I guess it wasn't a typo when you said they are concerned about their next text, rather than test. I am hearing more and more about instructors who are using smart phones as resources in the classroom and actually encouraging their use to research relevant information. If you can't beat 'em, join 'em.
With social media dominating most facets of our society, I have found that the attention span of student's has decreased over the past 9 years that I have been teaching. All too often they are concerned about their next text, or what is another student doing for lunch. Although we discourage any phone use in the classroom, it is very difficult to manage. You know I am a big fan of state changes to help re-focus, and usually that is the 5 or 10 minutes they can use to stay "connected". When they know there will be a short state change during each period, this helps reduce the need to sneak their phone use.
Nydia, I'd like to ask the same question as Samuel above. How did you acquire this skill?
Samuel, is this practice something you developed by experience or is it part of professional development at your school? It seems to me that could be a difficult skill to learn.
You obviously have a good sense of your classroom's dynamics. David, have you found the length of students' attention has changed over the years?
i also agree....my students sometimes need tohave the element of surprise
I agree Dave. I always stop and change state with my lectures. I find that works for me is to totally catch students off gaurd and sometimes say something that makes no sense! I find then people will start to think what is he going to do next. I also relate all lessons to something that my groups can relate to and it makes it more interesting to them.
Quite simply, I find that most students of the 18-25 year old demographics, are socially connected. This means they like to be together in groups, and like to discuss current events or what interests them. I find that if you have structured state changes every 25 minutes or so, this helps to keep them focused, motivated and less likely to zone out. The state changes might be as simple as a tasteful joke, real world stories or just 5 minutes of standing up, walk around and get the blood flowing back into their legs. One can start to see when the student's eyes start to glass over, and if you don't do something then, basically, anything you say after that point, will be lost in the air and not reach the student in any manner.
Given that people have different attention spans, this seems like a major challenge, David. How do you manage this process?
All in all I agree with Stan. It is important to recognize when the student's attention span cuts him off from the actual learning and they drift off into another state. To keep them focused, one must recognize and change their attention and bring them back to the class. These state changes can take on a wide variety of events, including jokes, real life stories, walks or just stand up and stretch.
I agree with you. Every class of students is different and the class dynamics needs to reflect the group of students present. What works for one class may not work for another.
