September 20, 2007
The lesson today focused students attention on discovering how important the various need were in their lives. Each student was given a sheet of graph paper and asked to make a bar graph with a vertical axis from 1 to 10 and on the horizontal axis they were asked to write the needs (love & belonging, power, freedom, fun) down. Using three different colors and bars, they determined how much of each need they wanted (bar 1; color 1), how much energy they put into getting that need met (bar 2; color 2), and finally how much of that need they felt they actually had (bar 3; color 3). Their graphs looked something like the example below.
Once they had their graphs complete, we discussed them and applied them to their lives in school. It was during this discussion that we talked about nonnegotiable. Nonnegotiable are those rules that can't be broken. We all agreed that each and every classroom must be physically and emotionally safe and no one's individual need satisfaction could interfere with that. We also agreed that all students have the right to learn and again no one's individual need satisfaction could interfere with that.
The lesson today focused students attention on discovering how important the various need were in their lives. Each student was given a sheet of graph paper and asked to make a bar graph with a vertical axis from 1 to 10 and on the horizontal axis they were asked to write the needs (love & belonging, power, freedom, fun) down. Using three different colors and bars, they determined how much of each need they wanted (bar 1; color 1), how much energy they put into getting that need met (bar 2; color 2), and finally how much of that need they felt they actually had (bar 3; color 3). Their graphs looked something like the example below.
Once they had their graphs complete, we discussed them and applied them to their lives in school. It was during this discussion that we talked about nonnegotiable. Nonnegotiable are those rules that can't be broken. We all agreed that each and every classroom must be physically and emotionally safe and no one's individual need satisfaction could interfere with that. We also agreed that all students have the right to learn and again no one's individual need satisfaction could interfere with that.
This was a really good activity to get the students really thinking about their needs. The biggest problem I saw with the day was the length of time it took to get through it, but it was well worth it. As Vicki and I discussed the outcome of today's lesson, we agreed that loosing an entire class period to choice theory was sometimes necessary, however from this point forward we would spend Monday's on choice theory activities and Thursday's would be spent having short class meetings. I've already had a class meeting with my lit classes and it went really well. I will explain them more in my next post.
1 comment:
Doing the graphs really made me start thinking about what i want and i that i should put more energy in what i want and less in what i don't.
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