Treating All Students Equitably REGARDING Teacher Attention

It stands to reason that treating all students equitably with regards to teacher attention and behavior would raise the academic achievement of the students generally and improve classroom climate; this reasoning is supported by way of a plethora of research. The research also confirms a commonly held view that male students get more attention than female students, whatever the teacher's gender. Racial/ethnic attributes in students may also be linked to differentiated teacher expectations. To conclude this research in broad strokes, the Pygmalion effect is widespread and, ironically, is communicated to students with techniques that would otherwise be effective teaching practices, only if carried out equity.

The next descriptions of teaching practices will be couched in a normal lecture-discussion style of teaching. This does not imply that I present this practice being the most effective, but I really do believe that it is a popular mode of instruction. Secondly, these practices aren't limited to lecture-discussion; they're widely used in more inquiry and experientially based instruction.

Equal Distribution of Response Opportunities. Simply put, that is directing questions toward all students, not just the people who volunteer or those that the professor feels most comfortable in querying. It is my observation that teachers at all levels have a knee-jerk reaction to call on a student who raises their hand. It is a habit that could be un-learned, in fact it is a habit one is wise to address with the students. I generally use the initial meeting of a course with a comment that goes something similar to this: "I would like to connect to everyone in this class, not just those who are the most eager. Therefore I will be calling on everyone, not just those of you who raise your hands or volunteer comments. I promise never to attempt to embarrass you or put you down if I call on you and you are reluctant to respond. However, I reserve the proper to help you respond by following through to my initial question with some leading comments. You'll find my behavior a little unusual, but you'll get accustomed to it.

Delving, Probing, and Correcting. Certainly we all hope to be adroit enough to follow up a question that confounds our students with one which is simpler to react to, or, if a student has responded and we wish them to expand upon their idea, hopefully to utilize Socratic questioning or something closely akin. Sometimes students response is merely off the mark, and we need to gently allow student know that he or she is going down a fruitless direction. However, as the research cited earlier has generated, we are not equitable in these practices. It's been my observation in dealing with other teachers and analyzing my own teaching that this is specially true whenever a teacher is working with a student perceived as less able. For several reasons, we believe that we do not want to embarrass the student involved, but if this is a more able student, we have been more prone to pursue our questioning or correct a response. To be equitable, a teacher has to be aware of this tendency and monitor his / her behavior. This will not imply that all initial questions and therefore their subsequent follow-ups are equally fitted to all our students. You might be smart to address simpler questions to less able students, even though issue of gender should have nothing to do with the difficulty of the question. And this does not imply that higher-level questions should be reserved for the students we perceive because the brightest.

Higher-level Questioning. I am going to not discuss the issue of more impressive range questioning at length, but I will define higher-level questioning as those inquiries which ask the student to go beyond factual information that he/she has (or should have) read, seen, heard, or whatever as part of the preparation for confirmed class session. For instance, a brief history teacher might ask his students, "Why did public opinion react so strongly to the Watergate cover-up?" This would be considered a lower-level question if an appropriate response were to be found in the assigned reading. However, were exactly the same question to be asked and the answer needed to be pieced together from several parts of the reading and/or other sources of information and requiring the students' judgment, it could be a higher-level question. I propose that we direct higher-level questions, especially open-ended ones where a variety of responses might have some validity, to students we perceive as less able. Following the student's initial response, one might probe and delve in a fashion that asked the student to compare his / her response with the public's reaction to Watergate. It really is obvious that one should be careful never to be too apparent in the differing degrees of difficulty fond of students of differing abilities lest the students look out of this strategy.

Latency. Latency, or "wait time" since it is also known is merely this: a far more than "normal" pause between exchanges. The more common type of latency (type one) occurs when a teacher asks a question and chooses a respondent. While research varies regarding the exact length of time a teacher should use, we know that most teachers practice very little latency, typically less than or around one second. I advocate that a teacher should wait at the very least three seconds when asking a question, especially a higher level question. Initially, this is very difficult. As a prompt for latency, I identify a part of the physical landscape, a window or perhaps a clock if such is put in the back of the classroom. After I ask a question I look to this feature and focus my attention on it. While this is initially disconcerting to my students who expect me to be scanning their ranks, it is effective in reminding me to practice latency. In addition, it serves to remind me to be equitable in my selection of respondents as well as lessening my focus on the obvious volunteers, students who've raised their hands or verbalized a reply.

The second type of latency involves the pause in discussion after a student has responded. This is referred to as "type two" latency. If an instructor gets in the habit of letting a student's comments hang in the air for just two or three seconds, this sends a signal to all or any the students that response is worth reflecting upon and evaluating. It's been my observation that, when type two latency is used, students are more mindful of their peers' ideas because the focus is recinded from the instructor. Again, this seems slightly bizarre when one first begins to practice it, nonetheless it does develop a more thoughtful and honoring classroom climate. In addition, it helps me in formulating my response to student input.

Encouragement. The original program uses the word "praise" instead of my terminology, but I prefer "encouragement" since it connotes a support of student ideas and work, rather than a Pavlovian reward of same. We are more curt inside our encouragement of student responses, according to some of the research. We have been more susceptible to simply mumble "uh huh" whenever a student of perceived lesser ability responds in an acceptable fashion, however when one of "favorites" responds in a similar fashion we are more prone to become more emphatic, e.g. "You got it!" However, I believe a still better practice is that of precise encouragement, another practice to be delineated.

Precise Encouragement. Precise encouragement is effective because it suggests why or the way the student response has merit. It also fits neatly within the practice of delving and probing. The instructor, if using precise encouragement, might respond in this fashion (after using a couple of seconds of type two latency needless to say), "I think you've got a real good point in distinguishing between arenas of behavior based on their "publicness." However, can we explain the complete of the difference based only on this distinction?" If the student seemed perplexed, one might delve by saying, "Besides the issue of publicness, how many other differing circumstances might factor in here?"

Proximity. It appears obvious that students that are located nearer the instructor could be more mixed up in discussion and connected to the instructor than students more distantly located. I also use randomly assigned groups frequently, which leads students to be grouped concerning the classroom in varying patterns. After group work, the groups report from their discussion. Because their seating arrangements have been varied, this allows different students to be proximus if you ask me on different days, even if I do get swept up in the center of the room. Also, I find it helpful to stand on the contrary side of the room from the group reporting out. This causes the group to speak to the whole room, not only me, and is more likely to encourage student to student discussion across groups. It's been my observation that I do tend to gravitate to front center of the area during sessions without group work; by catching myself at this, I move about more freely.

Just what constitutes proximity? Proximity is operationally defined at being within three feet or arm's amount of a student. I favor to increase this range to about five or six feet, and I imagine this distance to function as space that would allow the student and I to the touch hands, were we to extend an arm to each other. This seems a more appropriate distance for the collegiate classroom where we spend less time dealing with our students on projects and writing assignments in-class and spend more time talking with our students about such projects, assignments, and ideas central to the course we are teaching.

Individual Help. In the event that you asked most K-12 teachers, they might let you know that the large majority of enough time they spend assisting students with seatwork and so on is specialized in their less able students. It has been my observation there are obviously needy students who might capture their teacher's attention, if the student is not demonstrably needy, the teacher tends to direct his attention to either needy students or students the teacher perceives to be particularly engaged in the task at hand. While opportunities for individual helping probably exist to a lesser degree at the collegiate level (labs as an exception), there are still occasions when college instructors, especially those of a constructivist orientation, have students involved in individual or group projects while in class. If their tendency is the same as K-12 teachers, they're likely not be equitable in their attention without assistance. I also think that the bigger up students go in their educational careers, the less likely they're to actively demonstrate confusion and neediness of the instructor's attention. Thus, learning to be equitable in individual helping is of great importance to collegiate instructors.

Attentive Listening. Attentive listening, to define it operationally, is the usage of ones body to demonstrate that certain is attending to a student's comments, questions, or concerns. It is all too possible for an instructor, his head swimming with the flow of conversation and his instructional objectives, to devote significantly less than his full focus on a student, despite the fact that the instructor wants nothing more than an interactive, conversational classroom climate. It is also human nature to tend to devote more of this sort of focus on students one perceives to be particularly able. Much like the rest of the practices I have described, the goal of the effective and equitable instructor is to be consistent with active listening.

Courtesy and Personal Interest. Some of us are very susceptible to share personal comments and conversations with students while others of us have a more aloof stance. The main element here, as earlier, is usually to be equitable in this regard: either spread such attention around to all the students in a class on an equally occasional basis, or refrain from it altogether. Obviously, these practices could be counter-productive during actual instructional time, but I find such relationship-building worthwhile if completed in the minutes before or following the actual session. The key is to watch out for something to touch upon with all students, or, if students initiate such conversations, never to spend a lot of time being chatted up by a minority of the class.

Jeff C. Palmer is a teacher, success coach, trainer, Certified Master of Web Copywriting and founder of https://Ebookschoice.com. Jeff is really a prolific writer, Senior Research Associate and Infopreneur having written many eBooks, articles and special reports.