Welcome to the Teachers Need Teachers Podcasts, the podcast for teachers who don't want
to just survive teaching, but actually drive. I am really excited about today's
episode because it's something that I've seen discussed in different Facebook groups and has actually
been on my mind because I'm always having to deal with this, and it
has to do with catching students up when they're behind. You're two months into
the school year and you've come to a stark realization your students are behind.
It may just be a handful of students or maybe even an entire class,
but either way, you've realized that they are behind, and you don't know
what to do. You're struggling with the decision to either slow down and catch
everyone up or just kind of forge ahead and hope that those that are behind
will eventually figure it out. So which is the lesser of two evils?
Is there a middle ground? And let's not forget the added complexity of students
with IEPs, English learners, those with learning disabilities or behavior issues that are
just kind of adding to this whole picture. So how do we get this
done? Is it even possible? In this episode, I'm going to go
over my method for catching up students, whether it's five or fifty. And
while you won't be able to catch everyone up realistically, you can at least
get them further ahead so that they don't feel like they just want to completely
give up. Because let's be real, trying to catch up all students that
are at varying levels is trying to run with a handful of sand and not
drop even one grain. We can only do our best, but with some
reinforcements, we can do better. So the first step in this method is
obviously identifying the problem. That's not to say that just being behind isn't a
problem in and up itself, but we need to figure out what is going
on and get a bigger picture. How can you tell if your students are
behind? Well, for one, you can look at assessments, the baseline
data that you have, so you can look at where they started on a
particular scale and what their grades are now. I would also look at grades
not only in your class that if you have access to it, grades in
other classes or other subjects. And then also you can look at their behavior,
because sometimes students check out, not because they necessarily don't want to learn
or do something. It's because they're behind and they don't really know what to
do. I mean, I, for one can tell you that I don't
like to feel stupid. I don't think anyone likes to feel stupid. But
a lot of students definitely don't want to speak up for themselves because they feel
stupid and they don't want to admit it. So rather than trying and failing
and feeling even more stupid, they would just rather not do any work at
all and just come off as just being too cool for it or just thinking
it's a waste of time. So, now that you've assessed whether or not
they're behind, and you realize yes, they are behind, there's missing assignments,
or their grades are really low in your class or other classes, or
they're just not getting it. Now you need to figure out why. And
this one can be a little bit tricky. So are they behind because they're
below level? That's definitely a possiblebility. They could have missed a bunch of
time from absences, or they might have come from another district, so that
other district maybe moves at a slower pace than yours. Maybe you have to
look at language proficiency. If you have English learners, they definitely have a
possibility of being behind your other students because not only are they trying to learn
the content, they're trying to understand the language. So, as I mentioned
previously, there could be absences. So these are absences that are obviously out
of your control. But if they're gone because they were sick, or they're
gone because they just don't show it for school and nobody notices, or their
parents decide that they need to go to Cabo in the middle of the school
year, that could definitely be a reason why those students are behind. So
life circumstances, if the students' parents are going through a divorce or there was
a death in the family or an illness, that definitely will be distracting for
the student and definitely put them in a mindset where they don't necessarily want to
do any work, whether it's in school or outside of school. Also,
sometimes a whole class can be behind because of mandatory events like state testing,
or maybe there's like an assembly at your school or some kind of activity that
you cannot get out of and your students have to do, and so it
could mess up your pacing. We actually had this happen recently because we had
a very last minute fire slash earthquake drill and it was just for one class
period, so that one class was definitely behind all my other classes because they
lost about forty five minutes worth of instruction. So there could just be circumstances
beyond your control in the school day that put a whole class behind. And
then of course we have just plain old apathy, and that's why a student
doesn't want to do their work. They just don't feel like it. Now,
I'm going to be honest with you guys. When I come across these
types of issues where students just don't do anything, part of me gets kind
of upset, kind of triggered inside. It's like, why won't you do
this? And I think this happens to a lot of us. But we
also have to be empathetic and honestly not be hypocrites about it. I mean,
we all fall into one or two categories and maybe somewhere in the gray
area where when you were a student you either got your work done and follow
the rules, or you saw no point in what you were doing and just
didn't really do much, and maybe barely past something like that or somewhere in
between. But my point is, you have students that just don't want to
work. They just don't want to do anything, and it's not necessarily a
reflection of their parents or of your teaching. They just don't want to work.
And if you were that kind of student, kind of hard to justify
being really mad at them, because you get it. You were there for
me, someone who did get my work done. It is really frustrating for
me to see students who just sit there and don't even try because I don't
understand their mindset. It's not that I never found anything pointless when I was
in school, but I still did my work because that's what you were supposed
to do. So we have to have empathy for these students. We can't
get overly indignant or take it personally because they don't want to do the work
that we assign them. Not saying that we're going to blame anybody or make
excuses for these students. I mean, they're behind, and sometimes it is
their fault and sometimes it's not, but either way, we just have to
try to figure out why because that does influence moving forward to how we're going
to catch them up. The second step is to develop a plan. This
is going to depend on how many students are behind, and again if it's
just a few students or if it's a whole class. So you need to
ask yourself these questions. Is it enough for students to just demonstrate proficiency and
mastery or is it about them getting the work done and getting the grade for
it. And you may be asking why can't I have both? Well,
the answer is because your students are behind, so you have to prioritize.
So either you want the kids to get the work done and complete it and
turn it in and give them a grade no matter how they do on it,
or you are going to have students demonstrate proficiency and maybe not get all
of the work done, but at least they demonstrate it that they know what
they're doing. If they're behind, they don't have time to do both and
still catch up to the rest of the class. So you need to have
that tough conversation with yourself. This also begs the question what is the bare
minimum that your students need to do to catch up and be on pace.
So, for example, let's say that you have a math assignment with twenty
problems, can they do five and prove whether or not they understand the material.
Do they need to do all twenty for compliance or can they just show
you the bare minimum and still get full credit. Now you may be thinking,
well, if I do this all the time, then students aren't going
to finish my assignments. But we need to try to give the students the
benefit of the doubt and just try to get them caught up, because sometimes
what you're battling is the negative mindset. Sometimes you're just battling them telling themselves
that they can't do it, and they get overwhelmed. They feel like they're
drowning in these late assignments and they won't even try. If you can give
them a lifeline and tell them that you know what, show me that you
can do this, and maybe they get it done in five or ten problems
instead of twenty, then they're more likely to have more of a positive mindset
moving forward and are more likely to do your work in the future. Maybe
you only have like a handful of students that are behind, you're definitely going
to have to have a plan and strategize how you're going to go about this
so that you're not necessarily creating more work and creating more frustration. Because I
get it. There are times when I'm just really over it and I don't
want to catch them up because in my mind, I'm thinking, why do
I care more about your education than you do? And then I get upset
and I don't want to do anything about it, and I kind of throw
a mini tantrum, and then I get over myself because at the end of
the day, I do care if they learn. The thing is, the
further they fall behind, the more frustrated I become. And maybe you're like,
fine, just let them fail, and maybe their parents are like,
fine, you can just fail. But at some point I feel like someone
in their lives, whether it's us or their family or another teacher, someone
has to believe in them and believe that they can do this, and I
honestly prefer that emi at the end of the day. So here are the
things that I actually do. Number One, I do offer one on one
assistance. And I'm able to do this now more so than ever because I
am using the modern classroom project model where evidents are more self paced and they're
working more independently, and so it gives me more one on one time.
If you're not doing that model, you can still build in time where you
can work with students one on one while other students are doing group work or
individual work. So it's really key that you build this relationship with that students
so that you can catch them up. And I do my best and not
get mad at them or take it personally. I know it sounds weird,
but sometimes we do take it personal when a student isn't doing our work.
We get upset because they're not complying, so it almost feels like an affront
to us. But we just have to be objective about it and just see
that, hey, the student is behind, the student is not doing the
work. The student may be below grade level. How can you get mad
at someone for being below level? It's not their fault. And even if
it is getting mad about it isn't going to solve the problem. I also
would have a new set of materials. So some teachers say, well,
I already gave you that assignment. I already made that copy for you.
If I give them the assignment, they're going to lose it anyway. Give
them another packet, give them another worksheet. Seriously, you just want to
make it so that they can do the work right then and there. If
they have to look through their binder or dig through their backpack through crumpled papers
to look for that assignment. To do it, they're slowing things down.
They're less likely to get that work done. Give them a fresh, new
packet and just move on. Have additional resources prepared if the student is behind
because they're just at a lower level. So this could mean maybe showing them
videos, or if you have past worksheets or assignments that they did before but
they didn't really get it, have them do that again. I would also
have maybe some sites or additional resources for them to refer to, so that
it's not just you trying to catch them up. There's also putting some responsibility
on them to learn the material in addition to what you've already taught them.
It could be frustrating. You're like, I already gave a lecture on that.
I already taught them how to do that, and they weren't there for
that or they didn't pay attention. So how am I going to do this
again for one student? If I gave a twenty minute lecture, Am I
really going to give a twenty minute lecture for this one student? No,
you're not. You're going to find other lectures online or just other resources so
that you can stick them aside and they can learn that material while you're working
with the rest of your class. Communicate with the parents that they understand that
you're trying to catch up a student. There needs to be buy in on
the parent side too, And well, I know that's not always going to
happen because there just isn't always parent involvement. Let them know so that if
they are likely to help out their student or be involved or at least hold
them accountable, you have someone else on your side who's working with you.
Sure that you check in with them. This is something that I've been bad
about in the past, where I'm trying to catch students up, then I
forget to check see if they actually did it. So maybe two three days
past and it never got done. Because if you forget about them, they're
just going to, you know, slump down on their chair and just try
to be under the radar again because they don't want to have to do the
work. You have to remember that you're definitely in this self defeating mindset,
and so just these little wins when they're getting something accomplished, even if they
got five problems done and you gave them ten. That is something. I'll
even walk around and see student if they get one problem done, I give
them a lot of praise. If it's someone who really doesn't get anything done,
and I'll say, awesome, you've got that one question done and it
was correct. Let's try to get to five. Okay. After you get
to five, you can take a little mental break. And this just gives
them a goal and they can look forward to just having a break like I
promised, And it also encourages them because they feel like they're actually accomplishing something.
The third steps to adjust instruction, and this applies to when you have
a class or maybe all of your students that are behind. It's the same
mindset as with an individual student, where you have to ask yourself the tough
questions. Can they just demonstrate proficiency or mastery? Do you really need them
to get all of the assignments done? For example, we have grammar worksheets
that we give out and for each particular part of speech or something like that,
there's like twenty questions, So I really need to do all twenty with
the students kind of get away with just doing five and it seems like they
have it, then we move on. If they don't, let's go to
ten, and by ten they have it, let's move on. Do we
really care more about making sure that they get it all done and they get
the grade for that particular assignment, or do we care more about them just
knowing the content. There's definitely a difference when you're trying to catch students up.
If you are on pace, you have the luxury of doing both.
But when you're behind, like I was with that one class because of the
fire drill, I had to make a decision about what I could keep and
what I had to cut. Then you want to look at your pacing guide.
You want to see what are all the assignments that you're supposed to complete
before a certain amount of time. Maybe it's an upcoming assessment, or maybe
it's like a break or a holiday. Where are your students at and where
do they need to be by a certain cutoff point, maybe the end of
a unit. What is the shortest path there. Sometimes we're teaching things that
are must have and are nice to nose, so you can distinguish between those
and just kind of cut out the nice to nose. So maybe you're teaching
them a particular concept, but you had like an extension or if one activity
or a project that you were going to do with them, Well, we
got to cut out and just do the basic meat and votes. It is
just not humanly possible to teach every single standard that we're being asked to teach.
And after you're teaching all this time, I realized that I care more
about depth rather than rep meaning I'd rather teach a few things really well and
go deep with those concepts rather than just kind of covering everything. And because
what I've found is that when I'm just trying to cover a lot of things,
the students don't necessarily know the material well. And so when they're assessed,
maybe with like a district assessment or standardized testing, the students don't do
well because I only covered it, I only touched on it, but they
didn't really learn it. So the final step is to seek specialized support.
It's just not possible to get every student on the same page and the same
level, and it's often out of your control. You're going to get students
that are one to two grade levels behind, and you're just going to have
to deal with it. You'll also have students with learning disabilities, behavioral or
emotional challenges, speech or language difficulties, and they just need specialized support in
general. And yes, we are trained to help them out with that and
know how to accommodate for them in the classroom, but sometimes there are just
things that we need a specialist for to show us how to do it.
For example, there are reading and language specialists, there are speech therapists.
In some schools, there's a special class for English language learners that just came
to the country. You also have special education specialists. See specialists can help
you know how to accommodate and support those students that need extra help beyond what
you know how to do. Even as a veteran teacher, I can't help
all of them all of the time. I'm not capable of knowing how to
make up a jillion different accommodations for all of my students, So I will
seek help from different specialists. For example, if I know that my student
is going to the speech therapist and they're having a hard time articulating themselves in
class or with their group members, I'll ask the speech therapist what has worked
for that student or in other classes. So I definitely seek out help from
different people because I know I can't do it all by myself, and find
out what options are available if you want a student to be a sessed for
special services. So maybe you suspect that a student needs some extra help.
Maybe you suspect that they're having difficulty concentrating and learning. Doesn't necessarily mean that
they have ADHD, but maybe they are showing some of the patterns of the
student that is ADHD. Or maybe you learn that a student just recently moved
to this country and does not really know English and they were accidentally placed in
your class. In that case, you want to seek special services for that.
These are all things that can cause a student to fall behind, and
so if you can get them the appropriate services, or at least get appropriate
support for yourself, that can really help you catch them up too. So
these are some of the basic things that you can do to at least try
to catch them up. If the student is really digging their heels in and
they don't want to catch up and they don't want to do the work,
well, then you just got to let that go. Even if it's just
adjusting your expectations, adjusting your instruction that alone can really catch up students so
that they feel successful, and then you can bread the sigh of relief that
you've kind of done everything that you could now. This episode is definitely similar
to a previous episode where I discussed what to do when students are all at
different levels. So if you didn't catch that, be sure to go back
to episode one thirty four so that you can hear all about that. Thanks
for hanging out with me today, you guys, I will see you next time.