Kia Ora/Failte/Hi there.............I'm a Deputy Principal in a school in New Zealand (though I am originally from Ireland where I taught for 12 years-hence the various greetings!!!)
I have recently been looking into developing greater engagement in the students at our Intermediate School (Middle School) here in Christchurch, New Zealand and I am thrilled to have discovered this site.
If my teacher taught using Whole Brain Teaching strategies when I was in school, I would have LOVED it!
This seems like a very powerful and motivating tool. I am very keen to kick it off at our school but I want to make sure that I get it right. Any suggestions/cautions with regard to starting the programme new in a school??

I would start with a small group of interested teachers, who could be a Whole Brain Teaching Leaders. Let them experiment in class and bring it to the rest of the school.

One thing that you have to watch out for is that a lot of teachers try it for a few weeks and it works great, but they do not continue to evolve the system so it gets stale and they get stuck. If they work together and support each other, and watch the videos and ask lots of questions they will be amazing!!

Hello and welcome to WBT! One of the best things we have done is to slowly introduce it to teachers and provide them with ownership. As an Instructional Coach, I used WBT strategies when presenting 21st century learning to our entire staff at the beginning of the year. There was a handful of teachers that were gung ho, a large number that were curious, and a handful that would not try it...and that is okay. I continued to work with those teachers who wanted to learn more. I now conduct weekly/monthly workshops with teachers as we slowly roll it out to students. We focused on Class-Yes the first 6 weeks, Teach-Okay the next 6 weeks, and now we are preparing to roll out the scoreboard. We have found this pace to help teachers with feeling comfortable and mastering the techniques.

If you ever need anyone to come out for a workshop let me know!

Sean

Hello there,
I am always excited to hear about administrators on board with WBT. The problems I have seen in the past with this is that often teachers are use to admin giving them new things all the time and are not willing to try. As the other Whole Brain Teachers already said, it is best to get a few that are willing to try it out and let them work on it for a while. WBT usually works best as a bottom up method. After a while, if you get a few who are good at it and willing to keep trying WBT, I would suggest you have them plan some mini-lessons to do at your next staff meeting. I teach middle school and at our school site teachers seem to pay most attention to staff development when other teachers are sharing things that work. If you need help, have your teachers email me. I have taught several middle/high school WBT seminars. I can try to help them organize the material and send them some things that I use when training other teachers.
Angela Macias
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I couldn't agree with Sara(h)and Angela more. Find those teachers who are interested in some outside the box techniques AND who are willing stick with it. WBT is student engagement at it's best. From the simple management techniques to the methods in which a lesson is delivered. The youtube videos provide some great insight, as do the e books (free in the download section). Please keep us up to date on how things are going and let us know how we can assist in the Southern Hemisphere.

Jay