.2 Getting Feedback in Large Groups

How do we give individual attention to kids in classes of thirty? We need to understand that receiving individual attention is an unreasonable expectation of students. But we need to find ways to give special attention to students with special needs. The alternative is to say "Hey, I'm teaching a big class, and it's impossible for me to deal with students individually," and end it at that. In this class I try to find ways to help individuals. I can't help all the individuals to the degree that I would like to, but at least I try to do something. When I see a special need, I focus special attention on the individual displaying this need. The question is how to do this effectively in a large group.

One of the major weapons is feedback. The answer to almost any classroom problem is to learn to read cues from your students. If you know what is going on, you are in a much better position to avoid potential problems. How do you get feedback? There are several ways.

• Eye Contact
• Review Questions
• Testing
• Informal Contact
• Individual Conferences
• Parent Conferences
• Sampling
• Demographic Information

One of the things I do is use eye contact. I try to have eye contact with every single student in the class. Review questions are another form of feedback. It is not only checking what you have learned, it is feedback in terms of what one has learned or is thinking about. Testing is another form of feedback, and an important one. Unfortunately, the feedback from testing sometimes comes at a time when it is no longer useful. The best feedback you get from
testing comes at the end of the semester when you give the final exam and find out what the students know and don't know. Feedback from individuals come from things like informal contact before and after class, individual conferences and parent conferences. Even in college I find it useful to talk to parents. There is one teacher at a school that I work with whom I admire a lot. He is a retired Navy Commander, and if his kids aren't doing well, he visits their homes at night. This is on his own time. He finds that his visits make a big difference. Parents then provide a higher level of support for their kids.

Sampling is another tool. I sample by talking to people before class. I sample people's attitudes by speaking to them in the hall. This kind of sampling is important, but sometimes the people who volunteer information are either very happy or very unhappy and is therefore not a true cross-section of students. It makes me nervous when I don't get feedback from everybody.

Demographic information is the final tool. I know that in this class there is a mix of traditional and non-traditional students. I know I need to treat the non-traditional students differently. If I don't take into account single and working fathers and mothers, then I won't be able to use the examples that will make these students feel that they're part of the class.

	What is the best feedback a teacher will get from testing and why?	Answer Here
	Mrs. Cain teaches a third grade class of thirty-five students in an overcrowded classroom. She begins to slowly notice that a child in her class, Rebecca, has become increasingly upset over smaller things every day. She also cannot help but notice that Rebecca's grades have dropped significantly in the past month or so. What can Mrs. Cain do to help Rebecca in order to make her grades come back up to par?	Answer Here