Week 2...ish

Well, I'm counting this as week 2 even though the first week of school was only 2 1/2 days. Week 2 brought on new challenges for me in Whole Brain Teaching.

After the honeymoon of the first few days wore off, I found fewer and fewer kids participating with gestures and words. I seem to have 3 camps of student groups.

Group 1: The Super Engaged
These kiddos are super duper excited to mirror, teach and do gestures. They are SO into it and are helping to make class feel so much fun. I heart this group! They get a big ten finger woo.

Group 2: Too Cool 4 School
This bunch seems either to think they are above the gesturing and repeating, and therefore don't have to do it, or they are too embarrassed to do it.  I'm not sure always which it is.  Little by little, I'm starting to pull kids out of this group and into the first, but it's tough going with a few of them.

Group 3: Are You Talking to Me?
There are about 4-5 kids who can NOT stay focused on any one task for more than 20 seconds without suddenly turning to their neighbor and starting to talk.  It doesn't seem to be malicious, I'm-going-to-be-defiant-because-I-don't-care-about-learning-anything-from-a-dorky-teacher-like-you.  On the contrary, several of these kids are just really, really, really immature and have incredibly short attention spans.

So as we're sitting on the carpet together, going through a lesson, these three camps of student engagement, or lack thereof, are very interesting to watch.  Interesting, and FRUSTRATING.  (Take a deep breath, Dorian, take deep breaths.)

Here's what seems to be happening:
I begin a fun, engaging lesson, and then say, "Mirrors!"
About 3/4 of the class put their hands up, ready to mimic my gestures, and say, "Mirrors!"  It's like they're saying, "OK, Mrs. T, we're with you.  Let's get this learning ON!"  At this point, both the Super Engaged and my Are You Talking to Me? groups are with me...for the moment.

Then there's the Too Cool 4 School Group.  Sitting there.  Starting at the carpet.  Messing with their shoelaces.  Looking at the wall.  Putting their head in their hands and refusing to stare at me.  They aren't necessarily bothering other kids, but they're refusing to participate, and are of course, in complete opposition to Rule #1: Follow Directions Quickly.

So, quickly as I can, in my sing-song little voice, I make my attempt to get them to join us.  "Uh-oh, I need some more mirrors...Johnny, Suzy, Becky, Bradley, etc."

While this is happening, in these few short seconds, the Are You Talking to Me? group, which was perfectly fine at the beginning, has now spotted an opportunity to chat with their neighbor about why Johnny, Suzy, Becky, Bradley, and the rest are not participating, by the way when's lunch, what's today's special, is that a new silly band on your wrist, can I put it on, hey look what happens when I try to put it around my head, is someone saying my name, what, oh, Mrs. T, are you talking to me?

*Sigh.*

So now I have about 1/2 of the class still engaged as I try to wrangle the now very large group of non-engaged students into our lesson.

*Double sigh.*

SO.
WHAT.
AM.
I.
TO.
DO.
ABOUT.
THIS?

Hmmm...?

Any suggestions you might have would be greatly appreciated.
Here's what I'm going to start until I hear back from someone with a super-duper awesome idea to get these kids moved from being a bump on a log, to being part of the class.

Here's my idea.  I'm going to ignore them.  Some of the time.
As long as they're not causing a problem by bothering other kids, then I'm going to stop trying to pull them in by saying their names, and taking time away from the learning of the other kids.

And I'm going to use the scoreboard more and more.  I already use it quite a lot, but I'm going to be very intentional about being quick and deadly when it comes to non-participation by a large group of students.  Oooh, I see I have 5 friends not participating.  What a bummer.  That caused us a frownie.

Then the next time, if there are 4 students, Wow! I have one more friend participating than before!  They earned the whole class a smilie!

That's my plan for the time being.  If you have an idea for how to use the scoreboard more effectively, I'd love to hear it.  I'm itching to get a few more kiddos into participating a whole lot more.

How not to be a Chatty Cathy in 3 easy steps!

I so need that book.  If you know the secret to how to get ME to not talk so much, please write this book and quickly publish it.  I'll happily buy it and pay you bunches of royalties.

I realized yesterday, at the end of the day, when my voice was nearly hoarse, that I do, indeed, talk too much.  I never thought I was much of a Chatty Cathy when it came to talking more than my students do, but evidently, I am.

So, that's where I'm going to point and finely focus the WBT gun and its vast arsenal of teaching goodness.  I realized I really need to get my kids involved in more of peer teaching by using Teach/Okay more liberally throughout the day, and indeed, in EVERY lesson.  So far, mirroring and using gestures is mostly going well.  The kids really seem to like that.  But, I just talk too much, and the kids are talking too little.  So, tomorrow's special focus is for me to shut up a little bit more.

I have to give myself a 10 finger woo, though.  Even though my class is very challenging, and I'm still struggling a bit with getting everyone to participate and to STOP CHATTING TO THEIR NEIGHBORS,  my classroom is a little bit more manageable than my fellow teaching partners', and I am certain that is due to Whole Brain Teaching.  Don't get me wrong, she is an AMAZING teacher.  But Whole Brain Teaching has made keeping unruly kids much more easy to deal with, simply because they're always engaged.

Oh, I'm just going to go ahead and give myself a 10 finger rolling woo while I'm at it.  Today I got a new student who is NES (non-English speaking).  He speaks nada of English.  The ELL teacher was nearly doing backflips when she saw us doing gestures and using pictures.  By the end of the day, my newest kiddo was doing the gestures for the 5 rules right along with us, as well as saying the words.  I know he likely has no idea of what it means, but he was able to participate in class at his level, and that was pretty durned awesome if I do say so myself!

Classity Class? Nooity No?

I'm feeling a little frustrated today.  This is day 4 1/2 of school, as well as 4 1/2 days of implementing Whole Brain Teaching.  The first 3 1/2 days were fabulous.  The kids were (mostly) well-mannered.  Their little eyes lit up every time I began to speak to them.  I could actually see the learning taking place on their sweet little faces.

However, today is day 4.  And a half.
And the honeymoon seems to be over.

I had my first struggle with getting the kids to participate.  Everyday I've had 2 or 3 kiddos who have been reluctant to participate in the gestures, or who were talking to neighbors instead of working together as a class.  Today, however, I found myself trying to battle over half of the class.  Here's the problem I kept facing today:

I attempt to get their attention:
"Class, class!"
"Yes, yes!"
talk, talk, talk, talk
ignore the teacher
talk some more


So, as you can imagine...I was feeling a little frustrated with my class, and with myself by the end of the day.

I chatted with a fellow WBTeer, and she encouraged me to make more liberal use of the scoreboard and including more practice.  I also took another look at rehearsing procedures from the free download of the WBT e-book.  Feeling a little bit better now that I have a plan.

Other than that little hiccup, WBT is going really well!  I'm very excited to see my students really latch onto Teach/Okay and Switch!  They're doing a great job of continuing to teach even when they "finish" the teaching material, and most of them are doing really well with gestures.

My next challenge is to more fully implement the full 5 step lesson template in my daily lesson plans.  It's not something I want to try to do off the cuff.  But it certainly is something I'm excited about pulling in, especially now that my kiddos are starting to get the idea of Teach/Okay.

Here's to another day of learning, for both me, and my students!

First Week

So, I've had 2 1/2 days with my new class of kiddos so far.
They are a chatty bunch, let me tell you.
And very obviously unused to raising hands.

I think I say these exact same things about every bunch of kids the first few days of school.  :O)

But, undaunted by the chattiness or the inability of some of the kiddos to raise hands and stay in seats, I thrust forward into the realm of Whole Brain Teaching.  And let me tell you, I am SO GLAD THAT I DID!

There are two 2nd grade classrooms: mine, and my grade level partner, Amy's.  We got a fairly even mix of kids, meaning neither of us got all of the challenging kiddos, or the brightest kiddos...it's pretty even.  And don't get me wrong, Amy is a FANTASTIC teacher who has very strong classroom management skills.  But both of us (and I can include her in this statement because she has even mentioned it over the past 2 1/2 days) notice that WBT is making a HUGE difference in the volume and amount of chitter-chatter happening (or not!) in my classroom.

The kids are really engaged, and most of them are eating up the methods that I'm using to teach them.  So far, the class has become extremely comfortable with the following:
Class/Yes! (The first thing I taught my kiddos!  They love it.)
Mirrors (They really like the mirror check.)
Mirrors and Words
Hands and Eyes (A little challenging for about 2 of my kiddos, but it really helped to immediately pinpoint those kiddos that have trouble focusing for even 5 seconds.)
The 5 Classroom Rules (I did 3 rules the first day in the morning, and the other 2 rules in the afternoon of the first day.  They love doing the gestures, and nearly all of my students have the rules memorized completely.)
Scoreboard (Wow, they really work hard for an extra minute of recess time.  I have it on a small whiteboard so I can take it with us when we walk through the halls.)

On the third day we started Teach/Okay!  Most of them seem to get the idea, and I'm sure it will become more solidified as we use it over, and over, and over throughout the year.  They really liked it when I added in "Uh oh!  Switch!"  They seemed to like pulling down a magical lever to make the switch from "teacher" to "gesturer"...my explanation for their roles during Teach/Okay.  Here's a VIDEO showing what I want my class to look like soon.

We've also worked on procedures for passing out papers, lining up, coming to the carpet, and going to their seats, as well as writing down names, dates, and keeping their voice level volume at an appropriate level.    Here's another awesome VIDEO that shows some of these procedures done beautifully and seamlessly.

I wonder what these teachers' classes look like first few weeks of school.  That would be something really useful to see!

Here's to another upcoming week of fully implementing WBT in my classroom and seeing some amazing student engagement as a result!

Jumping in Head First!

I don't think I've ever felt quite so excited before for a school year to begin, simply so I can try out a newly learned teaching technique.  I've certainly never been excited for school to start again after having a very brief vacation due to teaching summer school, that's fo' sure!  However, I'm finding myself actually GIDDY with anticipation.

Why?
Whole Brain Teaching, that's why!

And just what is Whole Brain Teaching, you might ask.  Well, let me tell you...
It is all that, and a bag of chips!
It's the whole kit AND kaboodle!
And not to mention, the kitchen sink!

In short, WBT (Whole Brain Teaching) is a style of classroom management that encourages student participation by stimulating various brain functions through gestures, movement, repetition, laughter, merriment, and pure student fun.  It reaches out to visual, oral, and kinesthetic learners all at the same time, and I'm SO STINKING EXCITED to be doing it!!!

I found out about WBT completely by luck, or perhaps more accurately, by the grace of God, because I wasn't looking for anything, it just fell in my lap via YouTube.  Here's the first video I ever saw of WBT in action.  I thought to myself, "Self!  This amazing teacher could be you!  This incredibly responsive class could be yours!  Find out more!!"

And I did find out more, a WHOLE lot more.  In fact, more than I could reasonably take in over the course of the next few days.  I've been reading, watching, and soaking up through osmosis, as much about WBT as I possibly can.

I began reading from the "First Steps" section of website, while watching WBT creator, Chris Biffle's YouTube videos about each of first steps.  It helped me to read a little, watch a little, read a little, and so on.

 Next, I  moved on to the free e-books.  Now, I don't know about you, but I when I see something is "free" I figure there is usually a catch involved.  However, I've come to learn that WBT's creators pride themselves on truly making their materials absolutely free.  I've only found one item that is charged for, and that costs all of $0.99 each.

I can not emphasize how much WBT has already changed my attitude towards teaching this upcoming school year.  I tell ya...I was a Grumpy Gus just a few weeks ago.  Summer school was about the worst experience I ever had.  My usual classroom management was very ineffective with many, very unruly third graders.  I felt like a failure, and I was not looking forward to the start of this school year.  But now, after loading my arsenal with the likes of "Class/Yes!" and "Teach/Okay!" I feel more ready for a new year than ever before!

Here's to a great school year filled with energized, engaged students and a teacher who is once again excited about teaching!