Despite being in my 400th year of teaching* (*23rd), I have never really felt like I have nailed routines. Don’t get me wrong, I am organised and a creature of habit. My classroom is largely clutter-free and tidy. I label everything – including my box of labels. BUT, if I was asked to define my classroom routines across all of my lessons, I’d be hard-pressed to tell you my set-pieces, aside from: greeting students at the door; using and enforcing seating plans; taking the register; having my lesson planned. I’ve been reflecting on whether my position as an experienced and established member of staff has made me complacent and that some clear, consistent and rehearsed routines would just sharpen things up for my students and me.
As a member of the Ped Team, my focus of choice this year (in terms of research and practice) is classroom routines. I’ve started with the basics: what exactly are routines and why are they so important?
‘A routine is a sequence of behaviour that you need to use frequently in order to achieve a goal. An example would be the routine you have for brushing your teeth, or how you make buttered toast. Routines are a recipe, a sequence of: “do this, then do this, then do this”. Routines enable students to predict events during the school day, helping to minimise disruptive behavior.’ (Kern and Clemens, 2007)
‘Routines strip out redundant decision costs, reduce the amount of novel information that we have to process, and make the most of our ability to think less about the things we repeatedly do. They hack the attention economy of the classroom to help pupils learn hard things faster. A routine is a sequence of actions triggered by a specific prompt or ‘cue’ that is repeated so often it becomes an unconscious, automatic response.
Building bespoke routines requires the careful consideration and construction of two things:
- A chain What exactly will your pupils do?
- A cue What will start this chain of action?’
(Peps Mccrea, Motivated Teaching 2020)
My English colleague and the college’s Professional Tutor, Jo Sheldon, is used to discussing, modelling and using routines in her own practice and when working with trainee teachers and ECTs. She summarises the importance of routines as:
- Routines, regularly repeated and reinforced, are the foundation of a successful learning environment, allowing learning to be the focus.
- They are the bedrock of behaviour management – they ensure that off-task behaviours and disruptions are reduced.
- They save time.
- Students know what to do, when to do it and how to do it – reduces cognitive load (Think of the green traffic light!)
- They make students feel safe.
- They make your life easier!
So, what have I been trying?
- Continuing to greet students at the door, but handing them any resources they may need on the way in, reinforced by instructions on the board.
- Continue to keep resources, such as paper and highlighters, labelled and accessible for students to help themselves at the start of the lesson.
- Making the most of ‘Bedrock’ (a digital literacy improvement curriculum designed for learners aged 6 to 16) at the start of KS3 lessons. It’s personalised, gives immediate feedback, and builds students’ vocabulary.
- ‘Do now’ tasks displayed on the board. Once upon a time, I think these were just called lesson starters. A rose by any other name and all that…
- Essay Friday, and setting up and checking the revision programme for the week with Yr11 classes, using Google Classroom.
None of the above is revolutionary, but something I have learnt over the past 400 years* (*23) in the classroom is that the best ideas in education rarely are!
Katy Wayne, English
Heathfield Teach Share Blog 