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.