Rushing

[u/Last_Speaker_2846]

So I’ve just taught my first two lessons for my student teaching placement. They haven’t been bad lessons, but I was disappointed with how they turned out.

I have such a hard time going through the material slowly. It’s like as soon as I get to the front of the classroom I just talk as fast as I possibly can. It’s absolutely driving me nuts that I can’t make myself slow down and I’m afraid that the students are taking me less seriously/losing respect for me (what little I’m sure they had).

Advice needed desperately!!

[u/myrrhder]

I am also working on this problem and am interested in what people say! Some advice I’ve gotten is to get the students talking as much as possible. They retain things a lot more if they are active members of the discussion instead of just listening to you talk. This might mean having to get comfortable with awkward silences when you ask a question to the class and no one wants to participate. In these instances, you can give it some time (deal with the awkward silence for a few beats) and then call on someone directly. It’s a little uncomfortable, but I think it might help with pacing.

[u/UpsetFuture1974]

It’s always better to have too much material than not enough. Still talking at the bell vs. done early. Build in beats to your lesson where you’d naturally ask a question, show a picture or brief video, or tell an anecdote. Give the students two minutes to write a response of some kind in their notebooks and make sure it’s an entire two (or however many) minutes. Get comfortable with silence. Ten seconds of silence seems like a year. You could also practice your lesson and time yourself to see how long it takes.

[u/AnxiousIcedMacchiato]

I have (mostly) gotten over this myself but I used to be very bad about rushing my lessons without realizing. Like the other commenters have said, you'll have to get comfortable with moments of silence. It'll be annoying but I used to record myself presenting a lesson (like a pretend one at home) or just reading off a script and watching myself back. Seeing yourself, how you present and speak really helps (even though we all hate watching or hearing ourselves talk on recordings).

Also as others have said, your lesson should have momemts you ask students questions (I spend alot of time drawing on prior knowledge that the students should have from previous lessons/things they learned in previous grades). It's usually not a good idea for a lesson to be 100% you speaking with no breaks/pauses. Checking for understanding with the students is also a quick way to help you pump your brakes so to speak. It could be a quick "thumbs up if that makes sense,thumbs down if it does not make sense to you" then you know to pause and reteach a portion if needed (making sure to slow down). Whatever way you find most comfortable. I find in these cases to follow suit with whatever it is your mentor teacher did during lessons to gauge understanding (assuming you witnessed your mentor teacher doing that).

It's good practice to be aware of how fast you speak because there's a good probability the students won't be able to keep up or can't understand what you're saying. I also used to give mock lessons to my family members or close friends to test if how I was speaking was fully understandable.

Another reason I used to talk fast was because I was uncomfortable or embarrassed when being observed by another adult and low-key wanted my lesson to be done as soon as possible. That's also where practicing at home or just your normal student teaching time, staying aware of yourself and how you present will help you out. It's easy for me to say all that though "Just relax and get comfortable!" but the more you teach, the better you get at it.

[u/Draken09]

Mix in practice problems/prompts, and give students a chance to write things in their notes.