Whole Brain Wednesday - Amping it up!

Anyone else feeling in a bit of a slump this time of the year!? The snow days, delays & early releases have me in a mixed-up teaching slump! I can't wait to have normal schedule, full days and full weeks! I think my dog is one of the only ones who is still enjoying all this New England snow!

So this brings me to the topic of today's Whole Brain Teaching...

Today I'm going to share how I'm "amping' up the WBT in my room during this winter weather slump!

You know the feeling... (or at least you do if you live somewhere where it snows a lot!)
Delays... 2 hours off of instruction time, kids all amped up from extra sleep or play time!
Early Releases... If it's announced early, all day feels like a half day, which we know is out of the normal schedule and crazy! If it's announced part way through the day.... chaos ensues as kiddos go to the office to call home or as it begins to snow and all eyes are out the window.
And then, Snow Days... one fewer day of summer and don't even get me started on the day after when they're still all jacked up about playing in the snow!

So how can WBT help get you through the winter slump?! I'll tell you...

#1 Amp up the Rules!

We practice the rules every day... but what about practicing them multiple times during the day? Before your reading block, after recess, before specials! Help the kiddos remember the super-easy-to-follow rules that make the classroom so successful! If you don't know about the rules... click the picture above to check them out. Or, if you need a set of rules for your classroom, go visit my TPT page here.

Also, encourage your kiddos to help their friends out by holding up a number to represent the rule a friend is breaking. It makes your job easier, and let's be honest kiddos love to boss each other around ;)

#2 Amp up the Super Improvers Wall!

If you don't know about the Super Improver Wall, check it out by clicking the photo above! I am handing out improver stars left and right since the winter slump hit! Even if it only is a burst of motivation, it's enough to get us through a few more minutes! I'm giving them out for even the tiniest improvements... YES! You started your independent work right away, improver star! YES! You came to the rug quietly, improver star!
Check out some of my WBT Super Improver Walls here.

#3 Amp up the scoreboard!

Click the picture above to read about the scoreboard! The scoreboard is SO easy! It doesn't have to be fancy, it can just be a smile & a frown drawn on the white board. So there is NO excuse not to amp it up. Give out those smiles & frownies constantly... every lesson, every transition, every time you use class/yes, etc.
And of course make sure you follow through with a little fun time at the end of the day. We do a lot of games from ABCya on the Promethean board before buses as a reward for more smiles. We also have played Around the World and other fun (& quick) games as rewards. Some teachers in my building do an extra GoNoodle video at the end of the day for their reward. There are lots of other things you could do too that are quick and fun!

Hope you're motivated to Amp It Up with the WBT to help get you through the winter slump!

Whole Brain Wednesday: More Super Improvers

Hey everyone, I'm finally back with a WBT Wednesday... it's been WAY too long! Today is a quick tip for you Whole Brainers out there...

I want to share a really great idea one of my co-workers is doing with her WBT Super Improver Wall. If you don't know about WBT's Super Improver Wall, please click the pictures below to check out my posts about it. It is a FABULOUS motivation for students in my room and in many other WBT rooms!

So back to my co-worker... she turned her classroom over the WBT after I did a few informal PD sessions for my district early in the year. She was seeing a lot of success but wanted the super improver wall to be even better. So, she attached an individualized improver goal to each students' pencil box to remind them what they can do to improve in the classroom. The students wrote out their goals on their own to help them really take ownership over their goal.

SUCH a great idea, I especially love it for those tough kiddos because it gives them a focus throughout the day and they are reminded of it every time they open their pencil box! And super easy... just taped into the front cover of the pencil box.

I'm thinking I might need to put some individualized goals on my kiddos book boxes! How do you keep your super improver wall goals on your students' minds?

Whole Brain Wednesday: My Story

Today I want to take you on the journey I traveled when deciding to introduce Whole Brain Teaching in my classroom. I've shared it briefly in other posts, but after meeting with a few colleagues to share some WBT strategies, I thought it was important that I share my journey for those of you who need a little push towards WBT in your classroom.

During my first year of teaching I had a very tough class. I loved them dearly and still look back fondly on that year and those students, but I spent a lot of the first half of the year questioning my job choice. It killed me to question it too because I had literally wanted to be a teacher since I could remember. I had four students who were identified or would later be identified with ADHD and all were either un-medicated or inconstantly medicated. Now please don't get me wrong... I am not a "medication" pusher. I totally get that there are SO many interventions that can happen instead of medication and I also have seen medication be super successful for some students. But these students doing "gymnastics" on the rug during every single lesson and crawling under the tables daily added to a majority of students below grade level and students with little support from home equated to a really tough situation as a first year teacher. I would lay awake literally every night either worrying about my kiddos or trying to figure out where I was going wrong as a teacher.

My students WERE making growth, but I left every afternoon feeling exhausted and frustrated and on the verge of tears. And let me be clear on one thing, although I am an emotional girl and have been known to need a "good cry"... since starting WBT I think I've left school near tears maybe twice... nearly every day compared to maybe twice. Huge change.

Anyway... there was a big New England snow storm that year right around the 100th day of school. We had probably 5 days off including the weekend. I took this as "research" time. The teacher across the hall used WBT and I thought if it could work for her class of nearly 30 students, well then maybe it could work for me!

I watched video after video. I read article after article, blog post after blog post. I was addicted to the amazing behavioral management I was seeing. I was impressed by the growth teachers shared in their testimonials I took notes, decided what I liked and what I didn't and above all I knew WBT was for me.

I walked into school on the 100th day and printed out all the WBT rule and procedure posters and told my kiddos I'd been waiting until they were "ready" to try out something new in the class. I told them that the 100th day of school was the perfect time for 2nd graders to be "ready." I mustered up as much energy and excitement as I could and I sold WBT to these little 7 and 8 year olds and they ate it up!

In a few days my classroom was completely different. It was calmer... We had more fun during lessons... I was able to get all their energy out in PRODUCTIVE ways... I could get their attention with no effort... I had students focused - completely focused - during lessons. I couldn't believe how well it was working. A week or so later, I introduced mirrors and on our next math post-test I had one of my most severely ADHD students, standing at his desk, making all the gestures he had learned for regrouping to help him on the test. It was at that moment I knew WBT would be in my classroom for a LONG LONG TIME!

The rest is history... 3 years of WBT & a National Conference behind me... I even hope to become a "trainer" once I'm done with Grad School. I've done informal PD sessions for teachers and shared relentlessly with my grad class. I now walk down the halls in my school and HEAR WBT IN ACTION! Grad class friends tell me about the ways they are using WBT every day... Talk about amazing...

That's my story! Any other whole brainers who would like to share their story? I'd love to feature you on my blog :)

Whole Brain Wednesday: Sight Words Part 2

Hey everyone, I'm back with a 2nd week of sight word learning through Whole Brain Teaching on Whole Brain Wednesday.

 If you missed last week's post about sight words, I recommend you check it out before reading this post. You can find it here.

Today I'm going to talk about Electronic Superspeed 100 and Electronic Superspeed 1000. How you use these will definitely depend on your grade level as well as level of your students.

Let's talk about Electronic Superspeed 100 first. This powerpoint offers a slide for each of the 100 most common sight words. The slides look like this:

The sentence on the bottom can be used in many ways...

• Have students share as many sentences with their partner as they can that match the sentence outline.
• Give an example using the sentence outline, then ask students to come up with NEW sentences using the sight word on the slide.
• Ask students to use oral writing/brainies to read the sentences.
• Use to teach parts of speech.
• Other ideas? - comment below!

The letters and ? on the left side of the slide gives students beginning sounds to rhyme with the sight word. The ? means the students should be able to come up with other beginning sounds that work. I'm sure you can think of MANY ways to use these rhyming words.

Here's another example of an Electronic Superspeed 100 slide:

All of the words are featured on the Superspeed 100 game I discussed last week and in the same order.

Onto Electronic Superspeed 1000.
This slideshow features different levels of excitement... First for words 1-100, here is an example slide:

As you can see, the slides are very basic. After every 10 words, there is a 'zinger' just like in the Superspeed 1000 game I talked about last week:

These first 100 words automatically advance slides every 10 slides, stopping at the zinger. Each level gets a little faster which gets the kiddos all excited, trying to read the sight words as fast as they can.

For the rest of the words, the teacher can advance the slides as slowly (or quickly) as they would like. For words 101-300, there are 2 words per slide. You'll notice yellow is made up of 2 colors. All the words that are multi-syllabic are separated this way. I have noticed the visual separation of the word helps visual learners and struggling readers.

Every 20 words in this section feature a zinger following:

For words 301-600, there are 3 words per slide, with a zinger every 30 words.

For words 601-1000 students go on the Nightmare Rollercoaster!!!!

These slides feature 4 words per slide & roller coaster graphic zingers!

For these words, make the students feel like they're on a roller coaster... go fast through the slides, go slow, go backwards, go forwards... so much fun!!!

Both of these powerpoints are FREE to download off the WBT website after you create a (free) account. You can edit the powerpoints how you'd like... for example: adding slides of words your students are struggling with.
You can also use this powerpoint in SO many ways... turn it into a class competition teams playing reading each other, boys vs. girls, etc. My kiddos LOVE when I pull up Superspeed 1000 on the promethean board and I know your kids will too!!!

How do you teach your students sight words?

Whole Brain Wednesday: Sight Words

Welcome to another Whole Brain Wednesday!

This week I will be sharing a super fun way to practice sightwords... Superspeed 100 and Superspeed 1000!

I got an email from a coworker who has started using WBT asking if I'd heard of the sightword games Superspeed 100 and Superspeed 1000. A friend of hers had sent her the files and told her it was a WBT game. I had COMPLETELY forgot that at the WBT National Conference we had been shown the NEW Electronic Superspeed 100 and 1000 slide shows that had been created to accompany the game. I immediately downloaded them onto a flashdrive and began passing them around to everyone in my building. The same day, I used the Superspeed 1000 slideshow with my kiddos and the next day we played the game... They LOVED both versions of Superspeed 1000... are you curious to know what it's all about yet?!

Before I share how wonderful Superspeed sightwords are... ALL of the files I mentioned above are FREE on WBT's website! You just need to create a (FREE) account.

Okay so Superspeed 100 and 1000 involves a list of sight words. but NOT your traditional list. No, the 100 list has "levels" of repeating sight words. Each level adds another sight word. After 10 levels, the easier words start to disappear as other words are added. There are 100 words in the Superspeed 100 set. The sheets look like this...

When kiddos play Superspeed 100, you have students partnered up (groupings of one stronger reader and one weaker reader works well). Give students 1 minute to read as many levels as they can. If a student gets stuck or reads the word incorrectly, their partner can give them a "helpsie" before moving onto the next word. After the first minute, have the students record how far they got, then, read for a second time, to see if they can beat their first record. Because the words repeat, it doesn't matter if the partners switch who goes first or have the same student go first. If your whole class has mastered words at the beginning of the superspeed 100 list, you can tell the class to start at a certain level, or even differentiate having some groups start at different levels.


Superspeed 1000 is a little different. The lists of words do not repeat and each "level" has a silly word called a zinger at the end (such as 'zoink'). When students play this game, they read for a minute, mark their progress, then read the list again having the opposite student start (since the words DON'T repeat, it is important for the students to switch who goes first). Zingers are worth 5 points and all other words read are worth 1. This gives students motivation to get to each of these zingers! Here is what a Superspeed 1000 sheet looks like:

At the end of the Superspeed 1000 file, there are sheets with stars for students to record their points each time they play. They can then try to beat their previous record.

 Like I said earlier in this post, there are "Electronic" Superspeed games that are available as powerpoints FREE through WBT's website. Tune in next Wednesday for a post all about how to use the powerpoint files in your classroom to help your students learn sightwords!!! And in the meantime, think about downloading Superspeed 100 and/or 1000 to use in your classroom. I am even thinking about printing out the 1000 list to give to parents at conferences for them to use as practice at home!

Whole Brain Wednesday: Tall Tales

Hey everyone, we're back for another Whole Brain Wednesday!

One of my FAVORITE things about WBT is having students make up gestures to help them remember a concept. I try to always have gestures to go with new concepts, but sometimes one of two things happen...

1.  I ask the kiddos to try to come up with their own gestures.
2.  My kiddos come up with a better gesture than I had planned on using.

Lately, we've been reading Tall Tales and I am LOVING some of the gestures we've been using to help us remember the characteristics of a Tall Tale.

Here are some of our gestures...

1.  Exaggerations - Fingers in center, pull away from each other while wiggling hands up and down (think stretching the truth)

2. Action & Adventure - flick fingers out on both hands multiple times then dramatic running gesture with arms

3. Superhuman Abilities - "Muscle" gesture with both arms

4. Funny/Humor - Grab stomach and make laughing face

What are some ways you use gestures to help your students remember content?

Whole Brain Wednesday: Make it Your Own!

Today I want to share with you how you can make WBT your own!

I've shared in many posts the gestures my class has made up for different words. Such as this gesture we created for Author's message...

Or these gestures for story elements...

I want to share now what some of the first grade teachers in my building have created, making WBT their own after attending the 2 WBT workshops I did at my school!

One of the first grade teachers (Mrs. M) loved how the kiddos were getting right to it when using Teach, Okay and she wanted a way to connect this immediate turn & teach action with directions such as getting to work!
Teacher: *clap clap* Go get started!
Students: *clap clap* Okay!
And she tried it for lining up too!
Teacher: Let's get ready!
Students: Okay!
 Mrs. M said it has made a HUGE difference just by having the students give a verbal & physical response. They are reminded what they need to do and they get going immediately!

Mrs. M is also using capital letter, comma and end mark brainies when students read & write sentences during their phonics program (Fundations) to reinforce these important parts of sentences.

Another first grade teacher (Mrs. J) has created a list of "rewards" under the scoreboard as a reminder to students why they want to earn smilies! This is such a simple way to make WBT your own, but has been working wonders in her class... they REALLY want to be able to earn one of the choices on the board!
Some easy choices that you could include on a "if smilies win" chart are: extra brain break, chat time, around the world, game on the promethean/smart board (my kiddos love abcya.com), mind soccer (see WBT website), and ANYTHING else that is fun, motivating and only lasts a few minutes.

I hope you enjoyed another reason why I love WBT... you can make it your own and still be activating the WHOLE BRAIN and creating TEACHER HEAVEN!

Whole Brain Wednesday:

Welcome to another Whole Brain Wednesday!
Today I'll be sharing another quick and easy strategy. It's one I use daily and one that I can't believe I haven't shared yet...

The 10 Finger Wooh!

When kiddos do something great in a whole class setting such as: a very thoughtful answer, putting forth extra effort, being a helpful classmate, etc.... in a WBT classroom, they get a 10 finger wooh. The teacher says "Give _____ a 10 finger woooh! & everyone wiggles their fingers at the student and say "Woooooh!"

Even better... if a student deserves more than a 10 finger wooh, they can get an 11, 12, 13 or even 14 finger wooh!
The teacher will say: "Give ____ a 12 finger wooh!" and the class will respond: "Woooooh" wiggling all their fingers at the person, then "Woooh" wiggling 1 finger, "Woooh" wiggling 1 finger.

You can put some variations on it too... like when we were skip counting, I'd ask kiddos to give a 15 finger wooh counting by 5's or a 10 finger wooh counting by 2's. This is SUCH an easy strategy and can SO easily be implemented in your classroom!!!

Whole Brain Wednesday: Teach Your Hand!

Hey everyone, I'm here with another Whole Brain Wednesday with another easy to implement WBT strategy...

Teach your hand & Teach your foot...

You all know the dreaded "down time" that no administrator wants to see or hear about... And don't even mention the word "filler!" But as a teacher you know there are times where some of your students are waiting... oftentimes the waiting is for students who are moving more slowly.

Think... stop & jot... you're reading a great read aloud, where students have a sticky note trail. You stop, ask a question, students do a turn & talk (or teach, okay in a WBT classroom) and when they're done talking with their partner they jot their answer on a sticky note. You can probably picture the exact kiddo in your class who will be the last one to finish... every time. You want that kiddo to get the chance to finish, but you don't want the rest of the students just waiting... so, I introduce Teach Your Hand & Teach Your Foot.

In my classroom, anytime we have to stop & jot or record an answer when we are all together in a group, my students know they should "teach their hand" or "teach their foot" the answer when they are done writing. Even in reading groups, kiddos know to "retell their hand" while they wait for other students to finish reading.

It is exactly what it sounds like...
The kiddos whisper teach the answer to their hand OR to their foot! After the first time, when they look at you like you're CRAZY, then giggle uncontrollably as they teach their foot; the kiddos just do it without thinking... they don't sit around and wait, they just KNOW to teach their hand or foot!

And, common, don't they look adorable???

If you love this strategy... I suggest you introduce "teach your hand" first, then when that starts to lose its excitement, tell students they can choose "teach your foot" which will introduce a whole new level of excitement into waiting time!

Enjoy & go teach your foot what you just learned ;)