Heads or Tails Tuesday!

Today's HoT theme is direction or directing...

I was unsure as to which direction to go with this tonight. I could talk about my feeble attempts at directing freshmen in very rough reading/performance of Romeo and Juliet. I could talk about the direction the economy seems to be going (down) or the direction airline prices are definitely going (up). I could talk about how great I am at following driving directions but how bad I am at remembering them (it takes me forever to remember how to get certain places...even if I have been there more than once.) I could even talk about which direction I would like to go for vacation (south, please)...but I won't.

Instead, I am going to talk about direction change in my classroom...in the manner of desks.

I found that the quickest way to mess with kids is just to move the desks. Over Spring break I went in and rearranged everything and faced the desks in a new direction. You should have seen the kids faces when they came in that Monday--they didn't know what to do. I was blown away that a simple direction change could stop thirty 14 year olds in their tracks. I directed all of them to sit anywhere (for the time being) and many of them remained rooted to one spot...obviously confused by the fact that:

1. There was a new seating arrangement
2. I didn't have a seating chart planned out for them yet.

Eventually they got over the change and they have since adapted to the new direction. I guess now I know how to get their attention. Funny. I never thought something that a simple desk direction change could be my best classroom management tool.

Someone should put that in a college course...