Ever tried staying comprehensible while teaching that class — the one fueled by chaos, sarcasm, and an Olympic-level side-eye game? Yeah, this one’s for you.

🎯 Ready to see how your CI skills stack up? Take the CI Proficiency Quiz and find out your level at https://imim.us/ciquiz. You might surprise yourself… or confirm everything you’ve suspected since last Tuesday’s fire drill.

In this solo episode, Scott dives headfirst into the glorious disaster known as “THAT class.” From Bathroom Kid and Eye-Roll Expert to the art of pretending everything’s fine while silently screaming inside — this one’s equal parts therapy, humor, and hope for every teacher who’s ever ended class whispering, “At least no one cried.” Expect real talk, survival strategies, and a reminder that even chaos can be comprehensible… mostly.

💡 Want ready-to-use CI lessons that don’t make you lose your mind? Grab the CI Survival Kit — fresh, funny, and classroom-ready lessons every month at https://imim.us/kit.

#ComprehendTHIS, #CITeacher, #LanguageTeachers, #WorldLanguage, #TeachingPodcast, #TeacherHumor, #ComprehensibleInput, #SpanishTeachers, #TeacherLife, #CISurvivalKitHosts:

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Class Reset Questions - https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Tgv_OoD5Df-cM5Vz4Fcc6T6KbjBWOPWt/view?usp=sharing

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Host: Scott Benedict — Immediate Immersion

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Hello and welcome to...

Comprehend this

podcast, I'm going solo today.

So have you ever had that class?

You know, that one that feels like

teaching inside a tornado

made of teenage side-eye

and missing pencils?

Yeah, that one.

This week it's just me flying solo.

No guests, no backup, no

emotional support co-host.

Just one teacher trying to

make sense of that class.

We're talking chaos management, bathroom

kid, eye-roll expert and how to keep your

sanity when the vibe is crowd control

instead of comprehensible input.

So grab your caffeine, lower your

expectations and let's commiserate

because if you've ever

ended class thinking, well, no one cried.

So that's a win.

This episode's for you.

Let's go ahead and get started right

after these messages.

Ever feel like you're clinging to the

edge of your teacher

planner, just hoping today's

lesson magically appears?

Enter the CI Survival Kit, a monthly

membership made for

teachers who love comprehensible

input but also love not reinventing the

wheel every Sunday night.

Each month you get fresh, ready to use

lessons, time-saving tools

and just enough structure

to keep your teaching life together.

No stress, no guilt, just monthly help

from someone who gets it.

Sign up at mm.us.survival and let the

Survival Kit do the

heavy lifting for once.

Welcome to Comprehend This, Real Talk for

Real Language Teachers.

No drills, no dry theory, just honest

stories, practical ideas

and a reminder you're not

alone in the CI trenches.

Let's dive in.

And welcome back.

How's everybody doing today?

As always, if you have any questions or

comments, go ahead and

please put them in the chat or

in the comment box.

I will be glad to answer any questions

you have, address your

comments as we go along.

I'm going solo today, so we

don't have any guest hosts.

We'll have some new

guest hosts next week.

Excuse me.

But for this one, we

don't have any guest hosts.

So let's go ahead and

just get started here.

That class, everybody has had that class.

That one class that either has too much

energy or not enough

energy or they're unpredictable,

they're moody, all kinds of things.

And let me tell you, oh, I

have had a whopper of a class.

Last year I talked about coming back to

high school and I had

some problems with my first

semester and I made some changes and my

second semester went

swimmingly after that.

And then comes this fall.

Oh my gosh, I have a class.

And let me start how our school works.

So we're on a four by four, which means

that we have four classes

per semester and we cover

a year's worth of

material in one semester.

So the kids take eight classes a school

year, four first

semester and then four second

semester.

Teachers teach three out of four.

The fourth class would

be their prep period.

So I have this class and I am teaching,

this year I have a weird schedule.

I'm teaching two level ones, Spanish, and

then my third class

is building foundations

for success.

I have no experience teaching this class.

They signed me up for it.

I had to teach it has

nothing to do with Spanish.

And so that was just a

challenge all on its own.

But my second Spanish one class has been

challenging from the first

minute of the very first day.

I kid you not.

I start classes the same way.

So I had a first period.

I had a second period.

My first period went perfectly just like

I would expect a first day to go.

My second period, I had challenges from

the get go from the moment.

So it wasn't about not

building relationships.

It wasn't because they didn't like how I

taught or they didn't

like me or they didn't have

a chance to say they didn't like Spanish.

They came in with their preconceived

notions as they came into my classroom.

So they came in wanting

to not like the classroom.

Guten Morgen.

Skating Frau.

I think that's how you're

supposed to pronounce that.

Welcome, welcome, welcome.

Guten Morgen.

So right from that very, very, very get

go, I had issues with them.

They didn't want to

sit in assigned seats.

They wanted to do what they wanted to do.

I had blurters.

I had two blurters that just blurted

everything, just interrupted.

And if they weren't blurting directly at

me, they were blurting

across the room to their

friends.

I mean, usually on that, you get like a

week at least before the

kids start actually causing

problems before they start waking up and

becoming themselves.

They like to feel out the class, not this

class from the day one.

We have, because of state law, we have

strict cell phone policies.

They're not allowed to

have their cell phones out.

So a lot of us have lock boxes.

They refuse to put their

phones in the lock box.

My first period, my

third period, not a problem.

They went right in

the lock box right away.

Second period, nobody.

I even bribed them with candy with little

snack packs of Sour

Patch Kids, which is what

they liked.

I could not get them to put

their phones in the lock box.

Not only that, they would take the phones

out and blatantly use them.

They would complain

about everything in class.

I asked for the cell phone

because if I see it, I take it.

For the first time, I had kids absolutely

refuse and refusing is

an automatic suspension

at our school, but they still did it.

I just never had so many challenges.

They came in looking for

a fight every single day.

That was that class, cussing out of

control, using the N word out of control.

None of these kids wanted to be here and

it showed and they showed.

These are freshmen.

They're just starting their high school

careers and they are

giving so much resistance.

Let me correct that.

It's not every student in my class.

Because of the nature of where I work, I

work with career and technical academy.

I don't have as normal sized classes as

everybody else because

they have to pair them up with

the academy class that they're in.

They have to come to a different campus

than the main campus.

My class size was 18 and I had about

seven of those kids were

my challenging kids, seven

of them in different ways.

The blurters, the cussers, the N worders,

the refused to give

up the cell phone, the

ones who refused to sit in their seats.

That was all of it.

I struggled.

I'm telling you, this is like my 24, 25,

I can't remember anymore.

I'm getting so old.

This was a struggle for me

like I've never had before.

I thought last year where I only had a

few kids who were

troublemakers, this time it's

not.

I had a lot of them and all in one class

and nothing was getting done.

I would ask questions, crickets.

I would try to get

them to engage crickets.

I would get them to play, find new games

for them to play, crickets.

They weren't having any of it.

No matter what I tried,

they did not want to do it.

Any of you have that same situation?

If so, put in an emoji in the comments

and let me know that

you've had one of these classes

or somewhat similar to this because I'm

telling you, I was frustrated.

I didn't know what to do because what I

was doing in my first

period was working beautifully

like it usually does, but

this class just wasn't having it.

I made personalized stories that put

those kids as stars of the stories.

They didn't care.

I'm telling you everything that I tried.

I tried positive postcards.

I tried positive emails.

I tried positive phone calls home.

I gave them points that they can use

rewards for candy and

other things like that.

I tried points for parties.

All of these things were

utter failures with these kids.

They just did not want any part of what

we're doing, not any part of it at all.

They wanted nothing to do

with what was going on in class.

And I didn't know what to do to fix it.

I had no idea on how to fix it because

everything I tried just wasn't working.

I needed to find a way to reach these

students so that I

could find a way through.

So I wanted the other kids, at least

those seven kids, they

don't know how to do school.

They didn't want to do school.

They're having trouble, not just in my

class, but in all of their classes.

My secondary goal was to try

to find a way to reach them.

But my primary goal was to reach the rest

of the class and get

them to be able to learn.

I didn't want them to have to suffer

because of the schedule that they got.

And it was difficult.

Excuse me.

What I had to do is

go back to the basics.

I went back to the basics and I'm going

to tell you, I was out of ideas.

I would go in and I know

I've told you this before.

Chat GPT is my

wonderful teacher assistant.

I use it for a lot of things and I used

it to try to give me

ideas to help these kids

become more engaged in class.

So I went in and chat GPT

and I described my class.

I didn't put kids' names in there

obviously for privacy

reasons, but I would put, "I have

the blurter," and I

would put what he would do.

I had the inappropriate talker who used

not only sexual talk but

cursing and the N-word.

Put that in there.

I put in there, "I have kids refuse to

sit in their assigned

seats like openly refuse

and will not move and will not budge."

I had kids about the cell phones.

I put all of the problems I had and I

asked chat GPT for help

and it gave me some great

strategies.

Some worked, some did not.

As I'm progressing through the semester,

I'm trying these new

strategies, trying new games,

ways to engage them, ways to

reward them, different things.

A lot of things that came was very

straightforward stuff, stuff

that we all know about and we

try.

I tried those.

I went back and said, "I've done those

and they still don't work."

I've done what I ended up doing in the

past, but when you don't

do something for a long

time, it kind of escapes your mind.

It's not on top of mind.

That's what happened with this particular

strategy that I tried.

Chat GPT brought it back to me.

What I had done is I was just getting

frustrated because my kids

needed to learn and I wanted

my kids to be successful, but the issues

were they weren't and

they were resisting me at

every chance.

CI wasn't really working when I wasn't

getting the engagement that I wanted.

I went back to what

Blaine Ray always did.

If they didn't want to do CI, we'll go

back to the textbook and

you try it temporarily.

I brought the textbook out.

We started working on it

and we did it for two weeks.

Just like I suspected, even more lack of

engagement, even more frustration.

They weren't learning from the textbook.

We know the textbook

doesn't really teach very well.

I would give the instructions and then I

would tell them to work

on so many exercises and

then I would create them and work with

them and walk around and

help them, but a lot of

kids were more and more disengaged and

they didn't like the textbook.

I knew they wouldn't.

After I have done that two weeks and I'm

telling Chat GPT what I'm

doing, it reminded me of

something I have had to do maybe once or

twice in my career and

that was a classroom reset.

What we did is we took two days.

It took two days and I said, "Okay, I

know you're not happy.

I'm going to be honest with you.

I'm not happy either."

I was completely honest.

I opened up and I said, "You know what?

I like my job.

I like teaching kids and I like all of

you, but I hate this class.

I dread coming into this classroom every

single day just like you do."

The kids were nodding their heads.

I'm like, "Many of you come in wanting to

fight right from the

beginning and it wasn't

because you didn't like me, because you

did that on the day one,

the very first day before

you even knew me.

You came in with a fight on your hands."

We were honest.

After talking to them, I

said, "I want you guys to learn.

I want you guys to pass high school and

many of you already as

freshmen are not on the

path to graduating high school.

We need to fix this."

I gave them like 10

reflection questions about the class.

They could be completely honest with no

repercussions as long as

they were being respectful and

didn't call out anybody's names.

They could say, "I was having problems

with this particular

student or this particular

student was doing this, this, this that

didn't help me learn,"

but without calling names.

I knew who those kids were, so I didn't

even need to call the names out.

I wanted them to be honest and I gave

them about 20 minutes to

answer these questions,

get some ideas, get some things.

These were questions

like, "What isn't working?

Why do you think it's not working?"

Or, "What could we do as a

class to make this better?

What are you frustrated by?"

Just no common questions to get them to

really think about the

class and how we can make

changes to it.

I said, "Tell me, be honest.

Don't tell me what you

think I want to hear.

Tell me what your truth is.

Nobody's going to get in

trouble for this at all.

It's just the, "I need this honest

feedback so we can make it better."

We did this class reset.

Then I went through and I read every

single answer that they

wrote and I commented back

on every single one.

There was like 10 to 20 questions.

I can't remember exactly how many

questions it was, but they did it.

They did it in my formative.

I used formative for everything.

They put it in there.

I read it.

I sent them comments back.

The next day, I gave them time to read

those comments that I wrote.

I addressed some of the comments that

they wrote in there

anonymously, of course, about

things that they brought up.

I addressed all of those.

I explained some of the things, why I do

certain things and

some of the things that

they wanted wasn't going to happen

because of this, that, and that.

Like they, "Please let

us sit by our friends."

I'm like, "I love to have you sit by your

friends, but let's be honest.

You guys aren't doing the work when you

sit with your friends.

You're just goofing off."

That is a problem.

What was some other

thing they said they wanted?

I can't remember they said something that

was there, but I can't

remember what it was.

It was obviously not going to happen.

We went through all of this, and then I

gave them a plan based on

what they wrote and what

I needed from them in class.

We came up with some

new classroom reset rules.

I didn't think about this before, but I'm

going to do it right now.

Let me pull up what they were.

I've got to pull up my lesson

plans from a couple weeks ago.

Spanish one.

Let's see.

So it was probably here.

Let me see if this is the right one.

Maybe this wasn't the right lesson plan.

Sorry.

Give me just a moment while I find it.

Okay.

So it wasn't that week.

That was week 11.

So maybe it was week 12.

Okay.

Here it is.

Week 12.

Let me tell you the steps I did.

First of all, what we did was

we did the reset reflection.

We had a reset conversation.

Then this part was

setting the new expectations.

Here is the

expectations that we came up with.

We talked about them.

Here they are.

Here were the Spanish class reset rules.

Let me see if I...

No, it's going to be too hard.

Okay.

So sit in your assigned seat.

No switching.

No trading or wandering in easy win.

Don't stay in jail or out of sight.

If it's out, it goes to

jail till the end of class.

No warnings.

Three, listen when someone's talking.

Me, your classmates.

It doesn't matter who.

Respect equals quiet.

Four, be part of the

class or work silently.

We're going to talk

about that in just a moment.

You choose.

Participate or stay chill and quiet.

No drama.

Follow directions the first time.

It's faster for everyone, including you.

And we keep it calm, clean and kind.

No side talk.

No shade.

No chaos.

We've got things to do.

Bottom line.

You control your choices.

I control the environment.

Let's make this less

miserable for everyone.

And so I went with that.

And then I put that on a.

On a form.

And getting it was informative.

They had all the things

they could read through.

And I said, do you

agree to follow these rules?

Or no, I don't agree

to follow these rules.

And if they wrote no, they had to write

why they didn't agree.

Well, everybody bought in and I have no

record because everybody's recorded with

they're saying, yes, I agree.

And so we started class

with this new mindset.

Now, in the past, I hadn't ever done this

part of this reset before.

And this reset is

different from previous resets.

I mean, you've got to look at the kids

that you're in and with the kids that you

have and deal with those particular kids.

So what you did three years

ago doesn't necessarily work.

So I adjusted my reset plan to.

To this particular class.

Again, I follow the same.

The same steps in my reset because I

going back to my reset

steps, if I can find them.

There they are.

Reset reflection, reset conversation,

expectations, and a class contract.

Those steps are all the same, but what

that reflection looks

like, what that conversation

looks like, and what the expectations

look like, that's where things change.

Based on the kids you

have in front of you.

Now, this part I've not done before and

the chat should be suggested.

And I said, well, I will

try it and it's been working.

So be a part of the

class or work silently.

That means the students

have two choices every day.

Option one, be a part of the class.

Join in, listen, answer, laugh

appropriately, and do the activities.

You don't have to be perfect.

Just be present and respectful.

Or two, work silently.

If you're not feeling it that day, that's

fine, but you can't distract others.

You'll do your work quietly and let

everyone else focus.

No talking, no phones, no side shows.

You get to choose your level of

participation, but you

don't get to choose chaos.

And I wasn't sure how

this was going to work.

So I went through and I found activities

that my kids could do silently.

In my previous schools where we didn't

use the textbook, I would

have had to create these

or find them from previous class years.

I save everything I do, so I wouldn't

have to recreate the

wheel, but I could use previous

stories and questions and stuff that my

kids did not have that I

didn't use for this year's

kids.

But because I had the textbook, what I

did is I printed out all

the workbook activities.

I made a packet.

I'll tell you what, it's probably got 32

pages and I print two to

a side of paper, so I get

four on each piece of paper.

So it's a little packet.

And when I ask at the beginning of class,

so right after

attendance, I mean right after

our warmup, I'll say, okay, I ask every

kid and it takes a

couple of minutes, but this

way I'm getting that commitment.

I go through my attendance sheet and I

say, John, are you going

to be part of the class

today or you want to work silently?

And they tell me, then I go, Sally, do

you want to be part of

the class today or you

want to work Sally?

So I'm getting the

commitment right off the bat.

And that's important because they're

going to now get in the

mindset that they either are

doing option one or

they're doing option two.

If they choose to do option two, they

either they get the

packet, I'll write their name on

the packet and I'll

hand them that packet.

And it's a daily decision.

Now, during class period, if something

goes wrong and let's say

they're talking or they're

not participating or they're not, I'm

just going to say, I

need you back on board or I

can get your packet for you.

And nine times out of 10, they come back

on board and we're good.

But sometimes it's like, you know, I'm

just not feeling it today.

Give me the packet.

So I'll give them the packet.

If it's if they've already had the

packet, I've collected it already.

I give it back to them.

The one they've already had or if they're

a brand new packet

user, they get a new packet

with their name on it.

At the end of class, they put the packet

in the turn in basket

and then I will grade the

work that they did for that class period.

I'll keep the packet again

until they ask for it again.

And it's been working.

It keeps the kids who just can't focus or

can't whatever out of

disrupting the rest of the

class.

And it's their choice.

It's not a punishment.

I say it with a

straight face with no emotion.

It's up to them.

They're still getting language practice,

not the best language

practice that they're

choosing the worksheets instead, but at

least they're getting it.

And I'm fulfilling my job of getting them

to learn what it is

that they need to learn.

And they're not

distracting the rest of the kids.

And so that was really,

really important for me.

The other thing that I did was if they

choose not to participate, so they're not

participating actively and they're not

participating doing the worksheets.

I tell them if you choose not to person,

can I speak this morning, participate?

There's a three strike system.

You always have choices in this class,

but choices come with

results, not surprises, not

drama, just clear steps.

So the first time it's a reminder,

something like I'll

quietly say, like, Hey, you can

join in or work silently.

Your choice, no lecture, no attitude,

just my warning that they're off track.

Fix it and we move on easy.

Strike two, a seat

change and silent work.

If it happens again, you'll move to a

quiet spot and work on your own.

No phone, no talking, no side comments.

You're still

responsible for the assignment.

This is your reset zone.

Take it and chill.

And the third parent

guardian contact and a behavior log.

If they still choose not to participate

or distract others, I'll log it.

I'll contact home.

If this happens three times in a week,

I'll also loop and admin for support.

No surprises.

That's the line.

And I tell them the bottom line is you

control your choices.

I control the learning environment.

Let's keep it fair, calm

and consistent for everyone.

And that has been working.

I haven't had to write anybody up or make

any, um, parent contacts as of yet.

And I think we're in

second week of doing this reset.

So it has been working.

Now, the other things I had to address

where I have frequent bathroom users.

And we talked about this before and I

told you last year, I

came up with bathroom

passes, something I've never had to do

before because, um, my kids were taking

advantage of my system, but the bathroom

pass I came up with

last year were getting

to be a mess to handle.

The kids would lose them all the time.

Um, they were small.

It just was more of a

hassle than it was worth.

So I came up with a new

bathroom pass system for my kids.

So they still have to sign out with me,

but how they do that is

I give them a calendar,

a calendar for, for the month.

So they'll get a calendar for October.

They got a calendar just

last week for November.

And when they want to go to the bath,

because I don't like

them raising their hand and

asking cause it interrupts class.

They just come up, they

drop the paper on my desk.

I will sign it.

I will put a time stamp on it.

And then they pick it

up when they're done.

They go take the pass.

They go to the bathroom.

And I still limit five passes and I can

see if they've used the

five passes where when

they turned in the little slips of paper,

they only had five,

but they were swapping

them with other kids.

So some kids were taking 10 passes while

other kids were not having any passes.

There was all kinds of issues.

So this worked really well.

And then I could let them know they've

already three ago,

you're on number three.

You've only got two left and we still got

two weeks left of class of the month.

So that really, really helped.

Um,

once I got everybody to agree to the

bathroom passes, that has been working.

The contract that I had the kids sign, if

they are breaking it,

like I've asked them

to move their seat because they're not

sitting there

assigned seat and they start

to give me gruff about it, I say,

remember, we had an agreement.

Everybody has to sit in their assigned

seats to do their work.

If they still give me

objections, then we deal with it.

I'll take them outside.

I'll talk to them,

explain what the problem is.

And if I have to, I

might make a deal with them.

I go, if you can get your work done or

participate actively participate in class

for maybe three days or maybe even four

days, I'll let you sit next to your

friend for Friday, but then we have to go

back to our assigned seat on Monday, make

these kinds of deals with them.

The other thing is mental.

I had to change my

mentality because I'm not kidding.

I have had some tough classes and I used

to teach a class in middle school where

the kids were all behavior problems, all

in the same room, all at the same time.

It was done by design.

So they wouldn't be mixing in, distracting all the other kids.

And I drew the first year I

taught that I absolutely dreaded.

It was horrible, but I lied to myself

until it became true.

And I said, I love this class.

It's my favorite class.

I told them they were my

favorite class every single day.

And then we tell me, guess what, profane,

you said it to all of your classes.

And I made sure that I did not.

And they tested it because I was a little bit more than I did. And they tested it because they would ask

kids from other of my classes, who was my

favorite class?

And I told my other class that my peer,

that period was my favorite class.

That first, it was my first period.

I said, my first period is my favorite

class, even though it was with a whole

bunch of challenging kids for all kinds

of different reasons.

Um, and I made them believe it until I

believed it as well.

Now my other classes, I would say, Oh,

you are my, um, most engaged class.

I said anything but favorite.

And my kids started to believe that they

were my favorite class.

And then I started to believe that they

were my favorite class.

And we came together as

a team working together.

So that mindset is really important.

So I go into that class saying, this is

going to be a great day.

I love these kids. I love this class.

It's going to be awesome.

Instead of complaining about it.

And it's a mindset

shift and it takes a while,

but it does work when you

feel good about the class,

the kids see that you feel good about the

class and the energy changes.

So you have to be in

that right mindset and you

can't take it personally nine times out

of 10. It's not you.

Why they're behaving this

way. They have issues at home.

They have issues with

friends. They don't do school. Well,

there's so many things going on in

today's kids' lives.

You can't take it personally.

So you have to find a way to love every

one of these kids, no matter what,

so that you can have the

energy to teach them the best way

that you know how. And lastly, I know

I've been talking a lot.

We're going to end pretty soon here. If

you have any questions or comments,

please share them.

I know I'm not the only one who has

classes like this and you may not have it

every year or every semester, but you've

had a couple of them in your career.

The last thing I want to talk about is

just celebrating tiny wins.

So whatever is a win when you have

something that happens

and it might be small,

might just be there were

no tears that day and only,

we had partial participation

rather than no participation.

That is the win and let's celebrate it.

So then I will go into the

next day or at the end of class,

like class, that was a good

class. Was it our best? Not yet,

but it was better than yesterday.

Skatin Frow says, would you be willing to

share that reset reflection with us?

Yes, I will. Let me actually,

let me go ahead and see if I can get that

done right now before I forget.

Let's see. And for those who are

listening in a podcast,

I'll put it in the show

notes. I got to find it here first.

I do everything

informative. So I've got to

go there first. Let's see. Where's my

class? There's my class reflection.

And while I'm doing

it, let me just say, um,

what the questions were. I can tell those

cause I can look it up right here.

And there weren't as many questions as I

thought there were. There's,

I think there, there

are only six. So I said,

how are you feeling about this class

right now? Honest version,

not the one you think I want to hear. Be

nice, but be honest.

What makes it hard for you to focus or

stay engaged in here?

What's one thing I could do differently

that would make it easier for you to

learn or participate?

Please don't put things like let us play

on our phones or sit with our friends.

Be realistic. What can I do to actually

help you focus and learn?

What's one thing you could do differently

to help this class go better for

everyone, including you.

And when class is going well,

what's happening? What are people,

including you doing that helps it work?

Anything else you want me to know, even

if you think I don't, I won't like it.

So those were the

questions. Let me go ahead and

rent this to a PDF. Let's do that.

Print as a PDF.

Let's see. Class reset questions.

Put that in my

account.

I'll get a share link here. Just a

second. Class reset questions.

There it is.

Anyone with a link copy link done. Okay.

So here it is.

I put it in the comments

for those who are watching on

YouTube, but I will go ahead and also put

it in the link in the show notes so you

can get that for yourself as well.

I didn't grade this by the way either. I

just gave it to them.

I told them it wasn't going to be graded,

but I want it honest,

but respectful answers. And

they, they lived up to that.

So that was really good.

And thank you for asking that was a great

question. Skate and frown.

Um,

just celebrate those tiny wins. Every

little win says, you know,

you guys, you were quiet

today. That was the win.

Skating process. Thanks. I

wish more were watching with me.

I have that one class that makes me cry

on the regular. Yep. Um, yeah,

we don't usually get a lot of viewers.

We've got about five or six

right in the six right now. Um,

live on Sundays, but we

usually get a lot on the replays.

So that's where a lot

of them will be watching.

I'll see we'll watch it

get bigger and bigger.

Sunday mornings are always

hard for a lot of people,

but with the time changes is always hard

for me to find a good time that works

with everybody. So, um, it,

it will be available on YouTube so you

can rewatch for those who, um,

missed it live or miss part of this. And

also it will be out.

I'll be sending it

out to the podcasts. Um,

smooth we're done here sending it out

there, but thank you. Yes.

I wish as well cause every,

I everybody's had this

problem one time or another,

at least one time in their career,

but we want to celebrate those wins and

every little win, you know, guys,

half of you

participated today. That's the win.

Let's try to get at least one more kid to

participate tomorrow or

uh, you know, seven of you

turned in your phones today.

Can we get eight or nine tomorrow? If we

can get nine tomorrow,

then I will do this for you on the next

day. We can have, you know,

10 minutes of free time or, um,

I'll bring candy in for the class or I'll

bring cookies in or something like

that. Sometimes you've got to bribe them.

You know, PBIS does work sometimes.

And so do what you've got to do, but you

celebrate those wins.

You can't wait for it to be a full

success cause that's not going to happen

right away.

You take those small wins and show them

that they're progressing and

every little step along the way helps.

And that's what's really,

uh, what really work. And they,

they start to see that I'm

like, Oh my gosh, guys, look,

this happened, you know, we got everybody

turned in their cell phones today.

That is awesome. That is awesome.

We're going to go and show, um, 20

minutes of a movie tomorrow,

something like that.

Whatever you can do, or, Oh my gosh,

every turn on their phones, I'm going to

buy all of you donuts tomorrow.

We'll buy a, you know,

every class gets donuts,

something like that to

get them really excited,

find something they really,

really love and celebrate those wins.

Give those big jackpot prizes for big

wins. Like all the cell phones,

those incremental wins, a

few minutes of free time,

we'll help them with that.

Maybe a piece of candy, you know,

like some a Jolly Rancher or that,

or a little snack packs

of gummy bears or, um,

Sour Patch Kids cause those are their two

favorite things that they like.

So, um, those little, like the Halloween

packs are what I'm talking about.

Not like the snack packs like that.

The little tiny things you buy multiple

in the bag for Halloween.

Those work really, really well.

Find what works for your kids and

celebrate those tiny wins.

But the biggest thing, the

biggest thing is your mindset.

They reflect off of you.

If you don't have a good mindset going

into your class, neither will they.

And you're going to have to lie to

yourself in the beginning.

Like I did for that

class. I said that first class,

many years ago. Um, I

like, Oh, I love this class.

I love this class. And I did not. I, you

know, in the beginning,

it was really tough, but eventually guess

what really happened.

I did love that

class. We bonded together.

And one thing that I did that I had never

done with a class before

is I took this class on a

field trip. It was a local one.

We have a local Mexican restaurant,

right? Um, a couple blocks down from,

um, maybe the half a

mile, um, from our school.

And so I said,

you guys are the only class I've ever

taken on a field trip.

And we're going to go to a Mexican

restaurant and we're

going to have lunch and

you get to take lunch and you're going to

skip the class after lunch.

So that was for us fifth

period. Um, no, yeah, fifth period.

So they took, yeah, fifth. I'm trying to

remember that schedule.

It's been so long. Um, so we took lunch

and we took fifth period

and partially six periods. I said,

you'll be coming back in the middle of

sixth period and they had seven periods.

So, and then they had seven period and

they liked it because these kids didn't

really like school. So they were getting

out of class. We walked over there.

We had two other chaperones with me. We

had a really good time.

The kids enjoyed it. And the next year I

had that class again.

And a couple of those kids repeated that

class with me and they're like, Oh no,

we're not doing that again.

Next year. He goes, that was us.

That was our special thing for being a

good class last year.

And nobody else is

going to replicate that.

They were really proud that they had

earned that. And so that was a win.

So there's going to be days that you're

not going to like all your classes.

It just is the way that it is.

And there are those classes that are

going to drive you bonkers.

That's just the way that it is,

but your attitude in the way that you

handle it can make

changes for the better.

We're near the end of

the semester for me.

We end this semester

middle of December, right?

When we go for winter break.

So I've only got four weeks left with

these kids and then finals week.

So five weeks left with

these kids. So it came late.

I should have done it earlier, but the

class reset really has helped.

And it made everybody

focus on the behavior,

the atmosphere and everything.

So I can't highly recommend that enough.

And then also use chat GPT to help you.

If you have a stubborn kid

that you don't know how to,

what you can do to help this kid or how

you can better handle this situation,

chat GPT doesn't always

get it right. We know that,

but it can give you

ideas. It can make you think,

it can give you other perspectives.

So put in all the details.

Don't put any personal information in

there and let it give

you some suggestions.

And if you don't like the suggestions,

it's a chat. Tell them,

I don't like that suggestion or I've

already done that suggestion.

Can you go deeper? Can

you give me something else?

And that will get you some good ideas and

get you flowing in the right

direction. So that's a

wrap on today's chaos.

I mean episode,

thanks for hanging out with me and

surviving that class.

Talk without backup.

You're a true CI warrior. And please let

me know if you've done it,

what you've done to help win over a

class. Let me know in the chats.

Let me know in the comments. Let me know

that we're all in this together.

And I hope what we talked about helps you

get through that class that makes you

cry.

But if you got a laugh or a new idea or

just felt a little less

alone in the classroom madness right now,

Skate and Frau and I are all alone in the

room cause no one else is talking

here. Do me a favor,

hit that subscribe button,

leave a quick review and share this

episode with another teacher

who needs it.

You can always watch live on YouTube or

catch the replay anytime on your

favorite podcast app. And until next

time, ditch the drills,

trust the process. And I'll see you next

time on comprehend this.

Have a good week everybody.