Whole Brain Teaching is elementary  

Caledonia — “Class, class, class,” teacher Courtney Oosterhouse repeated recently to redirect her students’ attention to the front of the room.

“Yes, yes, yes,” they all replied in unison.

Oosterhouse lowered her voice and hunched over to tell her class what they were going to be learning that morning. 

“Repeat after me,” she whispered. “I can tell about adjectives and adverbs.”

Not only did the Dutton Elementary fourth-graders repeat each section of their teacher’s sentence, they mirrored her hand gestures — a different one for each part of the statement. Almost every word or phrase that Oosterhouse spoke was accompanied by an action for her students to associate with the word or request.

When she clapped twice and said, “teach,” students responded with two claps and “OK” in the same cadence, without missing a beat.     

The whole practice seemed rehearsed, like a dance; that’s because Oosterhouse and her fellow Dutton Elementary teachers have been using Whole Brain Teaching methods to increase engagement and information retention in their classes this year. 

Activating the Whole Brain 

Whole Brain Teachers of America was started in 1999 by three Southern California teachers including Chris Biffle, who earlier this fall trained the Dutton staff one day a week for five weeks.  

The method gives teachers games and tools, like call-and-response phrases, for classroom management and activating more parts of students’ brains.  

Principal Shawn Veitch said the once-a-week training was not mandatory for staff, but 100% of his teaching staff voluntarily participated. 

“We are trying to maximize classroom engagement, and I just think it’s amazing that all my classroom teachers voluntarily stayed an additional hour each week to continue to be the best they can be for their kids,” he said. 

Veitch said WBT instructs teachers to use common words and gestures, but they also have the flexibility to come up with their own.

During training, Biffle also encouraged teachers to make more conscious efforts to connect with more students individually, to make them feel welcome and like they belong. 

Oosterhouse participated in the training, and said she first witnessed WBT in action during college. 

“The kids were insanely engaged and there were no students off task,” she recalled. “(The teacher) had them all mirroring her words with gestures, teaching each other with gestures and the whole class was locked in with eyes on her. I knew I wanted to achieve the same thing.”

Having used the method in her classroom for 12 years, Oosterhouse said she loves it because her students are consistently participating in their learning and follow the strategies with ease. 

“We do the Magic Circle multiple times a day, where I say a main point in just a few words, they mirror with words and gestures and then turn and teach their partner using the same gestures over and over until I call them back again,” she said. 

The Magic Circle technique helps establish a daily classroom routine with predictable call-and-response for students to hear and follow directions. 

She added: “When my students are locked in to their learning, they make me feel like I am in teacher heaven.”

‘Engaged and loving it’

Dutton teachers are using Whole Brain Teaching skills at every grade level to energize classroom engagement and making connections with their students.

First-grade teacher Megan Barnum started using it this year. She updated her tried-and-true engagement strategies, like having students turn to the person next to them and repeat what their teacher just taught them using the “teach/OK” method. 

“It is still fresh, but the students are engaged and loving it,” she said. “My class wants to share their reasoning more without me asking for it, and they are really paying attention to what others are saying, too.”

When Barnum realized she forgot a hand gesture during a lesson about nouns, she said, “Oh no, Mrs. Barnum made a mistake.” Without skipping a beat, her students held up their hands in the shape of hearts and said, “We still love you, Mrs. Barnum.” 

Teacher Casey King said none of her usual strategies worked last year with one group of first-graders. This year, she said, learning how to use WBT has been “life-changing.” 

“My student engagement has been amazing,” she said. “They are learning and retaining the information and more importantly, the students are so caring of each other and we are always celebrating each other and building each other up.”

During a morning meeting, King and her students reviewed the five rules of Whole Brain Teaching in their classroom:

After reciting them together, King asked why the rules were important. 

“It’s important to follow our rules if you want to be safe,” answered Jayyden Sizemore.  

Added classmate Charlotte O’Mara: “If you don’t follow directions quickly, you’re not being respectful.”

Read more from Caledonia: 
• First day focus: be helpful & kind
• Early literacy efforts pay off for elementary school