WBT "Switch"

As promised, I'm back with more Whole Brain Teaching Fun!

The last time, we talked about my favorite part of Whole Brain Teaching: Teach, Okay! In case you missed it, or want a quick brush up, click the link and read on.

So you just taught this great lesson, you used Teach, Okay to make sure you students were engaged and talking about what they were learning. But, as you're walking around, you're noticing that a few groups have a talker and a listener, and it doesn't change.... what to do, what to do... well, you could assign numbers and switch who is the talker/listener each time they teach each other, and as I would agree, you should have 1's and 2's, it's tough to keep track of who you're having talking each time... And besides, there are times where what you are teaching is VERY important, so you want both kiddos in a partnership to listen and talk... and so... introducing: SWITCH!

Switch is super easy to integrate into your classroom especially once the kiddos are doing well with "Teach, Okay."
You teach something (brief, remember, we don't wan to lose their attention).
You clap twice and say "Teach."
Your kiddos clap twice and say "Okay."
Your kiddos then turn and reteach whatever you just taught them.
After 10-30 seconds (depending on how long you taught for) you say "switch" and hold your arm up and pull down like you're pulling a giant light switch.
Your kiddos do the same motion and say "uh oh switch."
They then switch who is the talker and who is the listener.
Easy, right!?
Now your talkers have to learn to be listeners, and your listeners have to learn to be talkers... the start to teacher heaven!

Chris Biffle explaining "switch"... (Starts around 1:50)

So, what do you think? The necessary added piece to "teach, okay!"

If any of you have been curious about more of WBT and have been watching videos or reading materials, I'm sure you've heard the term, mirror!... "Mirror" will be the next WBT post!

Another Classroom Update & Behavior Chart

I promise I will get back to the whole brainer posts soon! However, I worked all day on organizing my room and am excited to show it off...

I still haven't really been able to start "decorating" because everything needs to be organized first, but it's starting to look like a classroom.

I am still avoiding sorting through and organizing all the books though because it is going to be quite the process...

Alrighty, I'll stop blabbing and reveal the updates...

Alright so these are the shelves from the previously very unorganized closet area. The picture on the right shows the now pretty organized math manipulatives and literacy games. The picture on the right definitely may change, but currently there is nowhere else big enough to hold long construction paper and sentence strips. I don't really want to invest in big draw bins, but I may do that. Currently the paper is in hanging folders so I can easily grab one color at a time. I have cute curtains from last year that somehow will fit perfectly (I checked) just have to get a tension rod, hopefully they make one long enough to fit!

The picture on the left shows my now beloved art closet. It turns out there were tons of art supplies in the closet, but they needed to be organized (and there was plenty of other "stuff" to be thrown away). This closet now has very organized art supplies! On the right, I am so excited that I got to use my sparkly curtain somewhere. I am hoping it will discourage students to use the exit near my desk after they hang their coats and backpacks and encourage them to use the other opening.

The picture on the left is the fabulous book shelf behind my desk that is the perfect size for all my teacher manuals, curriculum binders, etc. On the right is a future post in the making. This is part of my new revamped behavior management system. I will post about it soon! But in the meantime, check out the "polka dots & sweets" behavior management clip chart from my TPT store by clicking the image below. It's only $1 and I will happily make you your own that fits your theme or has different words/color theme if you ask :)

   

Okay, a few more classroom pics...

On the left.. the BEST purchase I've made for my classroom! $28 at Big Lots... I saw a similar one (different colors) at Michael's for $50 which was too much for me, $28 I could handle, thank you Big Lots! On the right, the best piece of furniture found in my room! Love that this fits perfectly near the coat closet and can be used for the kiddos mailboxes. Plan on dressing it up with cute little polka dotty or striped numbers.

Last pictures...

On the left, another good find in the room (still in the box) put it together then didn't know what to use it for and it dawned on me how wonderfully organized my small construction paper could be with it! On the right, my room is looking like a classroom... the most important part of my room (learning circle) is looking like a learning circle, yay!

Alrighty, hopefully I can refrain from posting pictures until the room starts looking cutsie and like a classroom :)

Classroom Update & Freebie

So I was finally able to get into my room (the wax on the floors was having trouble drying in the humidity) on Monday & am going again today...
I was sorely disappointed to find out that I have A LOT of cleaning to do. I am super OCD about my classroom being clean and organized, so all of the "stuff" that's probably been in that room since 1970 WILL drive me nuts, so I will be going through literally every single item in that room before it starts to look cute... sad, but I'd rather clean house than be irritated at the clutter and dust for the rest of the year.

That being said, I spent about 5 hours going through stuff and organizing & even set up my desk (because that way it really looked like I accomplished something, ha).

Here are some before & after pictures... Can't wait until the after pictures are all cute and polka dotty or stripy!
I have a great closet area for storage as well as students backpacks/coats. There is also a closed closet in one corner. Here are the shelf areas before:


Here are the shelf areas after various garbage bag & much organizing...


I definitely have more work to do in the closet area, but I did make some progress!

More work to do!

A Little Progress

There were SO many teacher books, old curriculum binders, etc. in the fabulous book shelf I have just outside of the closet area. I have more of my own teacher books to add, but now that it's nice and neat that will only take me a minute or two, yay for organization!

Before

After: Ready for more books :)

And because I needed one place of sanity in the room, I set up my desk (or at least partially!)

Hopefully I'll leave my room with more to be proud of today!

But before I run off to my class, click below and head over to my TPT store to grab these Whole Brain Teaching Rules & Procedure Posters!

Bad Kitty Runs for President

Hilariously Educational!

Nick Bruel takes us on a hilariously entertaining (yet educational) journey with Bad Kitty as she learns about the election process in Bad Kitty for President. This children's graphic novel if filled with fantastic (an also hilarious) illustrations as the narrator talks Bad Kitty through the election she is running in against Big Kitty, since Old Kitty has already served his 8 years and can't run again. Big Kitty hits the campaign trail: kissing babies, throwing fits, getting donations and more. But does Bad Kitty (or Big Kitty) have what it takes to become president? Find out who wins, while learning an awful lot about our own election process, I promise you will laugh (and probably learn something too)! And seriously teachers, what better way to teach your kiddos about the election if it is an election year or if teaching voting is in your Social Studies curriculum (like it was for me in 2nd grade this past year!)

Reading Level: DRA 40
                      Lexile 690L
                      Guided Reading R
*I think the reading level is so high because of all the content vocabulary, my second graders loved this book and could handle reading it with some help on the content words.*

Teachers... here are some resources to help you to use this book in your classroom...

Web Resources:

• Activities: This link provides some fun activities you can do with your class after reading.
• Trailer: Show your class this hilarious book trailer video before reading!
• Series Website: Find out about the author and the other Bad Kitty books here!

Vocabulary: All these words (with really fantastically funny definitions from Edna) are in the back of the book. Be sure to directly teach these words as without vocabulary instruction this book will be difficult for many 2nd and 3rd graders.
President, office, primary, election, nominee, party, delegates, convention, caucus, 527 group, debate, moderator, polling station, ballot, write-in candidate, register, absentee ballot, democracy

Activities:
Before Reading: Create a KWL with your class with the title: Voting and Elections. Have your kiddos generate responses for what they know and want to learn about elections.

During Reading: (This could work as an after reading activity too)
Have your kiddos create a vocabulary journal for an election.
Students can write the word, write their own definition then draw a picture to help remind them what the word means.
When I teach with a book with so much vocabulary, I often break the class into 4-6 groups and give each group a word. Each member will write the word, their own definition and draw a picture. When the groups are done, they will "jigsaw" (mix the groups up so one member of each word group is now in the mixed group i.e. you have a group for president, office, primary and election, there are 4 kiddos in each group. When they jigsaw EACH group will have one member from president, office, primary and election)
The kiddos teach their new group about THEIR word. If there is time, the students can choose one or more of the words they learned from a group member and add the word to their vocab journal.

After Reading: Finish the L from your KWL, having students generate responses to what they learned about elections.
Discussion/Journal: Do you agree with who became the Cat's president? Why or why not?

Cross Curricular: Social Studies
You are already teaching a Social Studies concept just by reading this book to your class, but why not take it a step further?

• Have a class election: Read some other great election books such a Duck for President or Grace for President. Have your kiddos run for president of the class. What kind of power will the president have? How will the class hold the election? You can have lots of fun with this!
• Instead of voting for a person, vote for what the class can do as an extra activity. The trick is, the class has to figure out how they can get the ideas down to only 2 to vote for. How will they promote their favorite idea? How will they tally the votes?
• Find out if your local town hall will give your students a tour through the voting process: standing in line to vote, filling out the voting card, submitting it into the machine, etc. Maybe they will even let your kiddos vote in a mock election!

WBT Teach, Okay!

I am so excited to tell you about my favorite part of Whole Brain Teaching...
"Teach, Okay!"
The idea of "Teach, Okay!" is to get your students to either share their thoughts and predictions with a partner OR (even better!) reteach their partner what you just taught!

Get your own copy of this poster and other from a Teacher on a Mission's TPT page *Freebie*

So, how does it work?
We all know our kiddos don't have the best attention spans in the world and even the ones with fantabulous attention spans have trouble staying focused for more than a couple minutes.
So, what do you, the teacher, & your kiddos do?
1. Teach a quick or important point (no more than a minute)
2. *Clap clap* (or any variation of clapping) "Teach"
3. Kiddos: *clap clap* "Okay!"
4. Kiddos: Turn to their partner and reteach whatever they just heard you teach.
    You: Walk around, listen, check in, check for understanding, judge how long this "teaching" should go on.
5. You (when you find appropriate, could be as short as 30 seconds or as long as 2 minutes): "Class" or "Hands and Eyes"
6. Kiddos: "Yes" or "Hands and Eyes"
7. Teach for another short time & Repeat process

In my class, my kiddos have assigned seats in our learning circle AND assigned partners. That way, the kiddos know EXACTLY who to turn to in order to "teach." I also then have control over what kiddos are partnered together. That way I can be pretty certain they will stay on task. Having assigned seats and partners also made the process get going right away with almost zero transition time between the time I said "teach" and my kiddos start reteaching their partner.

Check out how these teachers use "Teach, Okay!"

Skip to 1:20 and you'll see a great example of "Teach, Okay" and teacher monitoring

Another way to use "Teach, Okay"

In my class I also use "Teach, Okay" for my kiddos to answer questions, especially comprehension questions after a read aloud.

When my kiddos would answer any question in my room (especially during the 2nd half of the year), I would ask them to use T.A.P. (Turn it Around, Answer it, Prove it). 

T.A.P. has gestures as described below. 

We would do our T.A.P. gestures as a class first before using "Teach, Okay"

"Turn it Around" *one hand flat out, other hand with pointer finger down, make a circle over other hand*

"Answer It" *one hand flat out, other hand pretending to write on hand that is flat out*

"Prove It" *one hand flat out, other hand in a fist, "stamp" down on hand that is flat out*

I would then ask the question and say "teach" my kiddos would say "okay" and then turn and teach their neighbor the answer to the question. I would listen in to make sure they were using T.A.P.

Next steps...

In order to make sure my kiddos were all being teachers, and not just listeners, we used "Switch" which I will share with you the next time I blog about WBT!

And then?...

Maybe you noticed in the video above the kiddos "mirrored" their teacher... I'll tell you all about that too!

I'm on Teachers Pay Teachers

I have finally created a TPT sellers page and just uploaded my first product, a Whole Brain Teaching Freebie.

 I will talk about Brain Toys in an upcoming WBT post, but if you are already a Whole Brainer, go get your free copy by clicking the picture below!

Enjoy!

WBT Hands & Eyes

"Hands & Eyes"

More whole brain teaching fun.

So, how is "hands and eyes" different from the "class? yes!" model?...

"Hands and eyes" is a way to get your students' attention, just like "class? yes!" however, by using "hands and eyes" your students know you need to make a BIG POINT or share a BIG IDEA.

"Hands and eyes" is a verbal reminder that easily reminds students to show with their body that they are ready for the BIG POINT or BIG IDEA.

So, you have a BIG POINT to teach, your kiddos are paying attention (or at least most of them) but you need them to realllllly focus.

You say: "Hands and Eyes!!"
The kiddos say: "Hands and Eyes!!"
The kiddos actions: They put their eyes on you and fold their hands in their lap
You: Tell the BIG POINT, BIG IDEA, etc.

In my class this year, I had a lot of fidgeters! WBT helped A LOT because of all the gestures involved with their learning. But sometimes, (probably a few times a day) there is something you are teaching that you need your kiddos to sit still and listen to, even if this is only for 30 seconds (and hopefully no longer than a minute or 2). This is when I used "Hands and eyes!" My fidgety kiddos would put their hands in their lap and focus during my BIG POINT.

The sign above is a freebie from Lyndsey over at "A year of many firsts." Get your copy, along with other WBT freebies here.

Easy enough, right?