The Impact of Expectations on Underachieving Students

2. The Impact of Expectations on Underachieving Students Practical Ways To Avoid the Pygmalion Effect and Promote Equity In The Classroom

3. Presenters • Karen Cox, MSM Class of 2009 • 5th Grade Teacher • Twinbrook Elementary, Montgomery County, MD • Greg Mullenholz, MSM Class of 2003 • Staff Development Teacher • Twinbrook Elementary, Montgomery County, MD

4. The Elephant Story

5. Motivation • Students’ attention and investment in academic tasks is affected by their relationship with their teachers (Personal Relationship Building); • It is influenced by their interpersonal relationships with peers, the feelings of support and community on the one hand, or on the other hand feelings of fear and defensiveness against ridicule(Classroom Climate); • It is influenced by their own confidence that they can grow their ability to perform academic tasks versus self-doubt or belief in innate low ability (Expectations).

6. Deliberately Influencing Motivation • Nurturing motivation is part of the classroom teacher’s job • Motivation is powerfully conditioned by significant adults, people we admire, respect, love • Outside of parents/guardians, teachers are the most significant adults

7. What Motivates Students To Learn? • Relevancy of the material • Varied activities matched to students’ learning styles • Students believing what they are doing matters to them, that they have a stake in doing well • Someone significant in the student’s life wants them to do well. (Teacher?) • A teacher believes in the student and pushes them to realize the potential they don’t see in themselves • Classroom culture supports students and encourages them to do well. • Classroom climate is a place where risk taking is prized and protected. • Students experience a sense of control and influence in their classroom culture.

8. What Are Expectations? STANDARD EXPECTATION What a teacher thinks a (believes or predicts) students will do. 3 Key Messages • Describes the level or type of performance a teacher wants from students.

9. Standards • Signal to students what is important • What we want them to accomplish • How we want them to behave • Four General Categories of Standards • Quality and quantity of work • Work habits and procedures • Business and housekeeping routines • Interpersonal behavior

10. Standards for Quality and Quantity of Work • Specify the characteristics that make work acceptable • “Explain using both pictures and words”(quality) • “Support your answer with details; from the text”(quality) • “Demonstrate the proper procedure for volleying a volleyball using the three basic movements”(quality and quantity) • “Respond to questions using complete sentences” (quality)

11. Standards for Work Habits and Procedures • Pertain to how students go about their work, not the work itself • How does a student get their work when they are absent? • How do students preview their work before they begin the task? • Procedures for coming into class and starting the bellwork • Procedures for recording homework • Procedures for independent reading/center time • Procedure for returning instruments, art supplies, or PE equipment following a lesson

12. Standards for Business and Housekeeping Routines • Pertain to non-academic work-related procedures • Attendance • Lunch Count • Breakfast • Using the restroom • Organizing my desk • Packing up • Lining up for dismissal in the gym

13. Standards for Interpersonal Behavior • Pertain to how students should treat each other, interact with one another, and cooperate with the teacher. • School rules • Cooperative work standards • Classroom meetings

14. Questions • Do my students know what the standards are, and do they understand what they mean? • Just because I am clear internally about what I want doesn’t mean the students have similar clarity. Standards in all four areas need to be communicated to students explicitly, specifically, and repeatedly.

15. What Are Expectations? “Classrooms are dynamic and complex societies that are rife with expectations: expectations that teachers have for students and that students have for teachers and for each other. These expectations explain a good deal of what we see in the classrooms – the good and the bad, the productive and the wasteful. But the expectations themselves can’t be seen; they hang in the air almost like an atmosphere; they exist only between people and they comprise a part of their relationship.”

16. What Are Expectations? (1) A standard of performance we are hoping for. (2) Our anticipation (or prediction about) what one will be able to accomplish.

17. The 3 Keys • This Is Important! • You Can Do It! • I Won’t Give Up On You! How does establishing and ensuring that students understand clear expectations tie in with these key messages?

18. Our Goal: Do Our Students Know This? • Everything we do in schools should have its focus on student achievement. • The 3 Key Messages aim at improving student achievement. • This is important: The material taught, the standards set, the relationships we have are important • You can do it: I expect success, you are capable, I value you as a member of our classroom community • I won’t give up on you: I believe in you, I am here for you, I will not leave you behind

19. Personal Relationship Building • “Positive teacher-student relationships are important to student achievement because they impact the climate and management of a classroom (standards), they inform instructional design and delivery (planning), and they influence student effort and academic engagement.”

20. Six Key Teacher Traits • Acknowledging Students • Valuing Students • Respecting Students • Demonstrating Fairness • Exhibiting Realness • Being Open to Humor and Having Fun

21. Pygmalion In The Classroom

22. Pygmalion • Character in Ovid’s Metamorphoses, X • Sculpts a statue of a beautiful woman out of ivory • Finds her to be realistic • Falls in love with her • On the feast of Venus, made offerings at her altar, asking for the statue to be brought to life • Venus grants this, and the statue is brought to life • What Pygmalion saw was real to him, and the natural progression was that he fall in love

23. Pygmalion Effect • "Simply put, when teachers expect students to do well and show intellectual growth, they do; when teachers do not have such expectations, performance and growth are not so encouraged and may in fact be discouraged in a variety of ways" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pygmalion_in_the_Classroom

24. Pygmalion Effect • 1968, Robert Rosenthal, Lenore Jacobsen • Self-fulfilling prophecy • Adults and children with higher expectations placed on them perform better • Those with low-expectations perform worse • Internalization of negative labels and positive corollaries • Application to negative racial stereotypes and subsequent expectations

25. Equitable Practices • 27 specific, observable teacher behaviors that communicate high expectations • Examples and Non-Examples • Focus on African-American and Hispanic students • Societal beliefs have tangible, negative effects on certain groups of students • Communicating High Expectations For All Students

26. Equitable Classroom Practices • Welcomes students by name as they enter the classroom • Uses eye contact with high- and low-achieving students • Uses proximity with high- and low-achieving students equitably • Uses body language, gestures, and expressions to convey a message that all students’ questions and opinions are important • Arranges the classroom to accommodate discussion • Ensures bulletin boards, displays, instructional materials, and other visuals in the classroom reflect the racial, ethnic, and cultural backgrounds represented by students • Uses a variety of visual aids and props to support student learning • Learns, uses, and displays some words in the students’ heritage language

27. Equitable Classroom Practices • Models use of graphic organizers • Uses class building and teambuilding activities to promote peer support for academic achievement • Uses random response strategies • Uses cooperative learning structures • Structures heterogeneous and cooperative groups for learning • Uses probing and clarifying techniques to assist student to answer • Acknowledges all students’ comments, responses, questions, and contributions • Seeks multiple perspectives

28. Equitable Classroom Practices • Uses multiple approaches to consistently monitor students’ understanding of instruction, directions, procedures, processes, questions, and content • Identifies students’ current knowledge before instruction • Uses students’ real life experiences to connect school learning to students’ lives • Uses Wait Time • Asks students for feedback on the effectiveness of instruction • Provides students with the criteria and standards for successful task completion • Gives students effective, specific oral and written feedback that prompts improved performance

29. Equitable Classroom Practices • Provides multiple opportunities to use effective feedback to revise and resubmit work for evaluation against the standard • Explains and models positive self-talk • Asks higher-order questions equitably of high- and low-achieving students • Provides individual help to high- and low-achieving students

30. Practical Applications

31. Analysis • How does this demonstrate that the teacher believes: • This is important? • You can do this? • I won’t give up on you?