Building your classroom into a positive, productive learning environment is usually the aim of every classroom teacher. However, it is often difficult to think of positive strategies that will lead to building that initial class cohesiveness and, in so doing, creating a relational environment.
The act of doing good makes people feel good. This small intervention will help. It allows all students to feel and experience what it is like to give and receive positive feedback. An important outcome is to encourage positive speak as part of “normal behaviour.” In this way we are promoting a “safe environment” and setting values of tolerance and acceptance of each other and the way we speak. In practice, it includes the teacher as a role model, giving the students real examples of productive and expected behaviours.
The follow on from this is that classroom relationships improve, and there is much research available to support the notion that successful classrooms are those in which relationships are strong. Even more important, if the teacher is a model of behaviour and a collaborative part of the process, it is increasingly likely that behaviour compliance is more probable.
A technique you can try:
Duration: up to two weeks, perhaps twice a year.
Process: students performing a Random Act of Kindness for a fellow student. In this intervention the teacher is a collaborative part of the process and activity.
1. At the beginning of the each day staff and students draw a name from the class list.a. One student will get the teacher’s name each day.
2. Each person needs to perform an anonymous random act of kindness for their chosen individual by 1.30 p.m.
a. Usually give a small gift such as a certificatei. Write a note relating to an aspect of their behaviour, work, etc.ii. An ‘apple for the teacher’ Teachers might like to prepare a special card for student use. A sample is included here, and could also be modified to include a school logo, or specific “value” the teacher wants to establish.
b. More enterprising students may be able to perform a little task that the receiving student can notice e.g. include them in a game, sharpen all their pencils, tidy or clean up an area for them, perform ‘their’ monitor’s task, etc.
Sample Statements for notes:
• I like the way you . . .
• I think you are . . .
• It makes me feel good when I see you . . .
• I feel happy when you . . .
• You are a good thinker and . . .
• You don’t get into fights. I think that is . . . because . . .
• You speak nicely to . . . or . . . I like the way you spoke to . . .
This list can act as a starter for a class discussion about comments that can/could be made.
Expectations/Responsibilities: In establishing the parameters, teachers need to ensure that students are clear to:
1. Only to write something nice about the person whose name they have been given (they can disguise their writing);
2. Be specific with their statements; and
3. Deliver the card in secret early today (before lunch ends) .
Positivity: The challenge for all students, regardless of whom they have randomly drawn is to be positive both:
• About the person they have drawn;
• About the behaviour they have identified and commented on.
It is important that this point is made and respected by all participants: only positive statements/activities about positive behaviours/activities can be made/performed. Students are to avoid sarcasm.
Student Diary: Teachers may like to have students record the comments and activities they have been involved with in some form. This could occur perhaps first thing after lunch when the task has been completed or at the end of the day as a summary before home time. Students could also record how they felt about what was done for/said about them on a summary sheet which is to be collected by the teacher at week’s end. The process of talking, reading and writing provides additional multiple stimuli for students, supplementing the act of doing good, encouraging greater uptake of the values and strategies being encouraged.
Class feedback and feed forward (on Friday): Teachers may like to focus the class through discussion, congratulate the class on their success, and can also:
• Collect all the summary sheets at the end of the week to create a display of positive comments for placing in the classroom. (Making certain each child has an anonymous comment, this encourages them to search for their contribution).
• Have students write their favourite comment received on a strip of cardboard or art paper for placing in the display.
• Have students write their favourite comment given on a strip of cardboard or art paper for placing in the display.
• Compare the “favourite comments given” list with the “favourite comments received” list.
It can highlight what differences there are in people’s thinking. i.e. comments might be expected in both lists, but not always seen in both. Talking about why is interesting. The display creates an additional source of reference and allows those of us who have a preference for visual learning the time to orient ourselves and to think about what is happening. Displays also provide teacher reference points going forward.
Keeping the focus for the second week: If choosing to have two consecutive weeks, it may be possible to challenge the students to identify the teacher’s comment in the first week display. They could either:
• Vote as a class on the second Friday to see if they can identify the teacher’s comments.
• Have a competition type activity over a day or so to see who can identify the most correct teacher statements.
