The Whole Brain Teaching strategies have made a huge difference in my students this year. Engagement has been the biggest difference I have noticed because my students have actively participated in their own management instead of just listening to the me bark out commands.
The scoreboard has been a great tool and I plan to use it again next year with some modifications. I am working on adding incentives that do not require me to spend money everytime. Also, I have added levels of incentives and tied the levels to total points earned so that when I do spend my money it is on something that has been earned.
I am also goiing to focus on the teach okay stragegy and come up with a system to assign 1's and 2's. Sometimes I like for my students to choose their own seats so I may just number the seats with 1's and 2's so they will automatically know who to turn to for the teach okay time. It is important to use this strategy quickly and not take time to organize the teams.
My students have laughed as we have used the Class-Yes, Mighty Groan and Oh Yeah! At the end of the year a student asked me why we didn't use that Whole Brain stuff anymore. I laughed and said that they had taken over their own behavior management and we didn't need some of the strategies anymore! That is the best testimony to the effectiveness of WBT!!
