Students learn best when they are paying attention. Imagine how much your students would learn if all of your students always paid attention to all of your lessons! Inattention is a pervasive problem in schools, so finding a way to reign that in is key to helping your students learn the most.
One key ingredient to getting students to pay attention is to teach well. Have amazing, well-planned, fascinating lessons for every single subject and every single lesson you have to teach. Boom. Done.
What? You already do that, and some kids still don’t seem to catch on? I hate it when that happens. I mean, I was always on my A-game and had multi-sensory, hands-on, multi-media, technology-involved, exciting and engaging lessons that connected with students’ interests and background… complete with realia and uh… unicorns. Yup. Every time. And yet… I still had kids who weren’t paying attention. Ridiculous, I tell you!