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=W.L. PLC= = = =September 7, '11= Kathy, Stacey and Kim met, discussed "brain breaks" and brainstormed additional ways to incorporate activity changes. Sustainable TPRS I'd add one more thing to that. Read "BrainRules." In a lot of ways, the way we do TPRSisn't brain friendly, mostly in the amount oftime between activity transitions. Since I readthis book in particular, but also previous brainresearch, I have re-worked TPRS with: 1. Real transitions. The brain pays attention for only 10 minutes, so I change activities more often. *5 minute mixer activities to get students in the habit of INIATING communication, not just responding *What else? 2. Fake transitions. I do something in the middle of a story that includes the entire class,so it's not just me telling a story or a couple of people acting. *Dance *Music cd’s, videos, singalongs *A crowd walks by *A flashmob *A crowd breaks into “La Cucaracha” *A crowd cheers/boos *Do the monthly gesture *TPR a bunch of vocab *What else? 3. Processing transitions. *Take a 30 second break --- turn to the person next to you and predict what could happen next in the story. (Stole that from Beth Skelton) *Draw the story we just told using your left hand. 30 seconds. (Brain Rules -- in order to transfer information to processing by a different part of the brain) In an adult class in Washington in February I experimented with really following the Brain Rules advice and changing activities A LOT. Every few minutes I was asking them to get up. We did running dictation, reading a story and acting it out with a partner. I told a storyand they acted it out. They drew with their left hands. The class went AMAZINGLY fast. When I did it yesterday in class --- randomly changingactivities even within TPR, by grabbing a prop or a picture or recycling older vocab, attention goes up. It has to be COMPELLING, comprehensible input, and if they aren't paying attention...well, it isn't compelling. And the brain isn't capable of paying attention to one thing for more than a few minutes at a time.It also says some pretty interesting things abouthow multi-tasking is a myth. No suchthing. It's a worthwhile read. It's physicallychanged my teaching more than any other book I can think of lately.Karen Rowan Carol GaabSustainable TPRS:In regard to the teacher who asked about TPRS being sustainable, Iwanted to throw out just a few tips for keeping it sustainable: 1) Use musicOnce a week (or every other week) introduce a new song by decodingthe lyrics with students. Tell them about the song, play the song acouple of times while students follow the lyrics with their finger. As they build up a repetoir of song, play 'old' songs. Require studentsto either a) follow the written lyrics as song is played. b) sing or lip sync as it's played. I play at least one song per class. 2) Use videoPlay videos - but make sure they are completely comprehensible. Sr.Wooly, Youtube, Cuéntame más interactive story cd, Extra, shortsnipits (1-2 min.) from movies and TV shows. 3) Partner WorkShort activities (2-3 min.): practice vocab, re-tells, creating a newending to a story, inventing the next event/detail in a story,reading, predicting the next event in a reading. My goal is a partner-type activity every 15-20 min. 4) READ!If you are reading engaging and interesting pieces, reading is verylow-energy / low-stress. Read with your classes! 5) Use a curriculum that is easy to use and requires little to no>prep! I may be a little biased, but the Cuéntame series is incredibly>teacher-friendly. Daily comprehensive lesson plans are provided,>including gestures, pqa, story-asking outlines, and concentrated>readings. To see/practice with the curricula, go to the 'free>downloads' at www.tprstorytelling.com 6) Use any OTHER source that will provide compelling, contextualized,>comprehensible input.

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