The teacher sensed this disengagement and began one on one discussions to get those students minds back on the task she had set the class. This seemed to help these children who set back to work with new-found inspiration. Was it that they didn't understand the task properly that they decided to rebel or give up? In this situation it appeared to be the case.
I also seemed to think if the teacher had a higher level of expectation of her students that it may have lead to higher levels of engagement. The excitement was initially there it just needed to be maintained. An idea may have been to have children share their progress as they went along with the task, the children appeared from other lessons to love this idea of sharing their work. This way the children would work productively and efficiently to have something to show and share with their peers as well as receiving consistent and positive reinforcement to keep them on task.