How to Encourage Students to Arrive on Time to Class

Video Transcript

"Hi this is Laura Turner and today I'm going to talk to you about how to encourage students to arrive on time for your classes. I have had classes that for no explainable reasons were all completely late every morning. And I've also had classes where for no explicable reason my students were all early and in the class before I got there. So it just sort of depends on what kind of people you've got in your class and what their schedules are. So in order to encourage these students who are coming in late to your class to come in on time I suggest to take roll at exactly the time the class starts. No exceptions. And, and at the moment they walk in they are going to be tardy. Number two; always be on time for class yourself. Sometimes students arrive late to class because their professor arrives late to class. I've also seen that happen. Number three, you can also implement a pop quiz at the beginning of class. If the students don't show up at the very beginning of class they're going to miss a grade. I think this is a little harsh, I don't like pop quizzes but if you like them and you want to implement them that's a really good way to sort of use the scare tactic to get the kids to come to class. Number four, you can show a fun clip or do a fun activity at the beginning o class that you'll know that they'll want to come see. So you can have like a series of clips that you show each week that you'll know the students will want to come to class early in order to see. So it's sort of a positive reinforcement. Number five, you can also enforce a strict tardy policy. And keep track of absolutely every time that they are tardy. You can therefore sort of bump it up to if you have three tardies you sort of get one absence and that's going to really affect students. And finally the best way I think to encourage students to come on time to class is to make your class as interesting as possible and to make them want to arrive to class, and to enjoy your class. Make the class engaging. Create discussions among students because well sometimes and not all the time, sometimes it's inexplainable but a lot of times students are not coming to your class on time because they feel as though they have to drag themselves to it. So examine your own teaching style and your class, and how it's going. And try to work with it form that angle."