W21D109 (Friday) The last class I taught this morning, is one of my hardest classes which I teach twice a week for 50 minutes. For the first time ever, the most challenging of the students was one of my best students and it was the most creative class I've taught all week. I was nervous as I entered (late) because, I had to drop another class back with their teacher, so instead of meeting them with calm demeanor, I came back into the room and they were doing the Macarena with their teacher. Needless to say, they were all riled up. It was the day before vacation, they had just come from an award assembly, and they were waiting in the hallway, because they were early to class. This is a class which I micromanage, because they are so often out of control and bickering with each other, but at that point I smelled disaster in a class that This was which to me was not the best choice. And that's kind of up to the teacher who was waiting with them. But I shifted gears instead of getting annoyed and talking to them. I'm like, I didn't like them, which I do, I turned it into an opportunity. I swapped up the warm up for an impromptu "audition" for the play we will be presenting in May. "Tryouts for our play!" And I just as I cited that on the spot, they were captivated. is a book that we have been reading, and at this point, they know the story well enough that we just started acting it out. This was not one of my inclusion classes, so you would think there would be fewer challenging behaviors, but that is not the case. They're great kids, but a little on the bossy side.
Why Mosquitoes Buzz in People's Ears is a book that we have been reading for a while, so was the perfect time to start playing with the drama of the story. And so while playing out the story "in role" I began to weave the myriad personalities into a quilt of interesting characters in the story, that can become their play. Contain, control and correct has been my mantra; today I let go of part of that control. It gave me a chance to recognize their wonderful capabilities. And when they started spinning out of control, instead of letting it derail my process, today it became part of my character as King Lion, to show my annoyance. They stepped up and played each part with conviction and creativity. There were ways my students created and performed, that I've never seen in class before. I also got one of my y wildest children to really listen and he obviously loved playing a role. Story is the connective tissue, for me, that holds the arts together. When you tell a story you use your imagination and new and wonderful ways.