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The fact that you have 6 sections and 4 of them have successful students indicates that your 14 years of experience have provided you with strategies that work for the majority of your students. Teaching "repeaters" has the extra challenge of combating the students' mindset that they are not capable, the work is too hard, they don't care, etc. (Often these are defense mechanisms. "If I don't try, I can't fail.") The fact is that you cannot make students do the work and if the students don't do the work, they can't earn passing grades because they have no way of demonstrating that they possess the skills.

That said, I'm wondering how the conferences you've had with the students went. Did you get any indication that they want to pass? Do you have any idea what might motivate them? Did they respond to you at all? Are these students able to graduate without the credit from your class?  Did their parents show any willingness to require that the students spend time at home completing the work (or at least limit what they do with their time until the work is done)? Has your school's counselor been involved in this issue? Do these students who refuse to do any work also refuse to take tests? Are these students failing other classes for refusal to work? If not, maybe talking to their other teachers might help you find motivators for the students.

The information I've read on retention of students shows a consensus that when students repeat a class or a grade, they are unlikely to be successful if everything that happened the first time around remains the same. Doing the same thing twice is not going to yield better results for most people. So changing lessons, assessments, etc. (while still teaching and assessing the needed skills) is likely to produce better results. Even so, the student has to believe there is some personal benefit to being successful, such as a desire to graduate.

I recommend that you read through other topics listed on this discussion board as they address things that might help you discover a key to reaching your failing students, such as strategies for establishing mutually respectful relationships with students, motivating reluctant students, etc. Perhaps something you read will trigger an idea that will help you work with these resistant students.

Hang in there.

When I taught Jr. High, I had a former student who spent a lot of time in inschool suspension. He refused to do any homework outside of the classroom. I came up with an idea of using a savings account. When he was in inschool suspension I would have a packet of work for him to complete. He would do that just to keep busy. It really worked. He ended up with having completed over 100 assignments. More than his class had.  Some years later I moved to the 5th grade. To keep students focused on completing work.....If every student completed all work for the week I would kiss our bullfrog on Friday afternoon to turn him into a handsome prince. He never became the handsome prince but to have your teacher kiss a frog was worth it. Also if they got all work completed and it was winter.....I would take the class outside and make a snow angel. I used many other positive forms of reinforcement over the years.....but these were 2 of the best.

You did not say what grade level you are teaching but it sounds like it is probably high school.  It would be interesting and helpful to know what message you conveyed to the pupils when you conferenced with them and/or their parents.  It sounds as if this is very frustrating for you and you may be feeling some pressure from above if about 25% of your students are refusing to do their work and therefore failing.

Something I found moderately successful when dealing with 6th graders follows.  It may be totally unusable with high school students.  I hope it helps or at least gives you some encouragement.

When I had students who refused to do assignments. I would talk with them individually or in small groups and ask them if they would like to pass the class.  I usually got answers like, "I don't care. It's boring. What do I have to take English for anyway?"  Unless I paid very close attention I would miss the fact that they did not answer my question. They tried to avoid a simple Yes or No when asked, "Would you like to pss this class?"

I just asked again, and again, and again if necessary.  Most students will not, absolutely will not say "I would not like to pass this class." In fact, no student I ever taught said, "I would not like to pas this class."  That is a start.  I now had established that the class meant something to them. They had admitted it.

I would then lead the discussion in the direction of the pupil telling me what he/she would need to do to pass the class.  I did not accept "I need to do my work." which was the usual answer.  I insisted on more specificity.  Here I found a number of differnt situations that had bearing on the student's attitude.

Some had at some time tried doing their work and for various reasons had been unsuccessful.  As Kate said these students had found a way to avoid failure but saw success as elusive.  For them, doing the work did not ensure passing the test.

Some had played around and failed because they simply completed too small a percentge of assignements to achieve a passing average.  They believed they could pass easily but still did not do the work.  This is much like the first group in that they too are avoiding failure by not trying to be successful.  They could cling to the illusion that they really knew how to do it and would not be bothered with demonstrating their mastery.

A third group seemed clearly to be unable to understand the relationship between doing school work and their grades.  When asked what they could do to pass the class ( which they have said they would like to do) they honestly cannot give an answer.

No matter what the situation was it seemed to me that I had to get every one of them to tell me something specific that they believed they could do to pass the class.  I know that sometimes I told them to think about it over night and we would discuss it further the next day. In a big majority of the cases whatever they said they could do really would work.  Most of them knew what they needed to do to pass the class.  Those in the third group who honestly did not know what they needed to do usually just followed the lead of someone else and that was OK.

Once a student began to identify things he/she believed they could to do pass the class we discussed it and analyzed it and evaluated it and realy talked a lot about it.  I did this to convey to the pupil that I thought his/her idea was important and workable and something I could accept.  Pretty soon I had the pupil really arguing on behalf of his/her own idea and trying to convince me to let him/her do it.  I always remained skeptical but eventually I reluctantly agreed that if he/she did what he/she said they woud do and did it well and could show me they had learned the information or skill or idea I would give them a passing grade.

It almost always worked.  The kids now felt they had controlled their destinies.  They had set up something they believed in.  They would work for it.

If you try to do this, please do not give up if at first you do not succeed.  It is hard to do.  If you are indeed working with high school students they will be more difficult to lead than my 6th graders were.  You have 14 years experience and you are a caring and devoted teacher.  You can make it work.  Good Luck!

Richard

There are a variety of approaches that will work to some degree, but I would first make sure that the administrator I was responsible to knew the situation. You do not want to find at the end of the class that you must give passing grades to students who do not deserve them -- as I've been forced to do -- because the administration didn't want to face the problem or its consequences. It's quite possible that at least some of your students think they can get through without doing the work. You don't want to find out that they're right!

Students who are not motivated by grades or the threat of poor grades must be offered meaningful incentives. The most useful approach I've used involves putting kids into teams that compete at a variety of classroom games, and then offering extra rewards to teams that complete their work (classwork or homework). I also offer incentives to individual students, by offering extra points on tests and homework grades to students who meet a set threshold of work that's required. Students often welcome competing on teams in the classroom. If they're chosen carefully - by you -- they can be used for collaboration and competition by turns, and they don't feel so exposed. The greater diversity of games and contests the teams do, the better, so they different student strengths can be employed and exposed.

This requires that you put aside the idea that grades mainly represent academic achievement, but the payoff for the students and you is worth it, I think. I'd much rather give students A's and B's for doing work than F's for not doing it, even if the A's and B's aren't warranted from a purely academic standpoint.

I'd also be willing to adapt the curriculum to assure that the students found the content of the course more relevant, so your adaptations are probably worth continuing. When I found I was teaching high school students who could read only at the 5th grade level, I dropped any ideas I had about what they should know about history, and focused on reading skills. It mattered little whether they retained much of the content; could they understand what we were reading?

Best of luck -- I know just what you're going through!

Excellent comments Matthew.

Matthew, I appreciate your comments about grading. Grading was the biggest challenge of my career. Not assessment, but grading. The subject was under constant debate and revision the first year I taught in 1977 and still continues to be  a hot topic. I agree with you that effort and progress should count. How to count it is the problem that continues to plague the profession. We are told not to grade behavior, but if that behavior is directly tied to academic progress (for example, attention to task, cooperation with partners, work completion) it is academic. I do not think a student should have their grade reduced just because they display challenging behaviors, however. For example, if a student talks back, talks out, etc., that should not reduce their grade, in my opinion, but should be addressed in another fashion. It is a complicated issue, for sure.

Kate,Your comment about grading reminds me, with sorrow, about a young lady I had for sixth grade science in 1989-90.  I do not know what was wrong but during the first 9 week grading period she failed nearly evey test and assignment and finished the 9 weeks with an F.  I was not required to record the 9 week grade numerically but only as an F. 

The remaining three grading periods she did a little better.  She was no great student but made a pretty good  D each grading period.  At the end of the year I had to average the grades according to this formula.  F = 0  D = 1 C = 2 B = 3 A= 4.    Her average was 3/4 or .75.  She had to have at least an .80 to pass and not have to repeat the class.  Because Science was a "Core Subject" failing that meant repeating the 6th Grade.  I appealed it to the principal and he said there was nothing he could do.  The next year the system was changed but she had to repeat the 6th grde becaue she fell .05 points below passing in one class.

The next year she became a truant problem and was pregnant by the end of that year.  I truly feel that the grading system ruined her life.

That was my first year in that school division and my principal was new also.  Neither of us realized that the system had the potential to cause a debacle like this until it was too late.  Had I had any inkling of the problems that could be caused I would definitely have fudged on that first grade and given her at least a D.

You wrote only 5 out of 40 passed.  That means a success rate of 12.5%.  Sounds like there is alot more going on than what you shared with us that needs to be addressed. 

You also wrote you teach 6 sessions with 40 students total, that averages to 6.6 students per session.   With a success rate that dismal and a student/teacher ratio of 6.6:1, have you thought maybe its you and not the students. What has been your success rate the previous 13 years?

Sorry for the bluntness, but we as educators need to hold our profession accountable.

bill, i took her to mean 40 students in the two classes refusing to do work (or 20 per class).... seems, unless it's special ed. or alternative ed. program, more likely 20 per class avg than 6.6.  if not, your point is well taken.

Sorry you are having this problem.  These difficult groups can cause us to re-examine how we teach and give us an opportunity to improve by changing some things or by knowing ways to adapt to particular groups which wind up benefitting all students.

First, I think it's important to review your goals and objectives, then throw out old methods of teaching these objectives in favor of ones that will be more motivational.  Matthew probably had the right approach with his competition and games approach.  "Nothing succeeds like success" in these games, so start simply.  

The potential for discouraged kids to succeed is amazing once they decide they want to do something.  Getting there can be hard and require persistence.  While a change in behavior could begin immediately, it more often takes months for those who are truly discouraged to change.  Thinking about behavior changes, you might want to look into the reward ideas of the behavioral school of class management since these can have immediate effects.  Stress the positive if you can.  Best of luck to you.  Change can be difficult.

Dear Leah,

You're in a tough position with that class! I had an experience that might be helpful. When I taught an 8th grade, all boy's, below grade level, language arts class, I made the rule that the lowest grade on completed homework is a C. I did not accept incomplete homework, but any true attempt to complete the homework would never result in a failing grade. We discussed this thoroughly and often, and the students tested me on it.

This homework was almost always some type of writing. I never dinged them for spelling unless it was one of our current vocabulary words and I made sure to write a positive comment as well as, sometimes, a constructive one. These kids need a lot of coaxing into believing in their own ability to produce something worthwhile. Success on homework assignments gave some of these students the courage to try class assignments too.

This did not work with every student, but it did encourage many of those who were not even trying in order to avoid failing and still allowed those who wanted better than a C grade to excel. These students have told me that they really liked this policy and one even wrote me a thank you letter while he was in high school telling me that finally doing homework made him realize how much it helps him learn. You just know that letter is a career highlight!

Best of luck!

I had good luck with some reluctant learners at the 11th Grade  level once in a history class.  They did not want to do the assignments and I was having no luck coercing them into it.  I finally told them (it was only three or four) that I would give them a grade based solely on the scores they got on the tests and quizzes.  I would not require any other work to be handed in for a grade but if they could pass the tests I would give them the average of their test grades and quiz grades.  Up to the first quiz I saw no change in their behavior and scores were low. When I showed them what scores they woud need to make an A or B after a dismal performance on the first quiz they got busy.  As I recall all of them made A. 

I think they thought they were showing me that they did not need to do homework or study sheets in class.  They were right.  They learned the information I wanted them to learn.  Win Win

I taught special ed. for 14 years in high school.  I had lots of leeway in choice of materials.  What I'd do with these two classes would be to get my hands on 5th or 6th grade literature texts for literature work then hit the real world materials hard.  I found driver's license manuals valuable.  They are available from the Dept. of Motor Vehicles as well as on line for free.  Job applications can be picked up at several stores easily and reproduced.  Medicine inserts, recipes from cookbooks with pictures, instruction manual for computers, iphones, etc. helped.  Assess their understanding of these pieces of information that are important to them (and the lit work they must have which they can read and understand) and you may have more buy-in. 

Leah,

I think I have to suggest that Richard in his post has the right approach to your problem. Ask the right questions that never seem to get asked. "Why are you having a problem with what we are doing?" Richard gets the locus of control away from him and gives it where it needs to be with the student.  He gives them control of the process. One of the problems I have seen is lack of foundation. I was a counselor at an alternative high school, the students were working in the computer lab taking a 450 question personality profile. (not a required project) I was peppered all afternoon with requests to define words!!?? They wanted to do this test but were frustrated by their lack of language. I watched these same students put to sleep in an economics class (required) because his discussion of hours worked in a day was unrelated to their life experience. When I suggested to the teacher that he was not connecting, he was clueless. Ask the questions and listen as Richard did. The students will be amazed if you ask them what they think. Somehow these student began to believe they could not do the work. They seem to have developed patterns of thinking like a deep grove in a record (what are those). They need help to get out of the grove, your reframeing can help.

I used the newspaper a lot and free copies are delivered and available.  Then, perhaps they can try producing one.

Jane, Please hang in there; you are obviously a good teacher if you have taught 14 years and you are smart enough to be a part of this organization!  I taught English for 32 years and many of those were with ninth, tenth, and eleventh graders.  The most challenging were the years and summers with repeaters (one summer with 32 repeating tenth graders, of which 30 were boys and 2 were girls).  I was also dept. head of a dept. of 23 English teachers.  Suggestions that you have received from several of these teachers about varying the materials and techniques are excellent.  I'd add that you should not feel guilty if you do not do the same things that all of your peers are doing because I doubt that all of your peers are in the same teaching situation that you have been assigned (and they are probably counting their lucky stars that they don't have your schedule).

Specifically, I suggest that you try substituting YAL (young adult literature) for the "classics" in the textbook and then use only excerpts from the classics (if they're required).  If your department doesn't have YAL copies, they should have!  In the meantime, push your dept. head to pay for at least 10 copies of a title or find 10 used paperbacks, number them, assign a number to every 2 students to share in each class, READ ALOUD from them (even the cuss words if there are any), and then take them up at end of each class.  If they want their own copy, remind them to use the school or public library.  To support this choice, I recommend this link and book: scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/ALAN/v33n3/gibbons.pdf  FROM HINTON TO HAMLET (Herz and Gallo)

My challenge was also to accept the reality that quanity of classwork completed is not as important as learning literary techniques and elements from whatever students will read.  Also, assignment of homework is often unrealistic in this teaching situation, so make time in class for students to demonstrate and for you to evaluate their learning.  That is where quality instead of quantity of material covered is more important.  Most of all, good luck and focus on the positive results you experience and let go of what others may judge as the negatives.

Hi,  I teach middle school, not high school, but they can be moody too and refuse to do work as well.  I agree with several people who mentioned that the student's perceptions of failure can definitely influence and undermine anything you are doing in your successful sections.  Obviously, what you do usually works. 

I'm wondering if working on the affective side would help rather than just the punitive side.  SIOP structures to support.  Not changing the content, but changing the presentation (be that working more with a partner, more visuals, more group work, more discussion before and after about, how did it go WHILE you were working?)

I know that discussing would take time away from the content at that point, but it might help them change their perceptions and take a risk when the focus is on HOW did it go and what was confusing and difficult? Rather than who finished and didn't.

Those SIOP protocols are really time consuming to prepare, but it might help the students change their thinking and that would allow you to go back to a content focus later.

Just my two cents.

I experience the same thing.  In my 14 years of teaching middle school, it seems that each year is a little worse.  I have 5 sections of Language Arts per day with an average of 27 students in each class.   The classes are leveled based on standardized test scores.  The high level class is not a concern.  They all do their work and get decent grades.  However, they never ask any questions, they never participate in discussions, but they do their work well and get it done on time.  The other classes are middle level classes.  Most of the time somewhere around 5 or 6 students in each of the 4 classes will do their work; the rest do not.  I have students currently with averages of 0% because they do nothing.  Not only do they do nothing, they bring no pencils/pens to class, notebooks/paper, etc.  Others bring some classroom supplies but are so disorganized they can never find their work or paper to write on.  

I have a theory.  The students we are teaching today have been in the public education system since the No Child Left Behind law was enacted.  These children are the product of an educational system based on high stakes testing.  These children have never been taught how to be students or how to learn, because they have been taught nothing but the test and how to take the test.  As a result, many students are not as capable as students of the past.  

You should obviously be fired. Immediately. Students not passing is entirely the Teacher's fault - always. 

All kidding aside, I, too have used the "broken record" approach with unmotivated students and it does work. Keep asking the yes or no question until you get a yes or no. Once they have admitted what they want to themselves - it's not about you - they will start to improve. Yes, you may get a "no", but then you will know exactly where you stand. You can then work on changing that to a yes.

Something which worked in my classrooms:  Post a graph of the comparison of class testing scores for each class.  Explain to the classes where you would like to see them and instill confidence in the students in telling them that you know they can do it.  This will give them a challenge and they can see as a whole class where they need to make improvement.