Get off my lawn.
Get off my lawn. Or the more nuanced response, much of which is scattered and buried in the article. That is, if a child has a diagnosable disorder, and that should absolutely be professionally evaluated without judgment, it's pretty likely that accommodation is already covered by the Americans with Disabilities Act. Proceed accordingly.
Further, the environment in which the presentation is made needs to be addressed. That is, teach the kids in the class how to be a supportive and encouraging audience. Grade not only on each presentation, but on how each student behaves overall as an audience member and participant over the course of the entire unit.
Create a flexible and objective grading for the unit that is basically just a pass fail but with constructive feedback on various aspects of researching, preparing, and presenting a topic as well as on attending a presentation and participating constructively in discussion. Consider teaching students about the fact that in real life situations they may face there may be hecklers or hostility. Offer ideas and plans for ways to deal with those people so they have some skills available. Penalize the grade of anyone in class who thinks they're cute and heckles, is hostile to, or harasses any presenting student.
Lastly, this is a job skill and a life skill. Incorporate learning and using Powerpoint or some other commonly used presentation software or other presentation methods. Why our culture has decided that it is a method of torture, I don't know, but kids get that message from adults. Just like they 'know' math is hard, or you should be afraid of the dentist.
Not all job skills are easy; make it a low stress and safe environment for learning the skill so when you have to present at work or you have to apply for a loan or any other situation where you have to talk to someone and persuade them of something you know it isn't going to kill you.
If you're gonna make the standard high school argument about things that will never be useful to you so why do you have to learn them, the ability to present yourself and your information to others is not one of the less useful skills to learn.
https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2018/09/teens-think-they-shouldnt-have-to-speak-in-front-of-the-class/570061/
Further, the environment in which the presentation is made needs to be addressed. That is, teach the kids in the class how to be a supportive and encouraging audience. Grade not only on each presentation, but on how each student behaves overall as an audience member and participant over the course of the entire unit.
Create a flexible and objective grading for the unit that is basically just a pass fail but with constructive feedback on various aspects of researching, preparing, and presenting a topic as well as on attending a presentation and participating constructively in discussion. Consider teaching students about the fact that in real life situations they may face there may be hecklers or hostility. Offer ideas and plans for ways to deal with those people so they have some skills available. Penalize the grade of anyone in class who thinks they're cute and heckles, is hostile to, or harasses any presenting student.
Lastly, this is a job skill and a life skill. Incorporate learning and using Powerpoint or some other commonly used presentation software or other presentation methods. Why our culture has decided that it is a method of torture, I don't know, but kids get that message from adults. Just like they 'know' math is hard, or you should be afraid of the dentist.
Not all job skills are easy; make it a low stress and safe environment for learning the skill so when you have to present at work or you have to apply for a loan or any other situation where you have to talk to someone and persuade them of something you know it isn't going to kill you.
If you're gonna make the standard high school argument about things that will never be useful to you so why do you have to learn them, the ability to present yourself and your information to others is not one of the less useful skills to learn.
https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2018/09/teens-think-they-shouldnt-have-to-speak-in-front-of-the-class/570061/
Next: "Teens were told that there would be no math."
ReplyDeleteI switched universities based entirely on the ability at the new place to meet the public speaking requirement with some bullshit thing or other. Then I failed out of grad school twice upon reaching the point at which I could no longer avoid giving presentations.
ReplyDeleteI have also successfully conducted several workshops since then, but a) I was deeply medicated for each of them, b) they were all on topics for which I had a passion, c) everyone present actually wanted to be there, and d) I was still on the verge of crying, fainting, and/or vomiting the whole time.
I am guessing you would be someone with accommodations under an appropriate system. Which is how it should work. In fact, having a hands on workshop with only a few people who sign up plus the teacher doing something you totally love might be one of the options as an accommodation. Or doing something completely different that maybe involved no public speaking.
ReplyDeleteIt's just fail by the adults to make it clear that life is pain, anyone who says differently is selling something not always comfortable and developing some skills to work with that is a necessary thing. No need to be cruel about it, but it's ridiculous to let people whose brains are not fully developed and subject to random internal chemical attacks have any kind of final say about things as if they have a total grasp of all possible future implications. Especially not as it seems that there is little differentiation between doing good with social media and just bludgeoning everything with it.