Toga! (or The Importance of Anticipation)

Are you old enough to remember those vintage Heinz Ketchup commercials? You know the ones where someone has the bottle tipped upside down while the song plays:

Anticipation. . .
anticipaaayaation iiis. . .
makin' me waaaait!

Oh hold on. What am I thinking?

Take a little visit back to 1979 for a moment okay? A little nostalgia is good for the soul.
Or how about this one? I'll meet you back here in a minute when I will promptly get to the point.

Two of the greatest Hooks in TV history. . . .


One of the greatest challenges in teaching is having enough Time. We get focused on "covering" enough content to make us feel like we are staying "on track." In the interest of staying on our timeline to meet the deadline by the time the bell rings, we begin to neglect that most important part of the lesson. We begin to think, "Open your book to page seventy-two," is enough to engage. After all, we have A ton to do today!

The other day it took me five minutes to get everybody on page seventy-two. That's a very long time. There is fascinating stuff on page seventy-two. I LOVE page seventy-two! I start to think these kids cannot follow a simple direction. What do I have to do to get them on page seventy-two?

The following video was shot while Lisa and I introduced a lesson on Greek and Latin roots. We are in the midst of incorporating these roots into our spelling program, but most kids didn't have anything to hang it on. We want them to understand why we take so many words from the Greeks and Romans. I don't know about you, but I'll take advantage of any occasion that calls for a chiton or a toga. And presents! Don't forget presents.

This was a little more. . . elaborate than I would plan for every day or even every week, but if I had asked them to go to page seventy-two following this hook it would have taken about fifteen seconds. I'm posting this here so I don't forget how important it is to dedicate a good amount of thought into introducing every lesson. It really is worth the time--it saves time, in fact, because there is less re-teaching later.

Doing a fancier lesson opening every so often puts the students in a more constant state of anticipation, I think. "What in the world are we going to do next?" They learn to expect something a little bit more. It's pressure on the teacher to come up with thoughtful hooks (yikes!), but the students also know more will be expected from them, as it should be.