*I couldn't resist the alliteration.
One of my favorite memories of teaching in the middle grades so far in my career is going to have to be my steak cake.
It started as a joke. If you don't know me, I love using humor and suspense and curiosity in the classroom. I have some other more professionally honed strategies as well, but these impromptu ones are probably my biggest strengths.
So when one of my students asked me what kind of cake I wanted for my birthday, I laughed it off and got inventive. I told her I wanted a steak cake. (Think of Joey on the sitcom Friends: Steak? Good. Cake? Good.) She probed and asked how that would work, so I described how I would like my steak as if I was ordering at a restaurant. This was more than a month before my birthday, and I forgot all about it.
Well, on my birthday this girl and her friend brought in a cake to surprise me. They had tackled my humorous challenge and owned it. I was humbled and proud...and quite speechless.
As teachers, we have this awesome responsibility. We must make connections with our students. It is ridiculously easy to manage the hum-drum of the everyday classroom without enthusiasm, responding to students on our level instead of theirs, perhaps using an authoritative relationship so the work gets done in order to pass the test and move on in our curriculum.
How do you make connections with your students? As I mentioned, I enjoy humor, and I have found very few kids who do not respond to it. I want to create a culture of curiosity in my classroom as well, so I hold students in suspense, creating a hook at the beginning of a lesson and allowing them to uncover the solutions for themselves. I encourage risk-taking.
With promoting problem solving and risk in the classroom comes vulnerability on my end. For me, this was something I had to learn. In my early years (and while my students had a natural affinity to me because I was in my early twenties and gung-ho), I could be strict and expect clear adherence to my classroom rules; I kept students in line and got the responses I wanted. Throughout the years, I've softened, I guess. I've allowed more freedom, which means a louder classroom and inventive results. Trust me, though, I still have clear management strategies. But I have found that students who feel they are in charge of their own learning actually do more. They dive deeper. They work harder.
I would encourage you to design lessons and units that give students choice...and then allow them to even come up with their own ideas beyond the choices you give. Obviously, this is difficult in some classes or with some particular content, but when you can, go for it. I think you'll find that your students will appreciate you for it and then work their tails off to impress you.
And on a last note, these girls who made me that awesome steak cake turned around and gave me another one as a second surprise this last year as well! They made sure I had a T-bone steak this time since I am Mr. T. after all. It was medium rare, just how I like it!
I like to think the end result was partly due to my unconventional challenge and partly due to their determination to surprise me with their clever solution to that challenge.
One of my favorite memories of teaching in the middle grades so far in my career is going to have to be my steak cake.
It started as a joke. If you don't know me, I love using humor and suspense and curiosity in the classroom. I have some other more professionally honed strategies as well, but these impromptu ones are probably my biggest strengths.
So when one of my students asked me what kind of cake I wanted for my birthday, I laughed it off and got inventive. I told her I wanted a steak cake. (Think of Joey on the sitcom Friends: Steak? Good. Cake? Good.) She probed and asked how that would work, so I described how I would like my steak as if I was ordering at a restaurant. This was more than a month before my birthday, and I forgot all about it.
Well, on my birthday this girl and her friend brought in a cake to surprise me. They had tackled my humorous challenge and owned it. I was humbled and proud...and quite speechless.
 |
| Check out the grill marks! |
As teachers, we have this awesome responsibility. We must make connections with our students. It is ridiculously easy to manage the hum-drum of the everyday classroom without enthusiasm, responding to students on our level instead of theirs, perhaps using an authoritative relationship so the work gets done in order to pass the test and move on in our curriculum.
How do you make connections with your students? As I mentioned, I enjoy humor, and I have found very few kids who do not respond to it. I want to create a culture of curiosity in my classroom as well, so I hold students in suspense, creating a hook at the beginning of a lesson and allowing them to uncover the solutions for themselves. I encourage risk-taking.
With promoting problem solving and risk in the classroom comes vulnerability on my end. For me, this was something I had to learn. In my early years (and while my students had a natural affinity to me because I was in my early twenties and gung-ho), I could be strict and expect clear adherence to my classroom rules; I kept students in line and got the responses I wanted. Throughout the years, I've softened, I guess. I've allowed more freedom, which means a louder classroom and inventive results. Trust me, though, I still have clear management strategies. But I have found that students who feel they are in charge of their own learning actually do more. They dive deeper. They work harder.
I would encourage you to design lessons and units that give students choice...and then allow them to even come up with their own ideas beyond the choices you give. Obviously, this is difficult in some classes or with some particular content, but when you can, go for it. I think you'll find that your students will appreciate you for it and then work their tails off to impress you.
And on a last note, these girls who made me that awesome steak cake turned around and gave me another one as a second surprise this last year as well! They made sure I had a T-bone steak this time since I am Mr. T. after all. It was medium rare, just how I like it!
 |
| They upped their game this time! A T-bone steak for Mr. T. seasoned to perfection. |
I like to think the end result was partly due to my unconventional challenge and partly due to their determination to surprise me with their clever solution to that challenge.
 |
| Bon Apétit! |
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