KWL Charts

Yesterday, I introduced the unit on World War II. Because we've discussed the importance of activating prior knowledge so often in our Reading class, I planned on spending nearly an entire class period retrieving this knowledge from students. When brainstorming ways to do this, I instantly thought of using a KWL chart. We have discussed KWL charts in every education class I have taken so far, so it seemed like a great option for bringing the students' prior knowledge to the front and center. I even had a student in each class copy the white board down on a piece of paper so we could finish the chart in two weeks. However, the students did not really seem to buy into the chart. I know they know a ton about World War II, but they were not anxious to share. It was really dissapointing. I had to call on people to get any responses. I was expecting students to be shouting out responses faster than I could write them on the board, but this was certainly not the case. At first I thought their limited reaction was due to the fact that my cooperating teacher never uses these charts, but this is such a simple exercise I don't feel the students need background experience to be successful. My hope is that perhaps once we finish the chart in the next few weeks, maybe the will buy into it next time. Perhaps they are used to teachers acting like they will come back to something, but seldom do. Perhaps I just need to earn their trust???