I can't believe its been a month already. Talk about time flying. I knew I would be a bit rusty. I was right I was a bit rusty, but not as out of practice as I was worried about.
Being a believer in WBT, day 1 I walked in planning on starting with a bang. We did class-yes, teach-ok, scoreboard, the 5 rules. It was a disaster. I can't even imagine how I could have improved it. The fight was almost immediate. I had some that loved it, some that were just too cool, and some that would never do it, not ever! Ok I'm exaggerating it wasn't all a flop but my challenging students came floating to the surface and made themselves know right away. All the better though, I don't need wasted time.
Class- yes is fun for all, but we're just now, 4 weeks later, really getting it the way I like it. The school standard is a hand up and all hands go up. I prefer the class-yes because the class has a
Teach-ok was the biggest flop, turning and talking was confusing to them even with me giving them the words to say. I had to back off and really build them up. My focus has been math, easy to break down and give a small chunk too. Ironically enough teaching your shoe or pencil was what made it start working for them. In the past that part was too silly and groups needed to be really comfortable before that would work. I guess when your pencil can't talk you have to do all the work.
Scoreboard has won me over again. If my students have taught me anything I know not to ever let it drop, my worst days are when I don't use it enough. Although I'm still working on what really motivates them to win.
The five rules worked differently this year. All my belongings are still in Michigan (whole ordeal way to crazy to tell you now), so the kids helped me out by drawing the rules in groups. We went through the rules, with the normal half-hearted hand gestures. We practiced and got it right, even with a few who didn't want to participate. Then in their groups, they designed the posters. One expectation, everyone had to equally be involved in the drawing/writing. I can honestly say that while every group went about it differently all my students are represented in the posters. Some groups had each student draw a picture, some groups drew one picture and painstakingly divided up the work so everyone did exactly the same amount of work. It was golden to see the solutions.
It has taken a while to get the rules down and everyone participating. I held off on mirror until we had the basic gestures for rules down.
Magic has happened. More of my class is willing to try when I introduce things. I introduced mirror, most of the group tried it out. We giggled at each other, some did very tiny gestures. Some tried not to do any. A couple refused to try, "Ok then please sit over there" was my response. By the end of the week even some of my tough cookies were trying. But Friday, one of my toughest kiddos decided to take my words literally and mirror me even after our fun had passed for the moment. That was the magic, she was so into it she was listening better that I had seen. In her mind I was going to be bugged by it, I know she was trying to irritate me. Honestly thought it was one of the best lessons I've had with her. What she didn't realize was that while her hands were moving she wasn't trying to talk to someone else, or messing with her stuff, and if others looked at her they had to look at me to see what she was doing. I love it!
