First Day of School; Fun Learning!

What a great day! First I had the students write very neatly, in good complete sentences five important facts about themselves. I told them it was their first assignment! Then I asked them to hold them up so I could see them. They were all so serious and diligent, until I told them to crumple them up and throw them! "Snowball Fight!" They loved it! When I rang the bell, they stopped immediately, picked up one and opened it so they could read it. We took turns reading them aloud and guessing who's paper it was! SNOWBALL FIGHTS!

SPAGHETTI & MARSHMALLOW TOWERS I challenged the students to work in small groups to build the tallest, best built tower. They got 5 minutes of of individual planning time, then their group got ten more minutes of group planning time. The hitch was...they could NOT talk at all during the actual construction. No mouthing words, no talking, no writing notes. No verbal language. So they had to come up with alternative ways to communicate, divide the jobs, and cooperate together. After we discussed what worked and what didn't. The students loved it!

Such fun learning!

It's January....and Here We Go....!

What a wonderful break, but now it is time to get back into the swing of things again. If it's this hard for us, imagine what our students are feeling! I know that when I go back, I will ask my class a question and they will all just stare at me with blank expressions. I call this "mush brain," and I give them one week to clear the cobwebs and get back in the game! I always make a joke out of it, so we all laugh together, but seriously...do they do any thinking at home with their families? =D January means Martin Luther King, Jr. and Black History month (the Civil Rights Movement). February means President's Day. Lincoln and Washington. What better way to get these concepts across, than using the actual words of these historic figures? Washington can be a bit dry, but both Lincoln and King were quite articulate and spoke in beautiful figurative phrases.

I love to pair the words of Lincoln with the words of King, and set up a Socratic Conversation or debate situation. The students jump right back into the game with these types of activities! I also find that it is a great time to have my students start to think of others besides themselves.

Random Acts of Kindness fit in perfectly at this time of year! And do the parents love it when the homework for the evening is to do something kind for your parents and report back on what happened, how they reacted, and how it made you feel! It's a great way to get your students and their families back into the swing of school!