This week, we are focusing on the importance of listening and how we use our different body parts to show we are listening. I started off the lesson with
Howard B. Wigglebottom Learns to Listen, a book about a rabbit who doesn't listen and finds himself in trouble. Once Howard learns to listen and starts listening in class, he receives a #1 Listener award and stays out of trouble.
We also discussed my classroom expectations for our lessons. Here are my expectations:
After this, we moved into an activity called "Follow, Follow." During this activity, students must use their listening skills to follow directions. This game is very similar to Simon Says, with the students listening for me to say "Follow, Follow" and then I tell them to touch a body part (ex: Follow, follow, touch your nose). After our listening ears were all warmed up, we moved into our lesson about listening.
We spent the rest of the time discussing The Listening Rules, four rules that show the teacher I am listening. These rules are:
- Eyes watching (point to eyes)
- Ears listening (cup ears)
- Voices Quiet (finger over your mouth)
- Body still (hug torso)
We practiced going over these rules and looked at a picture of other a student sharing, making sure to point out any listening rules we saw other students using in the picture. We also talked about how we can talk to ourselves (silently) when we want to share but know we need to wait. This helps us prevent Blurt-out-itis and be successful Panthers who can follow the listening rules!
