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It is great that you are learning and teaching
class meetings! Classroom meetings can work very will with kids with a
wide range of ages and they can work with groups that meet for short
periods of time. (I know teachers using parts of class meetings when they
are only meeting with students for 20 minutes 3 times per week). So I
don’t think that is the problem.
The thing that stands out for me in your question is how “in charge” you
are (which means that how “not in charge” the kids are) of the class
meeting process. It may just be how I am reading your email, but what I
notice is: “I have implemented”, “I have attempted to start an agenda” ”I
tried to form a circle.” My guess is the girls are feeling disempowered
and are getting you back (mistaken belief: I feel hurt so I will hurt
back) or are trying to show you that they are in control (mistaken belief:
I belong when I’m the boss or in control). The more ownership you give the
students over class meetings, the more they will engage in the process and
the more skills they will learn. Yes, there will be mistakes…but going
slowly, step by step, and doing the activities that engage the students
may be very helpful.
I’m guessing that your once a week meetings are also more than 15 minutes.
I suggest that you keep the meetings short – 15 minutes. Do them more
often – especially at the beginning as they are learning the skills. 2-3
times per week. (In the beginning, you might even try every day. Remember,
they are learning skills. When teachers start teaching reading or math,
they want their students to practice every day so they can practice and
retain the skills.) Short meetings, more often, are much easier for
students. This alone may reduce the challenges. Have them led by one of
the students. (That may take a little time for training and a system that
is fair so that all the students can eventually lead the meeting.)
Why are you having class meetings? Do the kids know? We think class
meetings are great for teaching kids life skills (connection, empathy,
separate realities, problem solving, planning fun activities). But kids
can’t always relate to those purposes the way we do. There are some good
activities for “buy in” for class meetings in the manual and in the book
that you might be able to try to re-engage your students. In particular,
the “Buy In” activity would be a good one with your mixed age group and
for the older girls who apparently have not bought in. I would pause for a
bit before you do this to disengage from what sounds like an emerging
power struggle. Then after a week or two of no class meetings the “Buy In”
activity might be very interesting. It might be interesting to hear if the
students felt like you were “making” them do something. You could check
this out by saying, “I’m wondering what mistakes I made when starting
class meetings. (This is also a great model to teach them that mistakes
are wonderful opportunities to learn.) How many of you thought it was just
another way for me to lecture and control you? How many of you thought it
was my agenda, instead of getting you involved? Getting answers from them
is part of the buy-in process. When students buy in to the idea of problem
solving together beginning the agenda is not a problem. It becomes a tool
for problem solving.
I may be wrong, but I’m guessing that you haven’t taught all of the
building blocks of class meetings yet. You clearly taught the students how
to do compliments. But when you say you “implemented separate realities”…I
don’t know if you mean that you did the activity with them…or talked to
them about it? We find that talking to the students is not nearly as
effective. Doing the activity and letting them discover the meaning (by
asking questions) is much more fun. Did you teach the other building
blocks of class meetings? (Did you do the forming a circle activity…or
just tell them to get in a circle? Did they learn about being helpful not
hurtful, communication tools, the reasons people do what they do, role
plays, finding solutions?) My experience working with teachers is that
sometimes it is tempting to skip teaching the building blocks because the
teachers want to get on with problem solving and “teaching life skills.”
But the process of teaching the building blocks itself teaches life
skills. With a wide age range of students you will be challenged a bit to
work the activity so that everyone can “reach it”….but that in itself is a
wonderful problem for the students to solve.
After you have taught your students the building blocks (by doing the
activities) I would recommend not doing much more “teaching” in the formal
sense. Instead, I would support them in beginning problem solving and let
the process do the teaching. (So, for example, I wouldn’t “teach” the
significant 7 to this group. The process of class meetings will help the
students incorporate those significant 7 just by doing class meetings and
problem solving together).
Sometimes it is helpful to get a picture of what the class meeting will
look like several months in the future. If someone were to come observe,
what would they see in 2 or 3 or 4 months? Here is an idea:
After the time for homework there is a snack and then a student lets the
other students know that it time for the meeting. There is a bustle of
activity as one student grabs the agenda, another gets recording materials
and everyone is getting their chairs in a circle. You are in the circle,
but not leading the meeting. (Your job is to gently remind the students of
the guidelines as needed, to ensure that students are being helpful not
hurtful, and to participate in the meeting like everyone else.) The
student leading the meeting (and it could be a student of any age, though
usually the older students start this out) opens the meeting by announcing
that it is time for compliments and begins by passing around a small soft
object. Today the group is complimenting the person on their left (this
changes of course, but it is what the leader chose). After compliments are
over, the leader looks at the agenda (if a non reader is leading the
meeting, he or she will have a helper who can read). A problem from last
week is checked in on and the solution is working. (If it isn’t working it
is put back on the agenda). Next, the leader notices that there are three
problems on the agenda. She starts with the first problem and asks the
person who put the problem on the agenda if he would like to just share
the problem, pass around the object and talk about the problem without
fixing or ask for problem solving help. He asks for problem solving help,
and after he explains the problem the soft object is again passed around
the meeting and each student either gives a suggestion or passes. The
recorder writes down all of the suggested solutions. After the soft object
has gone around the circle, the scribe reads the solutions and the student
with the problem decides which solution he’d like to try for a week. That
process took a while so there are only a few minutes left in the 15 minute
meeting. The leader decides to close the meeting with a short fun activity
and leave the other agenda items for the next day. The students re arrange
the room to the way it was before the circle and spend the last 30 minutes
in another activity.
If you are like me, you probably get frustrated and discouraged when
something you want to have happen doesn’t work like you had hoped. I want
to urge you to pause with this one. Be gentle with yourself. If you made a
mistake, see it as an opportunity to learn. Getting class meetings going
in a group of kids who have already been in school all day, who range in
ages from 5-13, and who may not have high problem solving skills is
challenging. It is also a huge gift to the students. It is a gift that
will last a lifetime. They are worth it. And you have the gift to offer.
Bravo!
If you still feel stuck and would like some more help, write back with
your phone number and maybe we can connect you with someone close to you
with more experience (which means they’ve already made more mistakes) or
we could support you on the phone.
Best wishes,
Jody McVittie
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