Monday, January 20, 2014
Reflection on Delayed Consequences
Please post your own response to the concept of "Delayed Consequences." Did you use the strategy and was it successful? What would do differently again?
I'm also sharing a link to a survey for you to take regarding overall management questions or concerns. See the second posting to take the survey for me. Thanks!
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I haven't had a huge amount of opportunity to use the delayed consequence from Love and Logic yet. In the past two weeks, we have had a lot of snow days, as well as a christmas party day and a field trip. I had one chance to use it, and I don't think I used it to its fullest potential. I had a student who I had to remind constantly to get started on his math work. We were coloring and cutting out squares, triangles and rectangles to later be made into a paper quilt. After many reminders, he still had almost nothing done by the end of the class. When I asked him why this happened, he told me he forgot. We had to move on to the next subject, so I said we would need to figure it out later. I think I put the responsibility too much on myself or "we" and that he didn't need to worry about it. I also should have implemented a consequence in the middle of the math period after reminding him several times. The chaos of the lesson let this situation slip through my fingers, and I wasn't able to follow through on a consequence/solution for him.
ReplyDeleteI'm wondering if this is an appropriate situation in which to use delayed consequence at all (and maybe thats why it didn't work). What do you all think?
I haven't had a lot of luck with both using the Delayed Consequence from Love and Logic and seeing it successful, either. I also don't think I used it to its fullest potential or maybe incorrectly. Like Maggie, I had a student that was being constantly disruptive, off task and rude. I told him that we would talk about his behavior before he went to lunch, to not worry about it right now. This didn't make him any less disruptive or improve anything during the lesson. I think these were one of those situations for immediate consequences.
ReplyDeleteIn regards to delayed consequence, I think this can only be used if something bigger happens that doesn't directly influence the current lesson or work time. For example, if a student says something mean to another student, or if someone gets tripped. I think something that more directly affects the lesson needs to be handled differently.
I know what Maggie means by feeling like it's hard to follow through because things get chaotic and you let things slip. Nonetheless, it is important to make yourself credible by backing up things that you say you are going to do. I think this will come with more experience and being able to control what the consequences are more.
Two weeks ago I had a situation with a student that shouted out writing was lame in class. The following is the conversation we had. "This past week, a student who is often disruptive, said, “Lame” when I asked what they thought of Writing. Everyone laughed. So I said, “Okay, S. opinion is that writing is lame, can you give us a reason to support your opinion?” He blushed and wasn’t able to give me a response. So I told him that we could discuss the reasons before he goes to lunch. I had forgotten to talk to the student at lunch but I followed up with him the next day and I told him that it hurts my feelings when he shouts out disruptive things. I told him it's really hard for me to focus when kids shout out or make weird noises. He was able to tell me that he thinks writing is lame because he doesn't like to be told how to write. I know that this student is a great writer, but he is having a hard time understanding that I'm trying to help him focus his writings to make them even better!
ReplyDeleteToday, during Writer's Workshop I had two students that were very disruptive. I told them individually that I did not appropriate them interrupting their learning and that I would need to talk to them before they leave for lunch. I had a conversation with each student individually on how it hurt my feelings when they made loud noises. I mentioned to them that it can be hard to get the whole class working and then when I do have all students focused, they decide to be distruptive. I asked if they could help me out by saving those noises for outside. They agreed that they would do that. We shook on it. Overall I would say the conversation went really well. I felt as though one boy really did feel bad. It was like he didn't realize that it hurt my feelings when he acted that way.
I really believe that a one on one conversation with a disruptive student can be helpful for your relationship. Maybe making a lunch date would be helpful to build better communication with that student.