Stir and Still

When I started teaching in SMP Al-Jannah, I was pretty surprised with the number of students who were kinesthetic learners.  Half of the class in each class can’t focus on the lesson without moving around. In my previous workplaces usually, there would be 1-2 kinesthetic students in each class. This made me think hard to plan my lesson every day. Until one day I remembered one of my mentors’ advices. She told me about how to handle smaller children with Stir & Still technique. Basically, you stir the class to move around in one activity and then you put the class to stay still in the next activity. Then, you keep repeating the technique until your class is finished. I believe this technique will work in my current classes too, even though I teach teenagers. This Stir & Still technique with the matching activities will benefit the kinesthetic students and also the teacher.

I usually start my class with Stir activity. My intention is to get their energy drained out, because some students are extremely energized during the class and later on, I can handle the class easier. One of my favorite Stir activities is to ask my students running around outside the class. Early this semester I taught how to tell time in English. So, I asked some of them who enjoyed drawing to draw some analogue clocks on sticky notes. Then I sticked all of the notes all over the hallways from 1st floor until 3rd floor. I put them in group and told them to find those notes as many as possible. After that I started the Still activity. They worked in groups to figure out how to tell the time and write them.  When they finished writing the answers, I asked them to stick the notes again all over the class. I repeat the same Stir activity, but this time they only walk around the class to find the notes. Then, we sat down, and discussed the answers. With this kind of pattern, it will help the kinesthetic students to channel their energy yet stay focus on the lesson. Other types of students, like audio learners and visual learners, are also not neglected since the teacher still gives explanations and also create writing activity during the Still activities.

Practicing this technique also brings impacts for the teacher. When the students are familiar with this technique, the class could be put into auto pilot mode. Months ago, when I practiced this technique to my current classes for the first time, I still followed around where they went to. I wanted to make sure they understand the task and be able to finish the objective. Now, since most of my students are familiar with some activities and they understand well the instructions, I only observed them from far away. They could wander around the school on the first floor while finishing the task and I would be observing from the balcony on the third floor. Once they will get used to it, they will automatically be seated in the class after wandering around the school or the class. The lesson delivery also becomes easier and endurable for the teacher.

When the students are kinesthetic learners, the teachers might be not kinesthetic teachers. However, I believe it’s still teachers’ job to ease the learning process for students. Learning before teaching is something that every teacher should practice. There must be ways out there that could help facilitating every type of learners. What I share in this writing is only one of them. Keep learning and teaching, teachers!