It works!

 Today we had a go at a 'mini Mantle' type activity with students in Room 1.  I used the planning Tim Taylor shares on the Mantle of the Expert site for Fairy-Tale Problem Solvers.

Michelle kindly helped by being the 'adult in role' (AIR) - Mrs Brown, mother of the three little pigs.  She's come to us with a problem because we were the Problem Solvers.  The children responded well to the AIR and were intrigued as to why she was upset.  Drama was a great hook into the activity.

The 'building belief' element of Mantle is crucial.  The students need to be a responsible team with a commission for our client. Mrs Brown had left our offices for the moment.  We were attempting to talk about what problem solvers might need to do their job (kids came up with tools, phone number, phone, sign).  I had imagined we might spend a bit of time getting our office ready but I sensed I was losing the kids.  In hindsight I'd gone to big here - should've stuck to Tim's plan which had a quick sign making task.   I was a bit vague re this part and this is an area it will be important to carefully plan for next term.

We had a quick chat about how we needed to behave to make sure our guest was comfortable and felt welcome when she returned to our offices - because she was very upset.  We got a chair ready for her and some tissues. Some kids helped to have a bit of a tidy up.  A quick sign was made for the door, we decided to sit at desks and we welcomed Mrs Brown back.  Jesame and Makaira took the lead here and were very keen to welcome our guest back. (This tied in fabulously with our PB4L focus for the week too.)  At this stage we had maybe 70% of the class engaged.

We got more information about our commission from Mrs Brown when she returned  - that we needed to help design a house for her sons.  At this stage we'd started to refer to ourselves as 'Agent Gretchen' and "Agent Neo' etc. (building belief).  Some of the students had questions to ask Mrs Brown to get more information.  Next time, I'll try to manage this phase a little better so all children's questions are heard and help the children have a sense of what we might need to find out.  There comes that balance though where student voice and student direction is so important and I don't want to over-manage.

Once we got to our task - designing the house - it was quite amazing to see what happened.  We had a different tone in the class and all children were engaged.  Most started out designing individually but soon chose to move into groups and collaborate.  Jesame found a clipboard and took on a quality control type role and was checking in with the agents on her checklist.  The designing continued for most of an hour.  Children were referring to themselves as "Agent..." and were aware they had a time deadline (mini tension?) when Mrs Brown would be back to see the designs.

I had an interesting discussion with Makaira - he was asking me if this was a game, and had whaea Michelle and I got this ready.  He was happy to play along and accept that we were using our imaginations and he said it was fun.  It's important in Mantle that the children feel safe and that we're not tricking or deceiving children.  Mrs Brown had the symbol of a handbag  (and when the bell went Makaira was one of the last in class and he put the bag over his shoulder and dabbed his eyes with the hankerchief - having a go in role as Mrs Brown)

Mrs Brown was invited back - would have been good to prepare ourselves a little better before she came in so children could have listened as Mrs Brown went around the groups - next time!  This was when the children received feedback on their design and also their design process.  We acknowledged that we'd solved a problem, and we could see Mrs Brown felt much better (problem resolved).

I didn't introduce the tension in today's mini Mantle session (there's a wolf tension in Tim's plan) though some children had mentioned this.  In a Mantle, introducing tensions are what prompts curriculum learning.

The Problem-Solving Agents exist now in our class, and we'll be able to return to this imagined world to solve more problems.

The students were engaged with a purpose.  They felt successful.  Students who are often disengaged were totally into it.  Some students continued with their building on and off until the end of the day, taking it home to finish.

I had no doubts about Mantle, but I'd been putting it off because of how 'room 1 was' type thing and will they cope...will I cope??!  I'm so glad to see what happened today.  I'm more confident now to plough ahead as I can see all the good stuff will happen, and like Dorothy talks about - it may appear messy and disruptive from the outside at first - but it will be worth it.  I saw today how well PB4L and reinforcing our school values falls so naturally out of this process.

Some things to note re next term's Mantle - managing the children who are going in and out for learning like Reading Recovery and Quick 60 etc. - just making sure they're arriving back in and know where to slot in.  Also making sure other adults are aware of what we're doing and what their part will be (e.g. teacher aides). 

And thank you Michelle - for your time and help today, and for being so supportive of being innovative to improve outcomes for our kids.