You know those days
when you can't seem to focus on anything and you don't want to be doing
whatever it is you're supposed to? All of Year 4 had one of those days on my
most recent visit.
The students came in
groggily, slumping into their seats. Although they were given assignments to
start the day - either word problems or micro-writing - very few got started
right away. Mr. Barry spent more time instructing the students to start than actually
working with them at first. Once some of the students actually started, the
ones who still didn't want to work struck up conversations with their
neighbors, distracting them. Mr. Barry tried to reign in their attention
through call-and-response clapping patterns, which worked well aside from the
fact that it had to be repeated a few times over the course of the first 10
minutes of class. Eventually, Mr. Barry resorted to raising his voice, which
silenced the class.
We moved into guided
reading, during which my group remained distracted for the start. D refused to participate at all, but the others eventually settled down and
answered the questions I presented. We finished just in time for the next
lesson, which was a preparation for Thursday's assembly. In honor of Book Week,
the students prepared to present the story of Rapunzel to parents accompanied
by a series of gestures. A number of the boys were reluctant to participate at
first, so Mr. Barry moved them to the back of the room. They stood there while
the rest of the students sat together on the carpet. The moment any of them
began to participate, Mr. Barry quickly welcomed them back into the circle,
making it clear that (a) he expected their best and that (b) they could deliver
it.
After they took
their break, the students continued the Book Week theme by beginning to create
their own book covers. The project engaged them more than the work they had
done earlier in the day, and their work was focused until lunch as well as
immediately after, when they returned to the assignment.
As we reached the
middle of the afternoon, my first real challenge loomed. Mr. Barry and I had
previously discussed the possibility of me teaching a movement lesson based on
the Take One Picture, but he had wanted to wait and see in what direction the
students took the image. When they latched onto knights and swordplay, a
movement-based lesson seemed to fit perfectly, and I was asked that morning if
I could run a lesson that afternoon. During lunch, I sat in the quiet classroom
and pulled together a plan, grateful for the experiences and repertoire I had
gained from my class on the Art of Teaching Dance as I recalled a myriad of
activities I could include for the occasion.
When we first
entered the space in which we would dance, the students recognized its usual
purpose as their gymnasium and took a few minutes to settle down. Once I
regained their attention, I set a few ground rules (for safety purposes) and we
started with a warm-up to define their personal spaces. When three of the boys
still refused to participate, Mr. Barry removed them from the group. I later
learned that he had read them the riot act before instructing them to write
apology letters to me. Meanwhile, the other students explored first the poses
and then the movements of peasants, spies, kings/queens, and knights. After the
three boys finished their letters, they were allowed to rejoin the class, and
they ended up really enjoying the activities. Unfortunately, about halfway
through the lesson, we had to stop because the Year 5 students needed the space
to prepare for their assembly on space. Back in the classroom, they returned to
their book covers until the daily assembly began.
At the end of the
day, Mr. Barry and I talked about how my lesson had gone. We went over what I
might do differently next time (trying to establish the rules and initial
instructions before leaving the classroom while the students were still in
academic mode) and where it would have gone next (partner work on responding to
movement leading into fencing-type movement).
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