If I have inattentive students, I try to come up with some type of activity or question and answer period so that they need to pay attention. I have also used times when students are inattentive to review concepts and see if their inattentiveness is due to them not understanding something.
On occasion, I have been known to throw a shocking comment out or make a tasteful joke about something just to get my students back in the game so to speak. They tend to respond well to this as it catches them off guard and gets them talking and sharing things about the class that they never thought of before.
Most times, you have the students' attention but just need to reel them back in as they've strayed too far off subject.
Hi Shelia,
Real-life applications bring about a lot of excitement and motivation for students. Students are really eager to learn about real life.
Patricia
Hi Constance,
Students seem to really pay attention when they know they may possibly be called on. Students do not like being caught off guard and put on the spot so to speak.
Patricia
Hi Ward,
We must be entertainers, and we must maintain enthusiasm. Students do not like being bored.
Patricia
I am very animated in my teaching. I look at students right in their eyes. No one knows when they may be called upon to answer a question or make a comment.
call on students to answerdirect questions
This usually works well with my students too. Since they hate lecture time, they are all for listening to real-life applications.
Great points Erika. I find that the students enjoy working in small groups. However, they panic when this involves a group grade.
I like to utilize small group activites that are relevant to the material being taught, and I also tie those activities into larger projects that we are working on in class. This helps the students to pay attention because I explain how this will then be applied to their outside work. The students also enjoy this time to share ideas and brainstorm. After the activities, the class discusses the results of each group. Often, I find that inattentive students enjoy these activities, and they also demonstrate learning from each other.
I only teach the clinical portion of the curriculum, and I have found it very useful to have each student recall significant events they experienced that day that tied into something they reviewed in lecture that week. I usually start out post-conference that way, and each student is aware that they will each be called upon to share information about their day.
Call the student attention or break the student in small groups for activities. Assign the student a topic to speak up in front of the class and interact the the rest of his/her classmates.
I agree with you. I think students learn from our experiences as long as it is relevant. knowing how it works in the real world is what they really need to know. I even have students who ask what I would do in work related senarios. I will add, that before this will work you have to establish some type of working relationship with the class.
Making the instructional info interesting and changing up the instructional tools.
One solid method is to bring that student into my lecture or discussion. I will ask for their opinion or advice, I will have them read something or challange another student and begin an interactive session.
Hi John,
A one-on-one conversation with students generally does the trick. Students need to know that you care about them and their success.
Patricia
Hi Timothy,
If you can get the student to understand how the content will help them in the workplace, you normally can capture their attention.
Patricia
Hi Patricia,
Yest it is. What do you do to engage your students and to encourage participation?
Patricia
It is important to engage students and to allow students to participate.
The most effective way I have seen to capture the attention of inattentive students is to utilize small groups whenever possible. Along with the small groups, I also like to change the group composition periodically. This ensures that the inattentive student has the opportunity to interact with and learn along with people from a diverse background. Although the content may seem boring to the inattentive student, by providing a group structure that they must interact with, the student eventually understands the importance of the lesson and how it may enhance their life circumstances. Another method I've used was to actively engage the inattentive student into the lesson by having them perform as a demonstrator or discussing the topic directly with them to pull out a response.
Most of the time inattention means that that student has not bought into the relevancy of the course material. I try to bring the material to life by directly relating it to what the students will be doing when they hit the floors in their new health care jobs.
