Whole Brain Teaching

29 February 2012

One of the best parts about Midyear Meeting was having the opportunity to hear about what other people have been doing in the classroom. Another Valencian TA talking about a method of classroom management called ¨Whole Brain Teaching.¨ When I got back to Alicante, I decided to do a little bit of research on the method in order to see if it might work with some of my classes.

Whole Brain Teaching (WBT) seeks to combine words, with gestures, with thought. In theory, creating more connections between a word and its meaning and thereby facilitating memory.

It seems to be like Total Physical Response (TPR)--which also connects words with movement--but applied to classroom management.

Looking at the website, I found a couple ideas that I thought could help me in the classroom. The first of which is Class/Yes.

The idea is pretty self-explanatory. When the teacher says, ¨Class,¨ the students have to respond with ¨Yes.¨ The catch is that the students have to say ¨Yes¨ the same way that the teacher says ¨Class.¨ So if I say, ¨Class. Class. Class,¨ they have to reply with ¨Yes. Yes. Yes.¨ If I say it in a high-pitched, they have to say it in a high-pitched voice. If I do a gesture, they have to do a gesture, etc...

The kids absolutely love it! I heard them all whispering to one another, ¨¡Qué divertido! How fun!¨

I like it because I get their attention without have to yell.

The second idea that I´ve used today is The Scoreboard.

On the board, I put a happy face and a sad face. I tell the students that if they do something good, that means I´m happy and I´ll put a happy face. They all get to say, ¨Oh yeah!¨ which, of course, they all want to do! If they are talking or aren´t paying attention, I put a sad face. Then, they all have to say ¨awwww.¨

I think that this offers an interesting opportunity to visually show the kids the type of behavior that I´m looking for. I get to reward positive behaviors and everyone gets to celebrate that! I can also show them the types of behavoirs that aren´t okay and that I´d like to see changed--without lecturing them.

I´m going to continue to explore this method, and I´ll write about other ideas that I use.

If you are interested in learning more, check out the website here.