CWs

Activity 1-A-2

CWs

We are currently in the midst of the end-of-year craziness with final testing and adjusted schedules for special activities. Due to this, having this discussion with students is a little difficult, so I'll be reflecting on previous conversations with students from throughout the year.

__FUN:__ Throughout the year, this is one area my students consistently strive to meet. Regardless of our content, there are always lessons that have less interesting material or are a bit tiresome to students. Bringing some fun into the lesson or activity can help to engage students and make these lessons more enjoyable which can lead to more learning on the part of the students. My students frequently ask for review games, partner activities or whiteboard activities. While these activities are generally easy to implement, they provide enough variety that students will buy-in to the learning.

__FREEDOM __: Choices play a huge role in middle school. Students make many decisions throughout the day from academic to social to life choices. Having an option to choose from and the ability to choose can make the difference between a student being cooperative or unwilling to work. My students appreciate just the option of working independently or with a partner. Simple choices like this help to teach students decision making skills and allow them to feel that their opinion matters.

__POWER__ : Students who feel as though they have no power in their daily lives tend to be uncooperative and difficult to deal with. Having control over factors that directly affect them allow them to continue to learn decision making skills while also finding themselves. My students use this idea of power when it comes to decisions on their attire, their friends, extra curricular activities and how they plan to handle their school responsibilities.

__BELONGING__ : This is by far the most important aspect of middle school! When my students are feeling as if they don't belong, there is little else that productively happens. As a teacher, I try to treat all students fairly in order to have them feel as though they belong within the classroom environment. In addition to the classroom environment, students need to belong to their other activities like sports or music groups. Many times, students seek me out as their sounding board when they are having problems with these social groups or their friends. Solving some of these issues can help increase their belonging.

__SURVIVAL__ : In most cases, these basic survival needs are met at my students' homes. Occassionally, this is not the case and they look to their school for help with necessary resources to meet these needs. These resources can come in the form of free or reduced breakfast and lunch, an extra change of clothing, access to counseling or medical attention.

The largest special population that I work with daily are my learning support students. In many of the social and emotion aspects, my students in this population have many of the same compelling whys that my general education students do. I have very few issues with acceptance in my classroom between my students. I think the biggest difference comes in the area of academics. Since students are looking for the same CWs, it is up to me to ensure that they are accessible to all my students. I think the biggest was to do this include making sure that the reading level is appropriate and differentiating the material as necessary. During implementation, it is important to make sure I circulate to be able to provide support if my students need it.