-631-8264 Phone (Toll free): 1-888-460-8022 Fax: 770-486-1609
Email: For info about newsletter/website, contact mark@thehumanconnection.net
To order books, and get info on training programs, contact divinyi@mindspring.com
Website: http://www.thehumanconnection.net |
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Copyright 2004 The Human Connection |
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