Those "getting to know you" handouts

Every teacher I know gives a "getting to know you" questionnaire at the beginning of the year, including me! Cleaning up all my papers in June, I'm always surprised at just how much students really told me about themselves in that first week, and how I wished I'd used that information better somehow. What that in mind, here are a few of my ideas about What to ask and How to use the answers.

1. Everyone's got something

For the past 3 years I've asked students the following unexceptional questions:

a). Describe yourself in 3 words: ___________, ___________, ____________
b). Describe school in 3 words: ___________, ___________, _____________
c). What's something you're really good at?
d). What's something you wish you were really good at?
e). What do you want to do "when you grow up?" (or what do you definitely NOT want to do?).

I've often been surprised by their interesting answers. "I can swim a technically perfect butteryfly", "I wish I were better at controlling my will", "I want to be a physical anthropologist (!)", "I know how to breed giant tortoises".

I make an overhead for each question with an anonymous jumble of answers. Even though most juniors and seniors recognize each other by the time I get them, they don't really know each other. I find that sharing the responses helps creates a really positive atmosphere of excitement and curiosity about each other. Also, the parents at back to school night love seeing the answers as well.

2. All I had to do was ask

One year on the back of my expectations form I also asked:

a). Which of these expectations do you think you'll have the most trouble with?
b). What can I do to help you succeed?

Common responses include "always doing the homework", "not being tardy", but also things like "I have trouble asking for help when I need it" and "I have trouble working in groups". These provide great heads' up for all kinds of things. The answers to part (b) are typically less useful, but sometimes can be a real help. Every now and then you'll get a student with some really bad habits who actually asks you to be really tough on them, which is a great point to come back to with them later.

3. Matchmaking

Something I haven't tried but would like to is asking the students something like this:

(a) Circle things you're pretty good at
(b) Underline things you still struggle with

The list could include specific math topics, more general skills, and "soft skills" like working with others, explaining your thinking verbally or in writing, asking good questions, etc.

Aside from providing a very rough pre-assessment of knowledge, this information could be used for creating working pairs, or surreptitiously choosing warm-up problems to boost the confidence/status of particular individuals.

Another nice question for designing working groups might be to ask about working style. Something like:

(c) Rate how much each statement applies to you:
I like to work by myself.
I like to explain my thinking out loud.
I like to have someone explain their thinking to me.
I like to try things myself, but have someone close-bye to help if I get stuck.
etc.

Clearly there's a lot of ways to get at this, and I don't particularly like this version, but that's the general idea.

4. Stealing ideas through the students

One year I asked:

(a) What are things that teachers n your past have done that really helped you learn?

I've gotten all kinds of great suggestions from this one. The opposite question of what to avoid is usually less helpful as students say things like "don't be boring".

Something that has worked for me, however, is asking students at the end of the first week

(b) What about the class is "working for you" (helping you learn)
(c) What about the class isn't working for you? What could I change?

Last year, students told me that I should: "slow down", "do more examples more slowly", and "give us more chances to do examples at the board." Obviously not all suggestions will be consistent with your goals or values, but the students are telling you something that needs paying attention to. Maybe their suggestions reveal that they don't understand what you expect of them in the same way you do.

On my end-of-the-year suggestion form for students, I noticed that some of their suggestions were the same as the ones they gave me in that 1st week (ouch!). I tried, but clearly it wasn't enough. Next year I'm thinking of re-phrasing some student suggestions I want to work at and having them all rate my success every few days so I can tell if I'm getting better.

5. Actually doing something

All that said, the main challenge I have isn't asking the questions but actually doing something with the data. Without a specific plan (typically including dates) it's too easy to file the answers away until June cleaning. Two other practical issues are the sheer time involved in compiling some of the data, and finding a useful and accessible format to put it in for when I need it. That's all a little much for the denouement of a post, so I'll leave those details until next year when I actually try to implement some of these again.