I have yet to interview Lucas one on one, however, I would like to take this opportunity to share an interesting interaction I had with Lucas and what I learned from that experience.
The bell rang; it was the start of third hour. The students had come into the class one by one during passing period. Each time a student entered, Ms. A greeting them with, “Hi!” Most students responded, “Hi,” back to her as well. (OC: I really like that she greets each student. I think that this makes for a very warm and welcoming environment where the students know that they are cared about.) After the final bell, Ms. A and I walked into the classroom and Ms. A immediately started class. She stated “Good morning kids! How are you all?” There were some scattered replies but the students remained rather quiet. (OC: The students seemed more tired and unmotivated than they had the two weeks before.) She told them that she had to meet with a couple groups yet to help them with ideas that they were struggling on, so to get with their groups and start an activity as she pulled each team. As Ms. A was explaining this, Lucas was sitting on top of the grouping of tables behind his assigned seat and was kicking another student, Dean’s, chair. He was looking at his cellphone and chewing a large piece of gum. (OC: He really did not seem interested in anything that Ms. A had to say, but, not only was he distracting himself, he was also distracting Dean.) He eventually moved back over to his table when he and his table mates began to engage in a conversation. They debated whether “cooking crack” was the right way to say it or whether it was “making crack.” (OC: I really found this topic of conversation to be weird and worried where they had heard about crack in the first place.) Ms. A walked over to the table of boys and encouraged them to get a move on finding their groups. It took a while for the kids to figure out who was in their group. Lucas stated “Go away!” to Dean. (OC: They obviously were not a part of the same group.) Lucas asked Dean, “Where’s your group?” Dean replied, “I do not know, magic.” Both boys giggled and Dean walked away to find his group members.
Lucas’s group consisted of Bobby and Mary. When they joined him at his table, Lucas began to poke Mary in the ribs. Bobby joined in on the poking. Mary asked the boys, “Why do you do this?” The boys replied in unison, “Because I can.” She rolled her eyes and said, “Is it because I’m not mean to you guys?” Bobby said, “No, it’s because it’s a free country!” Over by where they were choosing their activity that they would be doing for the next thirty minutes, there was a large group of students chatting. Lucas went to get the activity for their table and on his way back was bouncing a bag of cubes in his hands. When he sat down, Mary began to read the directions. Lucas opened the bag of cubes and stated that he was going to have a war. Bobby said, “Oooo! Me too,” and they both began collecting cubes of the same color to form their army. At this point, I asked to join their table and partake in the game. They all said I could. Mary passed the directions to me and said, “I don’t understand the questions.” I asked Bobby if he would like to read the directions aloud. He did. After we all listened to him and Lucas multi-tasked, listened and set up his army, the students began choosing a color for their game piece. Mary chose blue, Bobby chose yellow, and Lucas chose red. I added that I would be playing with magenta.
Lucas was the first to go. He rolled the dice and moved his game piece. He then had to solve the division problem on the square he rolled to. He wrote down the problem and then just sat there. I turned to him and asked, “How many times does two go into one?” He stated, “One time.” I said, “No…” He then replied zero. Lucas made no eye contact with me. He was looking at Bobby and giggling. I then asked, “How many times does two go into fourteen?” He replied five. After multiple tries, he still was not getting the correct answer. So, I started from two times one and asked him to keep multiplying the numbers until he reached fourteen. He was then able to say that two goes into fourteen seven times. Mary rolled the dice and was able to solve her problem successfully by herself. Bobby rolled as well and got the same problem as Lucas. He asked to roll again. I told him he could so he could have a new problem to solve. Bobby was able to solve his new problem without writing out the long division. He asked, “Do I have to write down the problem?” I told him he should so that he could practice dividing numbers. (OC: One of the goals of the week was to be able to strengthen their long division skills. I had thought to myself that if I just let him solve it in his head, he would not be practicing how to divide numbers. He would need to practice these easy ones to make the more challenging problems easy as well.)
Then, it was Lucas’s turn again. (OC: I went through pretty much the exact same process each time trying to help him solve the problem, however, each time he focused less and less. I feel that this was probably a reaction to him feeling more and more like he was unable to do the problem as the numbers got larger.) Lucas kept saying, “I don’t know,” “I am not good at this,” “I don’t know how to do long division.” He made less eye contact and kept looking at what Bobby and Mary were doing, asking, “Whose turn is it?” (OC: Lucas was getting frustrated. As the problems got harder, he got more and more aggravated and shied away from trying to solve the problems. He not only got flustered himself but was becoming defiant. As I was asking questions, he would completely ignore me and instead look around the room.) Lucas then took Mary’s pencil so she took his. (OC: I felt that Mary’s reaction was a pretty normal kid thing to do. An eye for an eye kind of mentality.) She asked him several times for his pencil back but he was reluctant.
As Lucas and I were trying to solve one of the problems, he began to throw the cubes at Bobby and Mary, yelling, “WAR!” I said, “Lucas, let’s try to concentrate on this problem, can you focus your eyes on me?” He proceeded to throw the cubes and even began throwing anything that was on the table. He said, “Nothing is allowed on the table.” (OC: At this point, I was really trying to keep my cool. I was getting aggravated by his lack of concentration and motivation.) I said, “Lucas, stop. We need to solve this problem. How many times does thirty go into one hundred and fifty?” He focused enough to say three times. I said, “Alright, let’s try to multiply out thirty times three.” (OC: I knew that that was not the answer, but I wanted to see if he could figure out that that was the wrong answer.) He multiplied it out and found that it equaled ninety. I asked if he could get in another thirty before he reached one hundred and fifty. He said yes and said that thirty goes into one hundred and fifty four times which equals one hundred twenty. I said, “Okay, now do your subtraction, one fifty minus one twenty.” (OC: I again knew that you could fit in another thirty, but I wanted him to discover this. Not only this but to realize that each time you subtract, you are checking your work. If you do the subtraction and it is still bigger than the number you are dividing by, you can put another one into your original number. I felt it would be a good learning process for him.) He realized his mistake and went back to the top of the bracket to change four to five. Meanwhile, Mary and Bobby had both finished their division problems and were waiting for Lucas to start the turn after this one. I told the table that we should change the rules to the game. Whenever you finish a problem, just roll for your next turn and it will be more like a race to the end. (OC: I did this to try to motivate Lucas. He was in the lead but his peers could quickly catch up. If he did not focus and really try to solve these problems, he could easily fall out of the lead. Plus, the other students needed something to do to keep from distracting Lucas.) About five minutes later, Ms. A said that we should stop what we were doing and move back to our seats.
I told the students that we needed to clean up, there were cubes all over the floor. Mary, Bobby and Lucas helped me to pick up the floor. As we were cleaning, we found that Lucas’s pencil had been broken during war. Since the pencil at that time had been in the possession of Mary, she said sorry. (OC: She felt really bad about his pencil, I am sure thinking that she would get into trouble for it.) She made a deal with Lucas. If he gave back her pencil, she would give him a brand new yellow pencil with a new eraser. He took the offer and they switched pencils on the way back to their seats. I took a deep breath on the way back to mine. (OC: It was draining trying to constantly redirect and focus Lucas.)
After the class was over, Ms. A and I were discussing Lucas’s behavior. She was explaining to me that she did not know how to handle Lucas. When the class was later splitting into pairs to work on a problem plan, she had asked him to move over to another table with her and another student who also tended to need some extra help. He had felt that she was singling him out and became upset. She told me, he had cussed at her saying, “I am not going to do that damn work!” and he refused to do any more work during class. I also shared with her my experience with Lucas and how he had been so distracted and unmotivated at attempting the division problems. Ms. A says that she has tried everything with him. She has tried cracking down on him and telling him what to do. This has only led to him pulling away and behaving even more defiantly. She has also tried to give him options and choices, however, this has only led to him taking advantage of the freedom and making bad decisions.
I worry about what to do with such students when I become a teacher. I know that it takes time to figure out strategies that work with each student, whether that is positive reinforcement, taking away recess time or etc. Is there, however, a strategy that makes this process easier/shorter? I also worry about my ability to balance these students and supporting their needs with the rest of the class. If I had not been there when war was breaking out during intervention stations, I wonder how Ms. A would have handled the situation. Would she have even noticed what was happening or would she have been working too in depth with her group that she would forget to look up to the rest of the class? When a student is being disruptive, and you are the only one there, what is the appropriate move for the student? These are all questions that I need to talk with my CT about.
While I was working with Lucas, Bobby and Mary at intervention stations, I noticed a couple things, first, the social dynamic. Lucas seemed to be kind of the “ring leader” for the bad behavior. He was the one would start poking Mary first and then Bobby would follow. He was the one who started throwing the cubes and then Bobby would follow. There was a social order, and in this case, Lucas was of “higher status,” and Bobby, in an attempt to fit in, did whatever Lucas did. At this age, kids are really just trying to blend in. They are going through an awkward time of changes both physically and mentally, and self-confidence is greatly established through the acceptance of their peers. They are doing whatever they can to make themselves look “cool” and relate to the other students.
I also noticed that there was a variation in the ability level of the students and I wonder how deliberate this mix was. As the daughter of a teacher, I know that, often times, teachers pair high students with a lower student so that they can help tutor them. The high student also benefits from getting the opportunity to learn the material better by teaching it to someone else. In this group, both Bobby and Mary were able to solve the division problems successfully without help, while Lucas was not. If I had not been there, I wonder if Bobby and Mary would have been willing and able to help Lucas solve the problems.
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