I have heard these or very similar words many times over the last few months. I do not think there is one right answer, because each of us have our own learning styles and learning curves. What I would like to do in this blog post is share with you what I did, in hopes that it will help and inspire you.
I found Whole Brain Teaching by accident. I was bored one night, sitting at the computer, and decided to google "second grade best teaching practices". Up popped something called Whole Brain Teaching. Out of curiosity I clicked on it. The website itself intrigued me. I wasn't sure where to go first, but then I noticed a tab on the dropdown menu labeled first steps. This seemed like a good place to begin, so I clicked on it. I then began to read each item under first steps. I have to admit that I was very confused at first. It was almost like reading a foreign language. At the same time, however, I found it fascinating. I had never heard of anything like it. At that time there was slightly over a month left in the school year, and I decided to give it a try. My thinking was that if it worked and I liked it, I would be ready to go at the beginning of the next school year. If I didn't, no harm in trying.
So, that night I typed up the rules (At the time I didn't know about all of the free downloads) and took very careful notes. The next day I came to school armed with both. The first order of business was to rearrange my desks so that all of my students had a partner. Then, I drew a T-chart on the board for my scoreboard, hung my rules on the board, and when my students came in explained to them that we were going to try something new. Then, the best way that I knew how, I explained to my students the five rules, Class Yes, Hands Eyes, and the Scoreboard. A little later in the day I taught my students Teach Okay and Mirrors. To be honest, Mirrors confused me the most. I was not clear on exactly how Mirrors worked. So that night I went home and googled "Whole Brain Teaching Mirrors". That was when I discovered the Whole Brain Teaching You Tube channel and all of the wonderful examples of Mirrors and Teach Okay. Armed with that new information I went back to school the next day ready to show my kids how it was done.
I have to stop for a moment and say that one of the main reasons that I was immediately so hooked on Whole Brain Teaching was the response of my students. They loved everything that we were doing. One of the first things that I noticed was that student engagement immediately went up. I always ran a tight ship in my classroom, but I was amazed at how effortless it now was to get and hold their attention. It was obvious how much fun they were having, and I was right there with them.
Anyway, this pattern continued for about a week. Each night I would go home and watch videos. I also discovered that there were lots of blogs out there, and I devoured them. The one that I learned the most from was Nancy Stoltenberg's. I never imagined that a few short months later I would be in the intern program and she would be my mentor. God works in mysterious ways. Every morning I would come back to school and share with the kids what I had learned that we were going to try. I remember watching a first grade video in which the teacher called her partners Peanut Butter and Jelly. Up until then I had just been using "A" and "B". I loved her idea, however, and the next day my partners became Peanut Butters and Jellies. If I forgot and called them "A's" and "B's", the students were quick to remind me.
While I was watching videos, I also discovered that you could register on the Whole Brain Teaching site and receive free downloads. The only requirement was to tell ten people about Whole Brain Teaching. I had already done that, so, as the site asked me to do, I sent a quick e-mail to Chris Biffle (The founder of WBT) letting him know that I had shared with ten others and thanking him for all of his hard work in making the resources available. I then entered the world of teacher heaven. I could not believe all that was available. I had no idea what each download was, so I just began downloading titles that sounded interesting to me. I would learn about something new and bring it back to school with me the next day. It almost became like a game with my students: "What is Miss Ray going to show us today?" I was spending hours on this every night, but it was so much fun that it did not seem like work.
By this time I was totally hooked on Whole Brain Teaching and new that I would never teach another way. It is hard to pinpoint one reason that I felt this way, but two things do stand out to me: First, rule two stopped all blurting in my classroom. I had a couple of students who blurted out all of the time. This had been going on all year, and it was very frustrating. However, by just saying "Rule Two" and having the kids say the rule, the blurting stopped within a couple of days. It was like watching magic happen before my very eyes. Then there was the change in my students' writing. The writing downloads were some of the first that I looked out, because I was the most curious about them. I fell in love with the Brainies, oral writing, Red/Green Writing, The Triple Whammy Sentence, and the Genius Ladder. Those were all things that I had implemented by the second week, and the results were astounding. In a way it is embarrassing to admit, because I always thought of myself as a very strong writing teacher, but I have to tell you that I saw more growth in one month in my students' writing than I had seen the entire school year. It was incredible!
Other downloads that I loved and also immediately implemented were Electronic Super Speed Grammar, Super Speed 1,000, and Super Speed math. I also learned from the downloads how to teach using the Five Step Lesson Plan and began building my lessons around that plan. If I wanted to know more about a topic, I would scroll through the Webcasts until I found what I wanted, and I would listen to it and take notes. Within a couple of weeks I had filled a new legal notepad with all of my notes.
At this point there was no real order to what I was trying out. My goal was to implement as much of Whole Brain Teaching as I could before school ended, so that I would be ready for full implementation the next year. I have to be honest. It was a little crazy. I was just so in love with WBT, that I was like a woman possessed. In all my years of teaching I had never experienced anything like it, and I just couldn't get enough of it. One evening I came across an explanation of Prove It on one of the blogs that I was reading, and I decided that I had to try it immediately. My lesson plans the next day called for testing practice, because we were about a week away from end of the year testing, and I really wanted to try it the WBT way. The next morning I was up at 5:00 watching Coach B's webcast on Prove It. I took notes and that same morning I was teaching my kids how to play.
I was so determined to try everything out before school ended, that I had my kids doing paper clip editing on the last day of school I didn't intend for this to happen, but I had just read about it a couple of days prior, and I really wanted to try it out. My kids didn't mind. They thought it was a lot of fun. That is what makes WBT so engaging for our students. It is that golden thread of "funtricity" that is woven into all that we do.
By the last day of school I had pretty much tried out everything except for three star homework, Mind Soccer, and the Super Improvers Wall. By the time I had learned about these things, their were only a couple of weeks left in the year, so it was to late to implement them. There were also a few other things that I didn't get to, like Puzzlers and Complexors (components of the writing game) and Brain Toys. I was on overload and finally decided that some things would have to wait until the next year.
That summer I got a copy of Whole Brain Teaching for Challenging Kids and began reading. I also made it a point to watch all of the webcasts that I had not already seen and read anything on line that I had not already read. By the end of the summer I had filled another notepad with information. I do not think I had ever been so excited for a school year to begin. I couldn't wait to see what it would be like to start Whole Brain Teaching with a class from day one of school. Let me just say that I have not been disappointed this year. WBT has far surpassed my expectations.
I have since been told that the way I implemented WBT in my classroom is not the norm. Most people probably take it a little slower than I did, but for me it worked. You will need to find what works for you. Take it at your own pace, but don't stop implementing WBT strategies and techniques. There are so many great WBT gems out there. You don't want to miss one because you stopped digging.
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