I have been pinning and saving all kinds of activities and ideas to Evernote , but I think its time to really pull it all together and make a plan. I've got the first day pretty much nailed down but the rest is going to be more like an outline.
Day 1
I usually start the year really knowing all of my students except for the few kids that transfer in over the summer. This year is a whole new group of students that I will probably recognize and know a handful, but for the most part they are going to be very new to me and of course won't know me as well as the 7/8s would. So my goals for the first day are:
I usually start the year really knowing all of my students except for the few kids that transfer in over the summer. This year is a whole new group of students that I will probably recognize and know a handful, but for the most part they are going to be very new to me and of course won't know me as well as the 7/8s would. So my goals for the first day are:
- Get to know my students.
- Let them get to know me.
- Teach them how to enter my room. (I am VERY particular about this!)
Basically when students enter my room I am very strict about them entering quietly and quickly and showing me they are ready for business. No matter what is going on that day, games, parties, career day, I don't care, every single time they come in it has to be like that. We don't have a bell schedule, students line up outside the door and come in all at once. Also since we don't have bells, every minute is precious. So we will probably practice it a bunch of times.
I plan on letting students pick their own seats for the first three days. This is where I start learning about them. Who are friends, who are talkers, who work well together, etc.
Next up I am going to give them a quiz! I made a fun Kahoot! quiz about me and each of my 5 groups will have an iPad. I like this activity because we can practice group norms for teamwork and using the iPads. Plus they probably haven't used Kahoot! before so it should be a fun way for them to get to know a little bit about me.
After the quiz I will have them fill out an "All about Me" form like Dan Meyer's Who I Am activity.
Day 2
This day we will talk more about the norms of the class and I'll start off by doing similar post it activities as Sherri at Middle School Math Rules!
Day 3
Introducing the Interactive Notebooks! So excited to be going back to these this year!!! I skipped last year and completely regret it. I am also excited that Office Depot has a sale starting tomorrow on composition notebooks. 10 cents each! They have a 3 notebook limit, but I hear Walmart does price matching with no limit!!! So hopefully I can get a bunch (ideally 72) so if students didn't get one I can supply it.
Day 4 and 5
Here's where it gets a little tricky. We don't have our schedules yet so I'm not sure how long my classes will be or when each class will have their double period (they will each get one a week.)
My plan is to use the workshop model again as well and since each of my classes will have a double block each week we will use the extra class for centers. So there are a lot of routines and norms that will have to be learned and practiced. I am toying with the idea of showing the same video Sherri is showing, but like she said the teacher does have a thick Irish accent. Will have to search the rest of the weekend for another as well, if not, it is a pretty good video. Really shows how the math workshop should be run. During these days or on the other days when the class has the extra period we will do The Marshmallow Challenge!
Also during these two days we will take care of handing out textbooks and setting our goals!
Ok! I think I have a good outline for my start of the year! Remember if you want to join in on the challenge visit Sherri's blog and join the Linky!
Looking forward to another year of collaborating! Maybe we can do a google+ chat this week.
ReplyDeleteSherrie