WBT Rules to Display

A new color scheme calls for a new set of Whole Brain Teaching rules posters.

You can download a generic pdf HERE.

I am looking forward to using WBT techniques again this year!

These will be going up this week.

BTS Classroom Management Linky

So I am a week late to this party. I like linky parties! There are usually some great ones this time of year.

Here are some past posts about classroom management:

Classroom management is the determining factor on whether your students will be successful during their year with you. A teacher who doesn't have a plan will not be an effective teacher.

When I taught 2nd grade, I used the clip chart and it worked wonderfully. I know that there is some dispute about it being too punitive or embarrassing, but I didn't find that to be the case. I think it has a lot to do with how the teacher approaches it. I used it in a positive way. There was always a chance for a child to turn their day around and make better choices. I focused on that and it was a good thing in my classroom.

In 4th grade, I have focused on a classroom economy. It has been wildly successful! I love it, even thought it is a ton of work. I also like Whole Brain Teaching. I have never fully implemented all the techniques, but the ones I have work great. I have started the last two years with WBT's 5 rules and this year will be the same!

I always start the year by explicitly teaching my expectations. We practice lining up, leaving and coming into the room, walking in the hallway, raising hands, and answering questions. I encourage them and offer extra practice if they struggle to follow the expectations. I am a very strict teacher the first few weeks, as we are all getting to know each other. I can always become more lenient, but it is impossible to move the other way effectively once classroom management has taken a turn for the worst. I am not an ogre, but I hold everyone to a high standard and as the kids get used to that, I can relax a little.

This year I am stepping away from my classroom economy. I am going to try Class Dojo.

I used this toward the end of the year and I really liked it. You can customize the behaviors and message parents and kids!

Online views:

Positive behaviors that I have added for my class.

Negative behaviors for my class.

Here are some iPad views. I open the Class Dojo app, take attendance (so that absent kids won't show up that day - you don't want to give them points on days they aren't at school), and then you just tap to add or subtract points. You can give individual points or select several or all kids at the same time.

I think the messaging feature is the best! I plan on using this for parent communication a lot this year.

There are tons of free resources for Class Dojo on TPT! 

Class Dojo just made class sharing available. So if you are departmentalized, you can share your class with all the teachers.

What do you think?

WBT Lesson Plans

 Let me begin with a confession. After the first week, I realize I am a coward. This summer I decided to fully integrate WBT into my classroom. I did plenty of research, watched the videos, and read the eBooks. I read many blog posts and blogged about it myself, but I am a coward.

I started the first day off in great WBT fashion. I followed the first hour and first day suggestions. My students know the 5 rules, Class - Yes, and the Scoreboard. Then I lost my nerve. I was unsure and nervous about making all my lessons follow the WBT format. So I just didn't do it. That also led me to drop the Scoreboard.

We had a good first week, but it could have been better. I kicked myself all week, but I just couldn't get the nerve to do it. So here I am, spending time on Saturday night watching the webcast, making notes, and forming some lessons. I didn't bring home my lesson plans, so I can only do a few this weekend.

I know if I can get this going it will change my teaching style completely and help my students retain the knowledge they need to know. I also know that I will have to step out of my comfort zone to do it. Ugh. It's a little scary to me.

My notes from the webcast have given me hope. I always work better after I get things written down.

Watch live streaming video from wholebrainteaching1 at livestream.com

The WBT lesson plans always begin with Class - Yes! After I have my student’s attention I will make my point. Then I will use Teach - Ok. My points shouldn't be longer than 2-3 sentences. I need to speak briefly so that I don't lose my kid's focus. Kids get disruptive when they stop processing my words. I am blessed with a great class this year. They are not disruptive, just prone to talking off topic!

Sample lesson:

-Question; Don't waste time with background knowledge.

-Answer with a gesture

-Examples

-Examples

-Non-examples

-Critical thinking

-Students give their partner examples from their heads.

The annotations to add are scoreboard (S-, S+), mirror words (MW), and hands and eyes (H&E). I need to work on using the scoreboard more often. It feels like a distraction, but I know that it makes all the difference with engagement. One of my goals this week is to integrate the scoreboard effectively!

Coach B made a big point about the (BR) Bridge. Students will turn to their partners and repeat your words over and over again. This is something I need to model and practice with the kids until it is second nature to us. We need to repeat concepts over and over to move them from short-term memory to long-term memory.

The last thing we add to the lesson plan is PPL - Praise, Prompt, Leave. It is the comprehension check. I love that it is a way to assess learning during the lesson. I can evaluate the lesson as I am teaching it!

I have added critical thinking to the end of the lesson on both of my plans. I have made plans for reading and science. I will be teaching these lessons on Tuesday, since we are out of school on Monday for Labor Day. I will write out the rest of the week on Tuesday night when I bring my lesson plans home.

Wish me luck!

WBT In My Room & Certification

I feel like WBT is all over my room! Check out these pictures.

Oral Writing steps compliments of Amanda from The Teaching Thief.

5 Rules compliments of Miss Nelson

Super Improver Wall compliments of Tara West

The main techniques compliments of 3rd Grade Thoughts

Homework bookmarks for the Universal Homework Model - I actually made this one!

I love it. I know that having all these visual reminders will help me get things off to a good start this year. I also have some cue cards for myself for the first hour and day.

Click to download free from TPT compliments of Deanna Schuler

I love this binder!

 Contents:

Super Speed 1000 (reading) I have the student's copies made and in their STAR binders!

Super Speed Math I have level 1 addition copied and in STAR binders!

I can't wait to use this to help my kids become writers this year!

I love pictures. Aren't posts with a lot of pictures better to read? I think so!

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I have been doing a lot of posts about Whole Brain Teaching for 2 reasons.

1. I think it is wonderful and I want to share the techniques and resources with as many people as possible.
2. I am working toward my WBT certification!  :)

Here is more information on certification straight from the Whole Brain Teaching website.

WBT Certification

I am currently at 1,100 certification points!! I am waiting on the online test and then I will be preparing to make a video!!

Does anyone want to join me in working towards certification???

WBT Red & Green Markers

Well, I have another Whole Brain Teaching technique to share with you. This one takes no preparation and it is crazy effective.

Key Points from Coach B:

• We are trying to teach too many things all at once.
• Break all the skills up into small chunks.
• We are waiting too long to provide feedback.
• We don't need to learn to proofread, it's the KIDS! If we don't show them their mistakes when they make them, they won't learn the correct way to do it.
• Correct in the moment of performance.
• Give a time limit writing assignment, not a topic or length requirement.
• Focus, initially, on one skill.
• Walk around student desks.
• Mark less perfect skills with a red marker and more perfect skills with a green maker. At least 2 marks per page.
• Students respond with a "Thanks" or "Okay!"

What should you start with? Start at the very beginning. Just assume they don't know anything. I am going to start with neatness. This is a major component of our writing. If we can't read their writing, why write?

Remember, this is a suggestions. Tweak as you need.

We won't be judging them by a hypothetical example, we will be judging them on what they are doing now. That is differentiation!!!!!! We are looking for their personal best and getting them to beat their own personal bests as we move forward.

This is a great way to show kids what they are doing good and what they need to improve. I love that it is inlcuding the positive. So many times we only focus on what they need to improve, especially with the lower kids.

You can skip to 6:30 for the meat of the technique. Before that he talks about certification and just basic information.



More advanced skills:

#11 is a great way to teach writing paragraphs!!! Any sentence can be a topic sentence. Students will box in key words in that sentence and those are the words that all the other sentences must be about. Those boxed in words are the targets for the other sentences. He suggests physcially drawing an arrow from the detail sentences to the boxed in word they relate to in the topic sentence. Love it! Such a concrete way to teach writing a cohesive paragraph.

Major Point!!!!

Start with one skill and then introduce a new skill. Then ask students to focus on both skills. It should be cumulative! Remember this is a year long system. Personalize it to your classroom.

I am going to pair this with Oral Writing and the Whole Brain Writing Game.

Read more about Oral Writing HERE.

You can download the Whole Brain Writing Game on the Whole Brain Teaching website. It is under the ebooks tab. Just register or sign in to get it for FREE!

These are from the Whole Brain Writing Game: (this ebook is 69 pages!)

This is the first activity. This is the teacher prep page. 

This is the student page.

This is a fun actiivty.

Go download it NOW! You won't regret it. I can't wait for school to start. There are so many things I want to teach my students!!!!

WBT Universal Homework Model

I hate homework. Don't you? Be honest. It isn't fun to plan for, copy, enforce completion, grade, or return to students. It makes me feel like I am banging my head against the wall. Ugh.

Ok, now that I have gotten that out of the way...

Enter homework Whole Brain style. I have high hopes for this model. Here is another fun video from Chris Biffle! You should really watch this one. He makes some great points! You only need to watch the first 15 minutes to get the gist of the homework model.

Watch live streaming video from wholebrainteaching1 at livestream.com

I changed mine up a little, which is a great thing about WBT. Coach B gives you free reign to tweak his ideas to meet your classroom needs!

Why would kids do extra homework???????
Peer pressure makes it happen. The class earns one point for every star of homework completed. Any student who did one star homework earns the class one star and so on. This is how you reinforce students doing their homework:

• Call for 1 star homework. Those students raise their paper in the air and you tally the points. (1 for each)
• Call for 2 star homework. Those students stand up and raise their paper in the air. (2 points)
• Call for 3 star homework. Those students stand up, raise their paper in the air, and jump up and down. (3 points)
• Call for 4 star homework. Those students do the same as 3 star, but everyone cheers for them! (4 points)
• Call for 5 star homework. Those students get to come to the front of the room and do the above. They get the loudest cheers. (5 points)

My class will be working toward free time on Friday. Look at this picture of my weekly homework graph. I will have this in a page protector in a central location in the room. I will use a dry erase marker to color the square throughout the week.

So if we earn 45 or less points during the week we get 3 minutes of free time. 46-85 points gets us 10 minutes and 86 or more will get us 20 minutes of free time.

Let me tell you how I am planning on using the homework handout. I am going to print them out. I made them 2 to a page to reduce copies. I will always have the instructions on the back. Once they are copied, I will cut them in half and 3 hole punch each half page. My students will put this in their STAR binders and keep track of their homework during the week. On Friday, I will collect the homework bookmark and any papers they are turning in.


I didn't add any decoration or fun fonts, because I needed it to be straight forward. So they aren't that pretty, but they will be very functional.

As always, if you want the powerpoint file to edit yourself, just email me.
rmoris at mesquiteisd dot org

WBT Oral Writing & a few pictures

“Make it physical and you make it visual. Those are the two biggest areas of the brain.”

Watch live streaming video from wholebrainteaching1 at livestream.com

If you can get kids to speak paragraphs and even short essays, writing is so much simpler. I need to practice using wait time so kids have a chance to prepare their sentences. This was a great webcast. I am so glad I watched it. I tuned into the first week goals webcast yesterday and this was on the list. I said to myself that I just had to watch this video because writing is going to be a huge part of my class this upcoming year.

In Texas, we have a state assessment in writing in 4^th grade. I am told that we are responsible for bringing their writing up to par, because the younger grades don’t always do it justice. I know the truth in that. Unfortunately, there is never enough time in the day when you are working against yourself. I am going to change that in my classroom this year by using WBT techniques. I am very excited.

After I finished watching the webcast, I immediately posted a link to this video on my Facebook page. I tagged a teacher in my building from very grade level. I am hoping they will take a look, come ask me about it, and begin to use oral writing in their classrooms.

These are my notes for implementing oral writing:

• Teach your students that every question you ask must be answered with a complete sentence. Be consistent!!!
•  Teach the wrong way to answer questions first (one or two words)
• Teach the right way to answer all questions (complete sentences). The answer must repeat part of the question. I am going to let my students know that I expect intelligent speaking in my classroom. The slang and incomplete sentences they use outside of the classroom doesn’t belong in academics. I want to give them the sense of the right time and place.
• If they forget to answer with a complete sentence just smile, cup your hand behind your ear, and say, “I didn’t hear your complete sentence.” It becomes a silent prompt.
• Teach kids to add a detail sentence to their answer, called an adder. The cue is spinning your fingers like a wheel.
• The answer to the question is the topic sentence. Everything else develops the idea.
• Teach kids to add a conclusion after adders, called a concluder. The cue is waving one hand above the other like “safe!”
• Say in conclusion or to sum up or finally with air comma (zoop!)

We need to do this hundreds of times before they will consistently transfer it to their writing. I am really in love with this. When I was in school, I always knew what “sounded” right when it came to sentences and grammar. Most of my students don’t have that, because the language they hear is not even close to correct. I am really going to focus on this every day.

If a student doesn’t know what to say next, they just say help me (throw their arms up) and everybody else can give suggestions.  It is a continuous safety net in the classroom.  The kids listen to the suggestions and then finish their sentence with one of the suggestions or something that comes to them.

Whatever you want in writing, think of a gesture, and get the kids to orally practice. That way we get lots of practice and train the brain.

If an adder is off topic, show them the bungee jump off topic routine. Walk your fingers down your arm, when a sentence is off topic leap them off your arm and shout, “Aiiii! Off topic!” Then bring them back to show they need to bring their sentence back on topic

This is another one of those, “Why didn’t I think of that?” moments. I mean really? It is so simple, yet perfect. I know this will make a huge difference in my student’s writing.  I just have to commit to teaching and using it daily.

I love the high five switch! Divide the class into ones and twos. Number one starts, prompts herself, and gets through it. Number two is mirroring her gestures. When one is finished, she high fives two and they switch roles. Kids can use oral writing as a pre-writing exercise with each other. I think I will find myself saying, “Talk through it so you can write through it.”

Oral writing is all about higher order thinking and I love that. This is going to stretch my student’s brains and get them thinking in new ways. Once we get this down as a group, I really want to have my class do this with a partner daily. This will help with writer’s block. It will get them thinking about how to start writing from a prompt and develop several coherent paragraphs without breaking a sweat. Isn’t that wonderful?

I am hoping this will really show them the link between speaking and writing. Telling a story orally is easy because we do it all the time. We just have to treat our writing the same way. We first generate our thoughts, use oral writing techniques, and then put it all on paper. I can’t wait to share this with my colleagues and students!

*****

Can you use this? I know I will be using this. Just another WBT technique to add to the list!

Classroom update pictures.
♥♥♥

Right beside the door

I love my desk!!!

WBT Super Improver Wall

This might be the thing I am looking forward to the most this year. I am really excited about it. I think this is something that every teacher should incorporate into their room. It is going to keep us positive and looking to improve based on individual skills. I am so glad I can share this with you!

Watch this video to get a better understanding of the Super Improvers Wall.

Watch live streaming video from wholebrainteaching1 at livestream.com

Begin the year with your Super Improver Board up in your room, but don't introduce it to the students until the 2nd week of school. Let them wonder about it. Build up some anticipation! If they ask me about it, I am just going to say that I have to make sure they are ready before I explain about our board.

• Explain to your students that it is all about rewarding students who improve. This means improving in anything we do inside the classroom and out.
• Students are not competing against each other, only themselves.
• Students must earn 10 stars to move up to the next level.
• Wait for students to notice the camera clipart on certain levels before you discuss it.
• Camera levels: when students begin this level, you take their picture with several of their friends. Print it out and place it face down on a board in the room. (It can be the Super Improver Board if you have room.) When that student earns 5 stars, they get to see the picture!

The great thing about WBT is that you can make it fit your classroom. Coach B talks about naming the levels fun things to go with your theme. I have seen boards that are sports themed, under the sea themed, and mine is team building themed. Be creative!

I got my cards from Tara West at her TPT store. You can access it here. It is a free download! FYI - you shouldn't pay for anything WBT related. People are not allowed to charge for any materials that make that are inspired by WBT.

I have mine on the inside of our classroom door. Sorry about the glare, that is the downside of laminating. Oh well, they will last longer this way.

Once I get my class list, I will write their names on white paper for the beginner level and tape them up! I really wanted this to be a focal point, so I put it on the door. We will see it every time we go in and out. I think it will be a great motivator.

I am planning on finding the coordinating colors and making the name papers this coming week. That way when a student has earned 10 stars and is ready to move up, I don't have to scramble. I will just get the baggie, pull out the appropriate color, write their name, and tape it to the door.

For the stickers, I just bought a pack of star stickers at Mardel.

I am going to carry stickers with me in the hallway so that as I see improving behavior, I can hand them out. Kids will just stick them on their name on the door when we walk into the classroom.

I am planning on using this mostly for behavior, but also for handwriting, desk organization, neatness on assignments, respectful words to me and other students, being on time to school, improving their test grades, and anything else that comes to me as the year progresses.

What do you think? Do you use something similar?

Have you registered at Whole Brain Teaching yet? There are tons of free resources just waiting for you!

For more information go to: Whole Brain Teaching

WBT SuperSpeed Reading and Math

SuperSpeed Reading

This is such a great tool for any classroom. I am going to be focusing on SuperSpeed 1,000, but there is also a SuperSpeed 100 for younger grades. There is also a SuperSpeed Phonics for kinder and 1st! Just register on the Whole Brain Teaching website and you have access to the ebooks that include all the materials you will need!!!!

wholebrainteaching1 on livestream.com. Broadcast Live Free

Don't you love finding wonderful ideas with ready-made materials to go with it? That is exactly what I am sharing with you. There are paper copies and an electronic version. I used the electronic SuperSpeed 100 at the end of last year with my 2nd graders and you would have thought it was candy. They would literally beg to play this "game!" I use the electronic version for whole class fun. The paper version is for student teams and that is where the real improvement happens.

This is so crucial to basic reading skills, because these are the words that make up most of the words we read. Coach B integrated the Dolch and Fry lists, so there are no words left out! This is reading practice that incorporates social interactions, beating personal records, and fast-paced fun. Perfect, right?

Procedure:

• Pair students up - you can decide how to pair them (ability, personality, etc)
• The students are working as a team to beat their previous record.
• They will trade off reading words, back and forth for 60 seconds.
• Students will come upon nonsense words that are read phonetically. These words are used to gage how far they have read.
• The next time students play they don't just start at the beginning. Once they break their record, they start one line down from the top. So the first time they break their record, they start at line 2. The next time they break their record, they start at line 3. Does that make sense?

This is from the ebook. It is at the top of the paper copy that students use.

I can't wait to use SuperSpeed 1000 this year. I know I will have students that still struggle with some of these words. This will help their fluency and help them comprehend the higher level reading we require of them in 4th grade.

In the eBook, there are differentiation ideas and one-on-one variations. You HAVE to go download it! You won't regret it, I promise!

SuperSpeed Math

Not only does WBT have SuperSpeed to improve reading skills, WBT also has SuperSpeed Math for addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, fractions, and the "gnarlies." The gnarlies are all the most missed math computation problems. A few college professors got together and published a study on the most commonly missed addition and subtraction problems. Coach Biffle has carried those over into multiplication and division as well.

page 7 of SuperSpeed Math II - Whole Brain Teaching

page 13 of SuperSpeed Math II - Whole Brain Teaching

Remember

• Students are saying the entire problem aloud. For example: "Zero plus zero equalls zero. Zero plus one equals one." This is important for memory formation.
• Students only work for 60 seconds. They get two trys and then it is their partner's turn.
• Download the eBook for more ideas about how to differentiate for your students!