Lapham Day 1

Today was my first day at Lapham. It was excellent and I can't wait to dive in even more. Rena is focusing on peace and focusing in the prevention groups this week. In order to do so she had them stare "focus on" the ooze tube. First this was done with just watching it for a set amount of time. Then Rena acted as a distractor, prefacing that she would not get to close to anyone but just be really loud and call peoples names to try and get them to get them to pay attention to her. Even after this she said if she did draw their attention that "all was not lost!" all they had to do was "Refocus." The first run of distractions was difficult several students found themselves laughing and exclaimed how hard it was. afterwards they were 4 students chosen to act as distractors although they had the same rule of safety. They were loud, falling, calling their peers names and really trying to help attract attention the first run for the students proved a little easier. For those that it was more difficult for improvement from last time or from the first time was the goal and not perfection. The idea being that in the classroom things will never be this distracting but learning to do it in hard situations would make it easier in easier situations. It was a great group all of them. After every running around and the distractors she used Like Rena has stated in class she focused on the positive behaviors even when other children were being distracted, those who were looking and listening when directions were given was rewarded b y calling their names and caught the negative behaviors' attention.