Student Contributor: A. Penrose
Classroom scouts can be used during whole class or group work activities. Students are randomly selected, or scheduled to be the scouts for the day and are in charge of looking for students who are following classroom expectations. Scouts will have the opportunity to give a shout out to a peer that they think did a good job of following expectations.
Students who are selected as scouts for the day, or for a lesson, sit in the back of the group so that they have a full view of their peers making it easy for them to observe behaviors. It is important to always give students the option to “pass” on being a scout if they are selected. Including scouts in the classroom should not take away from the scouts learning and it is important to discuss the role of a scout while also explaining that they still need to be engaged and participate in the lesson/activity. Using student scouts is a great way to help monitor behaviors but it also allows scouts to see what it looks like when expectations are followed and life skills are demonstrated. We have used scouts in my placement and students really enjoy getting to be a scout because of the responsibility that comes along with it and my students love giving each other shoutouts. I have not had any students be disengaged because they are a scout I just mentioned that it may be important to address this with the class because I can see where there would be a case where some students focus too hard on having to pick someone.
I put this in the corrective phase because scouts can be implemented if expectations are not being met and the students take part in recognizing good behavior. This tool provides students with the opportunity to shout out their classmates for exhibiting good behavior but it also makes assess if they are being honest with their decision of who they want to shout out. It is possible that students shout out their friends but in my experience this didn’t happen very often. This management tool can also be a part of the supportive phase because when selecting students to shout out they can specify which life skill students modeled during their observation.
More Information –
Tool Source: Project GLAD
http://projectgladstudy.educationnorthwest.org/files/observation-protocol.pdf
