Ways of Dealing with Incomplete Homework/Grade Improvement
@hipsterenglishteacher wrote a post asking about people’s experiences with the Zeroes Aren’t Permitted policy. There have been two ways my school has tried to address the incomplete homework issue: the HIP program and Tiger Time. This post ends up being kind of long, so instead of doing a reblog, I made a separate post. The information is under the break.
We did these programs schoolwide. Since leadership has changed a couple of times at my school and we no longer do them, I would like to figure out how to make parts of them work for my individual classroom, so if anyone else has any other thoughts or ideas, I’d love to hear them!
HIP Program
We had a version of ZAP a few years back called HIP (Homework Is ... *I can't remember what the P stood for, but it was some positive adjective*) at our middle school. Kids who didn't do their homework were supposed to call their parents (we had a script for them) to let them know they hadn't done their homework and had to go to HIP detention. If the class took place before lunch, HIP was a lunch detention (they got their food first, and they ate while they worked). If the class was after lunch, HIP took place after school. We sent a letter home explaining everything, and parents had to sign to opt out of it. One or two teachers supervised during HIP so that kids could get help with their homework. We got paid (or got adjunct duty credit?) when we volunteered to work in HIP. Results
I think the program made a little bit of difference for those who cared about their grade, or whose parents cared and were able to motivate their kids in ways that I couldn't. It was a lot of work to manage, though. Some kids would get assigned HIP from multiple classes, so it was hard for them to ever catch up. I found it difficult to get through all the phone calls in my math class because so many students would not do their homework. I believe we only did it one year schoolwide because our principal found another program that he thought would take HIP to the next level. The sixth grade team chose to try it again a few years later, but I don't think they kept it up for more than one year.
Reflections on the HIP Program
I think it would be easier to implement at the elementary school level because 1) most teachers have a self-contained classroom (fewer students to monitor and follow-up on); 2) they have recess to use as HIP or ZAP time (I wish we had that at the middle school—lunch time is not long enough, and having extra socializing time, which is something that the chronic no-homework kids want, would be great incentive to offer them). I do think it has potential to work better in the middle school level if we could streamline the process. It was a paper-based program for us a few years ago. Now all students have online access to their grades and lists of missing assignments. If we could transition to having computer access and online resources available to every student and teacher all day, we might have the tools to make this workflow faster and easier to manage. Also, having a late bus option for those students needing transportation would be helpful.
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TIger Time
We also did something called Tiger Time for a year or two. (Some other schools have variations of this called flex time.) For us, Tiger Time was a 30-minute period at the end of the day that replaced our homeroom at the beginning of the day. For three weeks, students were assigned to go to one of 3 types of classes: 1) study hall, 2) intervention, or 3) enrichment.
Study hall was for students who were missing a lot of homework. This was their time to catch up/complete their homework for the day. The nice thing about having Tiger Time at the end of the day was that they had all their assignments for that day, and there was no excuse for not having anything to do (although they always had to read their AR book if they truly had nothing to do).
Intervention was a chance for students to be retaught so that they could retake an assessment they did poorly on. At the end of the three-week session, they would have an opportunity to retake the assessment for a better grade.
Enrichment was for those students who turned in their homework and performed well in their classes. They had a variety of options to choose from; it all depended on which teachers were offering what classes. Whenever it was my turn to teach enrichment, I taught watercolors. Others had board games, crafts, sports--the possibilities were endless.
The Process
Before the whole program started, teachers were asked if they were interested in teaching an enrichment. This was voluntary, since it would require prepping for another class. No grading was necessary for the enrichment classes. I think everyone was involved with study hall and intervention. These classes were not intended to have extra prep beyond what you would do in the regular classroom. (Study hall was just supervision time, and intervention was on the same topic you taught in the classroom, so technically you should be prepared to reteach for kids who didn’t get it the first time anyway.)
Our students were grouped into teams (in other words, I shared most of the same kids with a certain set of other teachers). Once every three weeks, we would take one of our school meeting times to sit down and decide which kid would attend which type of class.
If we knew a kid did not do well because they were a chronic no-homework person, they got assigned to study hall.
If a kid had a recent assessment to improve on in different classes, we would pick a subject to give priority to. For example, for one round of Tiger Time, we would let the social studies teacher have her choices for social studies intervention. The next round, the English teacher would have priority. We made exceptions as needed. I believe we focused more on the “bubble kids” -- those kids who might just need a little more extra support to get into the passing range. (Three weeks of 30 minutes was a limited amount of time to close huge gaps in skills. I believe we had math/English intervention classes for students with larger gaps in their skills.)
If a kid was doing well in all their classes, they got enrichment.
To assign kids, we had a spreadsheet of every student with columns that we marked to assign them to a class. (This process sounds long and complicated, but it got fast once we knew what we were doing.)
Once every student was assigned, our math/English coaches figured out how many study hall classes, intervention classes, and enrichment classes were needed. They used Mail Merge with the spreadsheets to create little passes that informed students of which class/teacher they would be with for the next round of Tiger Time.
Before the next round of Tiger Time, they pulled out the next set of enrichment kids so they could see the options for enrichment classes and sign up for one.
Results
I think as a whole, our school showed some improvement (although I do not remember the detailed data). There were a number of kids who were improving their grades with the program. The kids liked having the opportunity to earn that extra elective time. It gave us another way to reward students.
There are a lot of logisitics to work out with this program. The principal and academic coaches put in a lot of extra time to make this work and make it easier on us teachers. However, there were still a few teachers who did not buy-in to the program because for them, it either felt like more work (even though intervention was said to be the same amount of work as you would have doing intervention in the classroom, I don’t think many teachers really did intervention in their classrooms because of time and different needs in the classroom) or they often got study hall (because they did not volunteer to do an enrichment) and those kids were not always the best behaved.
I believe we only did it one year schoolwide because our principal leading the program moved to a position at the district office the next year.
Reflections on Tiger Time
I think the program has great potential and I wish we had kept it. I like that it is time built into the school day; you don’t have to worry about keeping kids after school.
I don’t know a lot about PBIS, but I think Tiger Time could go hand-in-hand with PBIS (positive reinforcement for the good behaviors and work ethics). It would also provide intervention opportunities for those falling behind. If we could become a more tech-integrated school, that would facilitate this process and cut out some of the logistical issues. Getting buy-in from the staff would be key.
