After greeting the students outside the classroom door and working to memorize their names, we went inside to start the day. I told the students to find their name on the tables/desks and put their materials there. They have no idea yet that these will not be their spots for long! Their next direction was to silently line up in order by their birthdays (Responsive Classroom). This is a great time to observe the students. Which students take the lead and which are willing to follow. Who creates a new, innovative way to silently communicate their birth date? Do they help each other, support each other, etc.
FYI: comedy/tragedy symbol :-)
Playing throughout this activity was Safe and Sound by Capital Cities and Pompeii by Bastille. The music helped the students to have fun and loosen up while doing the challenging, silent activity. Dave Burgess, Teach Like a Pirate author, stresses music as a powerful hook. It worked perfectly for this activity. On my IPhone, I have a playlist for quiet work times and a playlist for dance breaks and transitions. I bought a small, but powerful Bluetooth speaker for under $30 at Best Buy, so that I can control the music from my IPhone no matter where I am in the room.
The other purpose for this lineup is to form groups for cubbies. There are four sections of cubbies in the hallway and each group had to come up with a name for their group and design a poster to be put up in their cubby area. They had a lot of unique ideas and worked well together. Their posters are getting laminated and will be up on Tuesday.
Before we started the cubby poster work, we had a ceremony of sorts. They sat at the spot where their desk tag was and I had them pull off the tag and rip it up while playing a heavy metal version of Over the Rainbow by Me First and the Gimme Gimmes. Later, a parent shared that tearing up the name tag was the first thing their child talked about when they walked out of the classroom at the end of the day. Funny! It was a symbol of no assigned seats.
The next activity, after making the cubby posters, was making play doh creations that reflect an interest or show something about them. We then circled up and shared.
After sharing their creations in a circle, we put the room back together and started the process of getting materials and supplies organized. This year, the goal is a place for everything and everything in its place. Students do not have their own desks, so I bought some bins and cleared some shelves!
Writing Binders and pencil pouches underneath. Only need pouches when traveling to Science and Social Studies. When in homeroom, there are caddies at each table/group of desks with communal supplies in them.
I framed this as our classroom, and they need to contribute ideas of how to make the organization piece work for them. They came up with putting the board games elsewhere so that the pouches could be near the binders. Smart!!
We did grab some carpet time to read You're Finally Here. Tomorrow we will read Ish. Ish is probably the most important read aloud all year!
Dismissal was at 12:45, so with lunch in the schedule, that was pretty much all we fit in. Had to pass out a ridiculous amount of notices as well. :-)
Going to be a great year and working hard to keep my commitment to at least one post a week!
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