New school, same lesson. In Hot Stuff this week, again in a 4th grade class, I tried the "Let's review some bad answers" technique... and fell on my face. It worked well in the already engaged, but not sure where to go next class of last week, and was a struggle to use in the less-engaged, more focused on blurting out answers group of this week. It's a great tool in classrooms where they're ready to answer and willing to raise their hands to be heard, thus providing an opportunity for every student who thinks they have the answer to give it. It's a less effective tool in rooms that are, in the words of their teachers, "squirrely." Their lack of respect for the idea of raising their hands to be heard leads to a lack of understanding that what I'm going for is group responses - a thumb's up to say, "yes! this is a good answer," or a raised hand to add "well, it could work if we change some words."
All in all, it was another example of some things work in some places some times. And the rest of the time, come up with something new.
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