As educators, we often view students as the equation that we must solve, especially when it comes to Social-Emotional Learning. We pull our hair (in my case, my beard 🧔🏾) to make our babies (students) mindful of how their texting and meme jokes impact their learning. 🤔📱
Today, my students overcooked my grits 🍲; I was .38 hot 😤 because they were not paying attention to my paint-drying lesson on subject-verb-object. I wanted to flip my desk over 🪑😤 and leave the class. However, I remember I must demonstrate the positive intelligence that I expect to receive from my students. So, I pulled up my big boy pants 🩳, channeled my inner Flavor Flav 🕰️🕶️, and changed the energy in the class.
I promptly pulled up the Wobble on YouTube. 📺🎶
The Wobble is a traditional line dance song for those outside of Black culture. Since the Harlem Renaissance, line dance has represented a cultural, communal experience when participants engage in synchronized movements. Over the years, the line dance has become a staple of family reunions 👨🏾👩🏾👧🏾👦🏾, weddings 💍, and, in some cases, funeral repasses. 🕊️
Once the beat kicked in and V.I.C. began singing “Wobble Baby, Wobble Baby,” the sand fell from my students’ eyes 😴➡️👀, and they began to become alive. The classroom became the beach. 🌊🏖️
Four minutes later, my students and my brain kicked into another gear 🧠💡, and I was able to talk to them about the difference between abstract and concrete language.
The moral of the story is that The Wobble can save dull lectures. We educators must also recognize our triggers and seek a win-win solution to reach our students. ✊🏾📝
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