Lip Syncing?
Teaching September 26th. 2006, 10:40pmSeems like I’ve been complaining about the same students, week after week. These days I go into class expecting something to be amiss, and I try to catch the same three or four students doing something wrong again and again. It’s beyond predictable at this point and is now just part of the routine of my day. How are they going to be bad today?
Today was dedicated reading day for one of my classes. The students have already done the work in the book, and it’s my job to get them to review. I’ve adjusted to my job as a human radio, reading books and having the class repeat after me. It’s tedious and boring, but these kids outnumber me and I can’t do individual reading without someone getting bored as their turn comes around. I usually read with my eyes down on my paper, but today the dialog was simple enough for a quick glance down to keep them reading as I scanned the mischief makers for problems.
I caught someone simply mouthing the words instead of actually reading. I stopped the lesson and made them read the same sentence again in front of everyone alone. The student couldn’t read unaided. He wasn’t paying attention in class and I caught him. Not only did he not know where we were, he couldn’t read without my help. I told him to follow along in the book by putting a finger on the words as we read them. I caught two more students doing the exact same thing. They were staring off into space as we read, and only one of them could read without any help finding the place or knowing what the book said. They did this multiple times after I started to catch students and started punishing them too.
One of the students said, "They are lip syncing!" I was surprised they knew the word, but that’s exactly what they were doing.
After class, the two students that couldn’t read anything tried to run past me out of class. I caught them both and made them stay after class. The scary head teacher listened to what was going on in class after I explained, and I caught bits and pieces of her rant as she started scolding the students. The part where she said, "You are lip syncing what your teacher reads and you think he wouldn’t notice? Do you think he’s a moron? He’s trying to help you read!" made me smile. I walked out to go to the bathroom, make some copies, and to get a drink of water. By the time I came back, one of the students was in tears, and one of them had their heads on their chest in deep contemplation. They missed their buses and needed to get rides later, which made their punishment extra lengthy too.
I’m so fed up with the same students ruining an otherwise borderline class. Their parents are just throwing money away, since these particular students have never passed a class test on the first try, done homework, or shown any interest in English ever. At least this time they were only hurting themselves and not stopping someone else from studying.
2 Responses to “Lip Syncing?”
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September 27th, 2006 at 9:42 pm
I used to do that in music class, especially when we’d sing some choir piece or something. Of course, this only worked temporarily, because about half of the boys would do it, too. You can tell when it’s just all girls singing. I never got reprimanded personally, but I shared in some collective scolding.
As for reading and following along, I always liked that. Of course, I generally like reading, so I’m weird. Pedagogically, there are mixed opinions on this teaching technique. Struggling students really don’t get much out of it. Once they get lost following along it’s very difficult for them to find their place again. This usually results in spacing out. Of course, they could just not try from the get go. But it’s hard to gauge how much they are trying to follow along silently.
Taking a guitar class now and learning to read music, I can sympathize. Once I miss a note when we’re playing along in class I have a very hard time recovering and rejoining the group.
September 28th, 2006 at 8:56 pm
Yeah, this is why I never read a long paragraph at one time. One sentence, pause, one sentence, repeat. Lots of chances to catch up. Plus I ask vocabulary and comprehension questions. I try to keep students on track that get lost. I prompt when possible too, so I’m being evil. When they aren’t even looking at the page however…
I used to have an evil Spanish teacher who would catch me making a mistake, or not reading a word properly in a class of 25 or more. I have no idea how or why she did it, but her method was “Shame provides the best lessons for all!”. She also had a nasty habit of looking at my paper and calling on me to answer the single question I got wrong in the entire exercise, then docking my homework score entirely. I really hated that woman. I was the only one that openly questioned her teaching “method” in a class of the largest group of brown nosing in school, so got put on the hot seat daily.
Those bad experiences caused me to stop studying Spanish entirely, and soured me on a lot of my foreign language learning study habits. This is why I am strongly against a ridicule based discipline system whenever possible. I try to help students before they earn my wrath.