Teaching strategies for building student trust and engagement

Learning Styles and Student Achievement

According to William Watson Purkey and John M. Novak, in order to teach a student, you have to be able to reach the student. They do not mean 'reach' in the physical sense, as in touching the student, but rather making a mental or emotional connection between the teacher and the student (Purkey, 1984).

Opening up to students is very important for teachers. While it is obviously not appropriate for a teacher to confide intimate personal details to the class, or gossip about others to try to be more accepted, there are ways that a teacher can seem more 'real' to the students. For example, crying over something very sad or letting the students know when the teacher is getting angry with their misbehavior goes a long way toward having students see teachers as real people. Children in the second and third grades often react very positively to this behavior, but there are ways to reach high schoolers and older students as well.

Once students see teachers as real people, they begin to feel they can talk to them, and will often open themselves up to all kinds of suggestions, including an interest in books, if the teacher suggests a book that they feel the student will really enjoy. Until the teacher has the trust of the student, it is very difficult to get the student to accept anything the teacher says as something they might enjoy (Purkey, 1984). Some of this comes from the 'realness' of a teacher acting like a 'normal' person, and some of it comes from the idea that students all have different ways for learning about different things. If teachers are aware of this, they can go a long way toward helping their students succeed.

Another way to get students more interested in school and learning is through writing exercises. Reading and writing are addressed here based on the idea that vocabulary words were the main concern in the study. These exercises have to be made enjoyable, however, or the students will not take much interest in them. Incentives are also a good way to keep these students interested in learning. One idea for a good writing exercise is the keeping of a journal. This journal can be something that only the teacher sees, or it can be something that the student will be required to share with the class. If it's going to be shared with the class, the students should be made aware of that before they begin writing, to avoid embarrassment and other problems later on (Purkey, 1984).

Allowing students some time each week to read each other's journals could spark an interest in reading in some of the students in the classroom. While not everyone's journal will be interesting or exciting, the students may find bits of stories, pieces of poetry, or almost anything else in those pages. The mystery of the unknown will create some interest in reading among the students, and may also help them to feel closer to each other as they share their experiences and realize that they are not all that different from one another. In younger children, journal writing needs to be simplified somewhat so that seven to ten-year-olds are not expected to write several pages each day. A few paragraphs might be more appropriate. In order for the teacher to remain a real person to the students, the teacher should keep a journal too, and be willing to share it with the class (Purkey, 1984).

Brophy and Evertson report that a systematic pattern is also a good way to help underachieving students. In a systematic pattern, each student is called upon to read, but there is no random choosing. Students read in order, and each one knows when their turn is coming. This can help them determine what passage they may have to read and look it over before they read it, reducing the anxiety that many poor or uninterested readers have when they are required to read in public. Systematic patterns are especially helpful with the second and third grade age group, because they still need a lot of structure in their school day to make the most of their learning experience (Brophy & Evertson, 1976). For the high school student, however, a less structured environment that employs different kinds of learning styles would likely be a better choice.

According to the work done for this study, high school students that are allowed to have different learning styles in the classroom and different activities performed much better as an overall class than did students that were only taught in the traditional way. The following tables will indicate that information. First, the students were observed five different times during activities. The observation checklists 1-5 are below, in part, to indicate what was seen as it relates to these students.

Observation Checklist 1

1. Class Organization

How are students working?

Time segments in minutes

Notes

Students:

First observation

Introduction of new vocabulary terms working alone working in pairs small groups whole class off task

2. Students level of skills

How students are relating to vocabulary usage

Time segments in minutes

Notes need help (more than 20% are unable to process)

Students are adapting to how the new vocabulary words relate to the content. Some students had difficulty understanding the new terms.

A somewhat skilled (10-20% need some assistance from teacher) working independently (fewer than 10% need assistance from teacher

Learning Styles used

Time segments in minutes

Notes

Verbal/Linguistic

Visual/Spatial

Body/Kinesthetic

Interpersonal

Intrapersonal

Musical

Naturalistic

Student Engagement Indicators - Make notes of overall impression of the lesson:

Hands-on Work

Tied Into Interest & Made Interesting

Students Given Choices

Give 1 to Get 1 activity gave students choices when deciding on which vocabulary terms to write out first.

Learning Put in Context

Students were able to relate new vocabulary terms to chapter problems.

Students started working independently earlier into the lesson without the assistance of the teacher.

Observation Checklist 2

1. Class Organization

How are students working?

Time segments in minutes

Notes

Students:

Game: Vocabulary Monday

Family Feud working alone working in pairs small groups whole class off task

2. Students level of skills

How students are relating to vocabulary usage

Time segments in minutes

Notes need help (more than 20% are unable to process) somewhat skilled (10-20% need some assistance from teacher) working independently (fewer than 10% need assistance from teacher

Learning Styles used

Time segments in minutes

Notes

Verbal/Linguistic

Students were able to work in teams using various learning styles

Visual/Spatial

Body/Kinesthetic

Interpersonal

Intrapersonal

Musical

Naturalistic

Student Engagement Indicators - Make notes of overall impression of the lesson:

Hands-on Work

Tied Into Interest & Made Interesting

Students Given Choices

Students were allowed to make choices about their teams when playing Vocabulary Monday - Family Feud. They were allowed to choice the order of answering questions.

Learning Put in Context

Students were able to work in teams. Team members were able to assist other students with new vocabulary terms.

Observation Checklist 3

1. Class Organization

How are students working?

Time segments in minutes

Notes

Students:

Second observation of new vocabulary terms working alone working in pairs small groups whole class off task

2. Students level of skills

How students are relating to vocabulary usage

Time segments in minutes

Notes need help (more than 20% are unable to process)

Students are spending more time working independently.

A somewhat skilled (10-20% need some assistance from teacher) working independently (fewer than 10% need assistance from teacher

Learning Styles used

Time segments in minutes

Notes

Verbal/Linguistic

Visual/Spatial

Body/Kinesthetic

Interpersonal

Intrapersonal

Musical

Naturalistic

Student Engagement Indicators - Make notes of overall impression of the lesson:

Students Given Choices

Give 1 to Get 1 activity gave students choices when deciding on which vocabulary terms to write out first.

Learning Put in Context

Students were able to relate new vocabulary terms to chapter problems.

Students working independently

Observation Checklist 4

1. Class Organization

How are students working?

Time segments in minutes

Notes

Students:

Game: Vocabulary Monday

Family Feud working alone working in pairs small groups whole class off task

2. Students level of skills

How students are relating to vocabulary usage

Time segments in minutes

Notes need help (more than 20% are unable to process) somewhat skilled (10-20% need some assistance from teacher) working independently (fewer than 10% need assistance from teacher

Learning Styles used

Time segments in minutes

Notes

Verbal/Linguistic

Less time spent on instructions

Visual/Spatial

Body/Kinesthetic

Interpersonal

Intrapersonal

Musical

Naturalistic

Student Engagement Indicators - Make notes of overall impression of the lesson:

Students Given Choices

Students were allowed to make choices about their teams when playing Vocabulary Monday - Family Feud. They were allowed to choice the order of answering questions.

Learning Put in Context

Students were able to work in teams. Team members were able to assist other students with new vocabulary terms.

Observation Checklist 5

1. Class Organization

How are students working?

Time segments in minutes

Notes

Students:

Third observation of new vocabulary terms working alone working in pairs small groups whole class off task

2. Students level of skills

How students are relating to vocabulary usage

Time segments in minutes

Notes need help (more than 20% are unable to process)

Students are spending more time working independently. Fewer students need assistance from teacher.

A somewhat skilled (10-20% need some assistance from teacher) working independently (fewer than 10% need assistance from teacher

Learning Styles used

Time segments in minutes

Notes

Verbal/Linguistic

Visual/Spatial

Body/Kinesthetic

Interpersonal

Intrapersonal

Musical

Naturalistic

Student Engagement Indicators - Make notes of overall impression of the lesson:

Students Given Choices

Give 1 to Get 1 activity gave students choices when deciding on which vocabulary terms to write out first.

Learning Put in Context

Students were able to relate new vocabulary terms to chapter problems.

Students working independently

As can be seen from the observation checklists examined above, the students used many different learning styles as the times of the activities increased, thereby indicating that they preferred these learning styles once they understood what the material was and became comfortable with it. Other ways of learning were quickly introduced, however, and these were not necessarily chosen by the teacher to occur at any specific period of time but instead happened spontaneously as the students found new ways to deal with problems or as they responded to instructions that the teacher supplied them with for information that they needed. This allowed the students to use some techniques for learning that have been suspected for some time to be effective but that did not necessarily work for all students or that had not been tried yet in this type of setting.

The students that were in the class where different types of learning were allowed performed better overall than students in a traditional class, as the following tables will strongly indicate.

Assignment Progress Summary (Class with Different Learning Styles):

Student 1

Student 2

Student 3

Student 4

Student 5

Student 6

Student 7

Student 8

Student 9

Student 10

Student 11

Student 12

Student 13

Student 14

The overall class average for this class was 85%. Now, this must be compared with the second class, which was the class that had only standard instruction. There were no creative learning styles used within that second class, represented below.

Assignment Progress Summary (Class without Different Learning Styles):

Student 1

Student 2

Student 3

Student 4

Student 5

Student 6

Student 7

Student 8

Student 9

Student 10

Student 11

Student 12

Student 13

Student 14

Student 15

Student 16

Chapter Five

There are many lessons to be learned from the past. The ways students learn to read and write have changed dramatically in the past fifty years or so. Even so, students and their ability to learn has not changed, so the change in teaching must mean that teachers have learned nearly as much as their students. No matter how much research is done about how students learn, and the best ways to teach them, the students should have a say in it. Unfortunately, the idea of being able to make changes based on student learning styles is something that may dwindle because of the No Child Left Behind Act and the structure that it often requires. It is important to address that concern here.

The No Child Left Behind Act says that all states have to develop Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) objectives that are designed to show improvements in achievement for all students, and also for specific subgroups (such as those that are economically disadvantaged, the major racial and ethnic groups, students that have disabilities, and students that have limited proficiency in English). These AYP objectives are assessed at the school level and then they must be reported for each subgroup separately (Reeves, 2003). The states have some flexibility in the defining of what AYP is, and also in the setting of the number of students that are required in order to form a subgroup that is statistically valid.

The smaller schools, many of them rural schools, are in the most danger of being mislabeled as being "in need of improvement" than are the larger schools. This is due to the somewhat more volatile nature of the school-level reporting from one year to the next year (Figlio, 2002; Kane & Staiger, 2002; Linn et al., 2002). If there are less than 100 students that are tested for each grade, the averages that are seen for that grade could fluctuate a significant amount from one year to the next year for many reasons, most of which are not related to the overall performance of the school. The volatility of these test scores generally comes from two specific sources (Linn et al., 2002).

First, there is a variation in many of the groups of students that are being tested for each year, and that can cause some fluctuations. The contributing factors for this can include both the attitudes and the abilities of the students within each cohort, the mobility of students, and/or a strong influx of various immigrants. Secondly, there are one-time factors like the turnover rate for teachers, an epidemic of flu, or noise from nearby construction that takes place on the testing day that can also affect the scores (Linn et al., 2002). In schools that have very small populations of students, having these differences often cause some dramatic fluctuations in the average annual test scores that are seen in these smaller, generally rural, schools.

One of the ways that can be used to reduce volatility in test scores at the school level is by averaging these test scores across several years, which is a remedy that is allowed under the No Child Left Behind Act (Reeves, 2003). A study that was conducted by David Figlio (2002) showed that there were stabilizing benefits of three-year averages and that these benefits were greatest where the smaller schools were concerned. In an analysis that was conducted of the school level data from two districts in Florida, Figlio (2002) also found that, for the smallest schools, going from using a one-year average to using a three-year average actually reduced the number of what were deemed "unstable" schools (which were schools that appeared to improve in one year and then fall back in the next year, or vice versa) from around 63% to only 27%. Even for the largest of the schools, the number of "unstable" schools was reduced, but not as strongly as were the smaller schools.

Kane and Staiger (2002) agreed that using a multiple-year average would improve the standing of the school as opposed to using one-year averages, but they also claimed that there were more efficient ways with which to measure the performance of a school. Kane and Staiger (2002) proposed the idea of placing a higher weight on the more recent scores that were seen for the larger schools, and placing a more equal amount of weight on several years' worth of the scores that were seen in the smaller schools. The flexibility that is built into the No Child Left Behind Act allows all states to explore various alternatives like this for their ways of measuring of AYP (Reeves, 2003).

Smaller schools face a high likelihood of mislabeling when it comes to performance, but this is not their only concern. They also face many other obstacles when it comes to the implementation of the sanctions that do apply when their school is identified as being "in need of improvement." Under the No Child Left Behind Act, the schools that fail to have AYP over a period of time find that they are facing interventions that are increasingly more severe (Reeves, 2003). Schools that are not able to make their AYP for two years in a row will get some technical assistance from their school district, they must work to develop an improvement plan for their school, and they also have to provide their students with options for other public schools. The schools that are not able to meet their AYP for three years in a row must provide a form of supplemental education to their low-achieving and their low-income students (Reeves, 2003).

There are three challenges seen when providing parents with a choice of schools where rural school districts are concerned. The first challenge is that many of the rural school districts have either one-building districts or they have only one school that operates at a certain grade level (Reeves, 2003). For example, of the 692 school districts in the state of Nebraska, there are only around 50 that include more than one school at a specific grade level. For districts like these, there are no alternatives for a school choice that is still within the district.

Second, the idea of transportation is already difficult in many rural districts, and No Child Left Behind, through the requirement for school choice, will only exacerbate the problems that are already associated with the transporting of students over long distances (Reeves, 2003). The rural school districts are already spending too much on the services that they use to transport students. In a recent study, it was reported that schools in rural areas are seen to spend over twice the amount that urban districts spend on transportation for their students (Killeen & Sipple, 2000).

Rural districts spend around six to eight percent of the budget that they have on the transportation of students, and the non-rural school districts only spend around four percent of their budgets for that same issue (Reeves, 2003). In West Virginia, which is, overall, a rural state, more of the education dollars are spent on transportation than in any other state; nearly seven percent of the education budget in that state (Eyre & Finn, 2002). Four of the counties in West Virginia spend over 10% of the budgets that they have just to bus their students to and from school. This may not actually seem like that much money, but when one compares 10% of budget of $900,000 to four percent of a budget of $9 million, it can be seen that this is a very dramatic difference (Reeves, 2003).

The longer bus rides that are required in rural areas also affect other areas besides the school district's budget. A year-long investigation, done by the Charleston Gazette-Mail, recently uncovered some very upsetting data that pertains to the bus rides that are seen in rural West Virginia (Eyre & Finn, 2002). During the 2002-2003 school year, there were more than half of all of the bus routes that were used by students in rural areas of West Virginia that were seen to exceed "reasonable" distances under the guidelines that the district had. The elementary children that rode the bus to school spent more than one hour each way on over 300 bus routes that were seen in 34 out of the state's 35 counties that are deemed to be the most rural (Reeves, 2003).

In addition to this, the elementary school children rode with many high school students in almost every one of the rural West Virginia counties, which could pose a danger to these younger students (Reeves, 2003). Students that had long bus rides also reported that they were more often stressed and tired, that many of their grades dropped, that they did not participate in many after-school activities, and that they had to spend a lot less time with their families because of their time spent on traveling (Reeves, 2003). The parents of children that attended school far away from home also attended fewer of the scheduled parent-teacher meetings, volunteered to help in the classroom less often, and did not attend as many of the extra-curricular activities that were offered at or held at the school (Reeves, 2003).

Finally, the more rural schools are also very concerned regarding public relations problems that are associated with the requirements of school choice seen by the No Child Left Behind Act (Reeves, 2003). The districts are required to inform the parents that, under the new federal law, if the school "needs improvement" the parents can send children to a different school that performs on a higher level (Reeves, 2003). At that time, however, they must also inform the parents that there is currently no alternative school that is located within that same school district. Under circumstances like that one, there is a strong potential for confusion and dissatisfaction in the community.

Theoretically, the students of schools that appear to be struggling would be able to attend school in one of the a neighboring districts, but this is not often a viable option, since the transportation issues that were outlined above are very upsetting for many individuals (Reeves, 2003). One of the possible solutions to this issue in the more rural areas is encouraging the districts to offer more supplemental services instead of alternatives for school choices. While these supplemental services are not actually required until a particular school fails to make AYP for three years in a row, the offering of these supplemental services much earlier would help to provide parents much-needed assistance in order to help students meet the state standards (Reeves, 2003).

The provision of many of the supplemental services that are offered in rural areas also presents many important challenges for school districts (Reeves, 2003). However, with guidance and assistance that could be offered from state agencies for education, these problems could be addressed much more easily than the problems that pertain to a choice of schools.

Under the No Child Left Behind Act, all states must give to the parents of students in schools that are "in need of improvement" a list of service providers that are approved by the state (Reeves, 2003). In more recent months, some states have also been requesting many proposals from various organizations that are hoping to be allowed to provide these supplemental services in that state. As the states collect those proposals and review them, there are many challenges that have arisen which concern the providing of services in the more rural areas of many states (Reeves, 2003).

In some states, proposals received came only from the larger companies like Sylvan Learning Centers, or from online companies (Reeves, 2003). These proposals and the companies that provide them can pose many problems for the more rural school districts. First, the providers are not required to agree to a provision of services within every school district in a particular state. Because of this, both urban and suburban schools have an advantage in being able to attract more supplemental services because they can create a much more lucrative market for these providers on the basis of their economics of scale.

In addition to this, many companies that are applying to provide services for these school districts have no facilities that are operating in more rural areas (Reeves, 2003). It is unclear as to whether the No Child Left Behind Act will be able to provide enough of an incentive for the providers to want to offer services in the more rural areas and the small towns that are found in so many states. With these kinds of difficulties, the rural districts will most likely have to examine various alternative means in order to provide enough supplemental services for their students (Reeves, 2003).

When they are first examined, the online providers would appear to offer a very viable alternative for schools that are located in the more rural areas of the country. Iowa, for example, which is one of the predominantly rural states, actually received many of the supplemental services proposals that were sent out from these online companies (Reeves, 2003). After they were thoroughly reviewed by the state, the process was reopened to other proposals because there were limitations that were associated with having online service and online service providers.

As an example of this, it is seen that the online programs often require a degree of maturity and a skill level that is not always seen in the student. The student that works with the online program must be not only computer literate but most also be able to work on a more independent basis for the computer-based program to be effective (Reeves, 2003). Because of this, many of the online providers are only able to offer programs to students that are in the higher grades, with some providers allowing for middle-school students, as well. The online providers that were willing to respond to Iowa's request for service providers can only work with students that are in grades 5 through 12.

In Iowa, most of the schools that need improvement are in the elementary school category, so they are not helped by these online programs (Reeves, 2003). Another one of the problems that is associated with these online providers is that the schools would have to allow the students enough time to do the work there at school. There could not be any homework because many of these students do not have access to computers at their homes, and therefore would have to complete all of their work during class times. Not only would the school have to ensure that it allowed this, but there would need to be extra staff hired to keep an eye on the computers and the students that were using them, which would cost rural school districts and small school districts money that they do not have (Reeves, 2003).

Another concern for the more rural school districts is that they need to see that there is a high level of quality from online or distance-learning providers. Unfortunately, the No Child Left Behind Act does not have any guidelines for schools to use to help determine and monitor what kind of quality supplemental providers actually have (Reeves, 2003). Because the options in the rural areas of the country are so limited, the rural schools would have to accept what they could get and they would have very little, or possibly no, assurance regarding the quality of services, particularly for those providers that offer online services.

To ensure that students in rural schools are able to access the supplemental services, state agencies might be willing to work with these rural districts in order to help with the development of more creative solutions that could be used to solve the problem (Reeves, 2003). The states could then work with rural school districts to help identify the potential providers that would be available to the community, such as service centers that are available on a regional level, local community colleges, some of the more prominent after-school programs, local libraries, or many faith-based organizations that are in the local or regional area (Reeves, 2003). What is more important, however, is that states could provide more guidelines to both the schools and the districts in order to help with the identification of quality providers for supplemental services. Also, state agencies that deal with education would be able to work with the rural schools in order to develop virtual high schools and other opportunities that involve learning online (Reeves, 2003).

For example, Kentucky's Virtual High School (KVHS) is very trendsetting, and one that provides a model for other schools to follow. KVHS was originally developed to provide an expanded curriculum to students from all across the state (Reeves, 2003). KVHS also provides many advanced placement courses and courses in foreign language, as well as instructional support for students that are considered to be at-risk, and programs for adult education (Reeves, 2003). In addition, there are many opportunities for professional development that are available to educators across the state.

The program is designed to be part of a technology plan that was developed by the Kentucky Education Reform Act in 1990 in order to establish a network of technology across the state so that it could be used, mostly, to improve the access to a higher-level curriculum and support programs in many of the smaller schools (Reeves, 2003). This virtual high school also provides ways of addressing the multiple challenges that are currently being faced by the more rural schools, which includes providing supplemental services to students.

The No Child Left Behind Act also required that states make sure all teachers of the core academic subjects are what is considered to be "highly qualified" by the end of the 2005-2006 school year (Reeves, 2003). The core academic subjects generally include English, a reading or a language arts class, mathematics, science, foreign language, civics and government, economics, arts, history, and geography (Reeves, 2003). The law states that a "highly qualified" teacher is one that is licensed or certified by the state to teach a particular subject.

In addition to the licensing or certifying requirement, these teachers must also demonstrate that they have a competency within their subject. In order to demonstrate this competency, elementary school teachers must be able to pass a test given by the state that demonstrates both their subject knowledge and their teaching skills in reading, writing, mathematics and any other areas of basic curriculum for elementary school students (Reeves, 2003). Middle or higher level teachers are able to demonstrate their competency in three different ways: 1.) they can pass a test given by the state; 2.) they can complete an academic major, a graduate degree, or an advanced certification; or 3.) they can meet the requirements of the state evaluation standard that is used to judge their competency (Reeves, 2003). Given that there are already so many current problems seen in the more rural schools, there are many potential obstacles that are facing these rural schools and the rural school districts when it comes to being able to meet the requirements.

Many schools in rural areas already have problems with recruiting and retaining many teachers, particularly those that have credentials in specific subject areas, those that work with special education students, those that teach a foreign language, and those that teach either LEP and/or bilingual programs (Reeves, 2003). The requirements of the No Child Left Behind Act will exacerbate many of the problems that already exist, because this law increases demand for teachers that are "highly qualified." The increased demand could then result in having higher levels of competitive salaries, but it could also stop the teachers that are doing what they can for their students in the form of different learning styles from being able to do that.