Becoming a Wiz at Brain-Based Teaching

Wow. So, I think I'm going to start with all of the positive things about your lesson first. I LOVE your wiki. It is a great resource and has a lot of valuable information on it. I think you did an excellent job at finding resources to support the learning that you guys found in the book. Awesome job. I can't tell you how much of a great tool this will be for me in the future. I also love that you broke up the book evenly and everybody had a chance to share their part. I loved the fact that Eileen was walking around during this lesson, because it reminded me of actually teaching a class full of students, and it was a great demonstration of something you can do in your classroom. I'm not even sure she did in on purpose. I loved the activities and the quiz. The quiz was an excellent way to get me emotionally involved in your lesson. I thought it was great that you started out with that.

Now, for my suggestions. Your lesson contained A LOT of information about Brain-Based Teaching, but I wish you had presented it in a different way. You TOLD us about how the brain needs hands on, kinesthetic learning. You TOLD us how 12th graders can only pay attention for a maximum of 17 minutes. You TOLD us about a lot of things that were important to this book. That was the problem. I feel as though it would have been more beneficial if you had taught us the information the way in which the book says is the best way for students to learn based on brain-based teaching. How much more powerful would it have been if you would have done that. I honestly can tell you that I am glad that you made the wiki because now I have that as a resource to go back and figure out all of the information that I missed. It was a lot to digest in a little amount of time done through a lot of talking. That is just something to think about.