Transitions

Transitions
Whether you physically move from one place to another (as a whole group or in small groups) or stay in place but change activities, you are making a transition. Transitions done well can enhance learning and provide a mental and/or physical break to keep interest alive and students alert. Transitions gone awry can eat up class time, allow students to lose focus, and create opportunities for a negative learning environment.

Here are some best practices for helping transitions go smoothly:
 * Have an agenda or list or other obvious directions so that students know what to expect and when
 * Model any expected behaviors
 * Allow time for transitions and make it clear what the expectations are during the transition
 * Give time for students to have closure on the one activity before starting the next one, and let them know that's what you're doing

Specific to small groups, especially if they are moving from station to station
 * Allow time for transition
 * Give warnings before it's time to start the next transition so students who need closure have time to do so without feeling rushed or pressured
 * Use timers on the screen so anyone can look up and see how much time is left (this is good for teacher and student)
 * Go to each group and warn them that time is nearing the end--as the teacher, you'll figure out which stations or groups need a longer warning than others
 * It is not as effective to just yell out to the whole class "2 minutes!"--go to each group, you'll get a feel for what's going on and it can double as good formative assessment time
 * If you give a signal, is that the start of the transition or the signal that they are to start the next station and do you have time allowed in between to move from one to another and time to get situated in the new place
 * If there are things for students to do before leaving one activity, remind every time...a group won't pay attention to those instructions when it doesn't pertain to them (save the file, return the screen to HOME, put the lids on markers, ....); if they're generic to all stations, you might need to do it for the whole group, if they're specific to one station, go remind that station
 * Be an active participant/observer--if you're not involved, students won't be involved--spend time with each group observing what they're doing, promoting discussion
 * Be prepared with things for a group to do if they finish before the time is up--have something for each station; sometimes one station will always finish early and sometimes one group of people will always finish early--having an extension activity for each station will take care of that issue
 * If you are an active participant/observer, you'll know before a group finishes that they're about to be done and you can "head them off at the pass" with the next step

Additional Resources
I wish I could attend this workshop! This presenter has nailed it. Not all the information is on these slides, so you'll have to do some guessing as to what the presenter talked about, but the titles on the slides should help with that. These slides cover more than transitions but they're in there too:
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When you get to the section on "quick and dirty data collection techniques--counting models," this presenter has captured some of the best. But there are only pictures and the stories must've been explained out loud. Rubber bands and paper clips pretty much work the same way... a student has a pile of those items on his/her desk and each time they exhibit the undesired behavior, the teacher simply strolls over inconspicuously and just picks one of them up. When the pile is gone, the student knows they've lost their chances and the teacher has a "count" of how many infractions there are. Some people keep the pile on the teacher desk and when there's an infraction, the teacher picks up a paper clip or rubber band and holds it out to be visible to the student and then puts it in the counting place (the teacher's pocket, a jar on a shelf,...). Most other students will just think the teacher has a nervous habit of playing with paper clips or rubber bands. Some people do the rubber band thing around the wrist... for each infraction, the teacher puts a rubber band on her/his wrist and by the end of the period, the teacher counts the number of rubber bands on the wrist. You can probably figure out the other ones or make up your own techniques. I'm not familiar with "fit to be tied" but I have a good guess. :-)

This pdf file from Florida schools has a lot of good stuff in it. It's pretty dense reading--be prepared! It's heavily research-based, which is reassuring.
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