- Post your intended "feature" lesson (along with materials, rationale/procedures for grouping, and school-to-home connection) two weeks in advance so that your coach can reflect and respond early enough to ensure you feel prepared to confidently address the range of learners' needs.
- Pair older children (as mentors) with younger children. Your coach can guide you to a series of locally filmed videos and PowerPoints that show you how to develop mentoring attitudes and behaviors in older children. Your coach can also identify and arrange observation time for you with experienced colleagues on campus. Please request observations of two different classrooms in which the teacher and children engaged this model so that you get a sense of the range or possibilities desired choices for the younger one and guide the youngster along.
- Plan a drawing and kinesthetic component (for younger) and a literature/life-experience connection (for older).
- Non-verbal signals work for all ages and often secure your intended results more efficiently than use of words. For many children, using to many words, causes confusion or distracts from the main message. For some children, using long stretches of words and rationales encourages them to engage the adult in an argument*. Neither result is productive. Choose your words carefully, and use them sparingly. Three non-verbal signals to observe this week include:
- tilt of head to signal your questioning child's choice
- adult hand over child hand to contain fidgeting
- index finger perpendicular to lips to signal "Quiet now.
*see Interpersonal Council research, (10/10/07) entitled Rant exposure can trigger the development of a range of defensive reactions from "shutting down" to "oppositional arguing."
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