Dear Reader,
My devotion to this newsletter is such that it sometimes gets into my everyday life.
A good example of this has been this week. I knew I was going to write today's newsletter about the topic of habits; specifically, good habits to start incorporating into our routine that will serve us well down the line.
And lo and behold, I started seeing signs of this... everywhere. First, I was asked not once, but twice, to re-explain for what I feel is the 7-millionth time the difference between used to and being used to (cue deep breath, smile, briefly considering a career pivot as a dating profile ghostwriter, whiteboard*). Old habits, current habits and all that.
Then, someone in my life who I'm very fond of suddenly quit smoking after literally decades - so, you guessed it, they quit a bad habit.
But the cherry on top of the cake happened yesterday. I was driving along a route I take quite often, when all of a sudden, I saw this little colourful work of art:
Which, even in my generally deluded state of mind, I understand is not a huge change to the ecosystem in the grand scheme of things, but it's such a lovely little colourful change to my commute that it made me smile... and how could it not make me think about this idea of introducing a little new habit into our everyday life to serve us well in the future. I know these bright little spots will bring a smile to my face for the foreseeable future!
So, dear teacher, here I am today with the last September newsletter: in the spirit of this month's theme "looking ahead", I want to tell you about:
- the science of making and breaking habits (TL;DR: the former is easy, the latter is blooming hard)
- 4 little habits to introduce into your everyday teaching that will serve you well in the long run
I've thought about habits that can help the novice as well as seasoned teachers, with special attention for those who will have to take their abilitazione for their final exams (particularly if you have to do a critical incident analysis).
So, without further ado, let's get cracking 🔥
Forming new, good habits: easier said than done (but it can be done!)
Ever found yourself at the end of a phone scrolling session that somehow lasted 20 minutes but a) you can barely remember what you saw and b) how on earth did you waste 20 minutes on it?!
Well, that's the power of bad habits, my friend. Not the Ed Sheeran song (though, I mean, absolute party banger); I'm talking doomscrolling, binge-watching, over-eating; or, if we want to extend it to the classroom world, leaving marking to the last minute, over-talking, procrastinating the hell out of lesson planning (cue Sunday evening blues).
Bad habits are easy to form: neurologically speaking, it's a 3-part loop including a cue, a routine, and a reward. But, as I'm sure you know if you've tried to give up doomscrolling social media, they're not easy to get rid of.
Now, if you are interested in learning more, psychiatrist Tracey Marks explains why sheer willpower has failed you when you've tried to quit a bad habit and a few techniques that might work instead:
I quite liked the part about the cognitive distortions that we use to justify our bad habits, like "just this once" or "I'll do it later" (yeah right), and how to use them as a starting point to quit the habit. Have you got a bad habit you want to get rid of, in teaching or otherwise? I'd love to know.
4 good habits to introduce in your everyday teaching (that will serve you well down the line)
Now that the start of the year is (sort of) out of the way and we're not yet under end-of-year-stuff attack, it may the ideal time to start introducing some micro-habits into our everyday lives.¹
Here are 4 small habits that I think will pay off big time in the medium-long term:
1. Keeping a record of students' mistakes
There is no way to learn a language but to make mistakes. And not in the inspirational card way, but in a practical way: we acquire new language structures by trying them out (in a process of hypothesis testing) and seeing what feedback we get. My kid is currently learning to use sometimes vs. once vs. the other time, using them interchangeably: when we don't understand, that's the cue that the usage was incorrect. But if a child (or adult, for that matter) doesn't try to use the new language items, they will just stay stuck at a plateau and not progress - a topic I'm planning to cover soon, by the way.
In reality, however, when you have 28 students and they all make *multiple mistakes* per week, how do you use that? My answer would be that you keep tabs on them by recording them. A simple table with mistakes you hear and can note down discreetly during the lesson will do. Ways to jazz it up include:
- dividing the mistakes by category (lexis, grammar, pronunciation, etc)
- having students record their own mistakes
The magic of this is that soon enough, you will start noticing patterns and more recurrent mistakes. This helps you with the issue that I think is always in the top 3 for most teachers: the lack of time. We never have enough time in the classroom: by knowing what mistakes happen most frequently, you'll be able to prioritise, offer consistent feedback, drill and repeat. I mean, English does have a quarter of a million words, so this is as good a place to start as any.
Bonus: if you get asked to write a reflective essay on your classroom experiences for your abilitazione, this could be a focus point and you'll have plenty of material ready to go.
2. Giving thinking time
This is simultaneously quitting a bad habit (giving insufficient thinking time) and starting a good habit. With the pressure we feel to "get through the syllabus" and give all students a chance to do something in our classes, it may be easy to slip into the habit of not giving thinking time.
But research has pretty unequivocally shown that thinking time benefits students not only emotionally but also in terms of their language production, which becomes more complex and more accurate when they're given a few seconds (or more) to think before they speak.¹
So, this year, give the gift of time: take a deep breath and get comfortable with that very uncomfortable silence that sometimes follow a teacher's question. You will reap the rewards in the long run.
3. Asking learners for feedback more often
I've been guilty of, well, the opposite of this one many a time, especially when I was more inexperienced: I would just carry on with my planned lessons without consulting my students. Maybe part of it was a fear of what they might have said if I had asked?
But chances are, some of our students will be lost at some point. So, make a point of stopping every so often and checking in with them: how are they doing? What did they not understand? What are they struggling with? A simple class discussion, anonymous survey or a quick prompt for them to fill in in writing will do the trick and help you adjust your teaching. In hindsight, it's much more time-efficient to slow down and go at their pace than to rush only to have half the class fail a test and then have to repeat the test. Which, I don't need to remind you, you'll end up having to grade. On a Sunday night. Before the Christmas holidays.
4. Making notes about what worked (but mostly what didn't)
Last week, I updated the lesson materials for our conversation course for teacher, Speak Better Teach Better. The last time we ran it was two years ago, but I still have a very precious document: a feedback document that my colleagues and I had compiled during the course - during being the keyword here because the longer you leave it, the less you'll remember.
So now, I have some really insightful comments about various aspects of all the lessons and related materials, including:
- what activities took too long
- what our participants appreciated
- what questions were unclear
Something else you might like to start taking a few notes about is any critical incident that occurs during your classes. Here is a little guide I wrote about how to do this, complete with a 4-step procedure to analyse critical incidents. I've seen many final exams for the percorsi abilitanti ask for this, so it might be worth getting into that mindframe!
And with that, I bid you adieu for today.
Wishing you a lovely Sunday with your loved ones, full of good habits - or bad habits as long as they make you happy at least!
Take care, dear teacher ✨
¹ OK, maybe not the ideal time, but I've been waiting for the ideal time to tidy up my wardrobe since moving and guess who's still wearing the same 4 outfits because I've no idea where half my stuff is.
² And isn't it a great teaching for them as human being, too? How many hours of our time would be saved from listening to absolute rubbish if people just stopped to ✨ think before they speak ✨?
P.S.: My weekly suggestion for things to listen to/watch/read to improve your English while relaxing: Breaking news for all of us book nerds: the origin of the Book of Kells may not be what we thought, i.e. that monks on Iona Island, off the coast of Scotland, wrote it. I've been to Iona Island and was very proud of having done so, but new research suggests my pride may have been in vain. Read all about it in The Guardian.
✨Cool things I heard this week
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