Tag Archives: environment

62. Stop the copying

Here’s a quick activity to stop copying and get pupils moving onto more challenging work.

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If you use worksheet banks such as 10ticks, you will sometimes find you have columns of questions which gradually get harder. Many pupils find long exercises like this a bit of a hard slog. The hard workers get on with it, the less motivated copy them. Do they even need to do all of them to make progress?

A simple solution is to vertically slice the worksheet into two or three pieces. Each piece has a selection of questions, with graduated difficulty. The pieces are easier to stick into books as they are smaller. There is less photocopying/printing cost and consequently it is more environmentally friendly.

Did I forget something?

Oh yes, if you are careful how you hand them out no two adjacent pupils have the same questions! To quote one of my class, who wanted to have a lazy lesson:

“Miss – You’ve done it to me again! I’ve got to do my own work!”

(And at least this time this particular pupil actually noticed, before they attempted to copy …)