Mystery Student

It's officially fall!  I can't believe that we are almost at the end of September already!  All of FIRST GRADE LAND from our school took a field trip to an apple orchard today and I think FUN was had by all!  Thanks to a great group of teachers, parent volunteers, and the staff of the orchard, everything went pretty smoothly!

One reason why I think everything went pretty well was because my kiddos knew the expectations for their behavior!  Classroom management is so incredibly important in and OUT of the classroom!

I wanted to show a small "system" I started a long time ago that is used in both settings: Mystery Student. There are variations of this floating around! 

Each student is given a number at the beginning of the year and that number is written on a stick.  I can pick one, sometimes two, sometimes even three students in the morning when our day starts. The students don't know yet who the mystery student is but find out at the end of the day!  In reality I'm watching all students, but the firsties think I'm watching only the "mystery students" during the day. I watch to see if good choices are being made, manners are being used, hard work is put forth, and rules are being followed,  At the end of the day, the mystery student(s) is/are announced and they are awarded 10 tickets each.  We have special tickets at our school that the students can save and use to buy something at the monthly school store.  In the picture, you can see that as a "reward" you can give raffle tickets, a certificate, sticker, etc. to say "AWESOME JOB" or how proud you are of them for having a great day!  What's even better is, the rest of the class ALWAYS cheers for the mystery students.  This has been such a positive way for students to work extra hard throughout the day and a way for the class to be a team and cheer their friends on!  

Let me know if you have put something like this to use in your classroom or what you do to create positivity and how you set clear expectations in your classroom!

Are they getting it?

I spoke with my assistant principal last year about making sure teachers were checking in with their students to make sure there was an understanding of what concepts were being taught.  There are always the same students who consistently raise their hands, while the others tend to sit back and daydream observe.  After speaking with my A.P., I tried to come up with a way that all students would participate without having feelings of anxiousness of having to being called on or the nervousness of getting the "wrong" answer.  So, the THUMBS UP, THUMBS DOWN, SIDEWAYS THUMB came to be!

As you may see in the picture, my firsties were learning about "turnaround facts." Those are number sentences where the addends change order: 4+5=9 and 5+4=9.  Unifix cubes were used and during our discussion I had asked a question and wanted to see if the boys and girls agreed with their friend's answer choice.  They had to take a minute to solve it, then give their signal: thumbs up= I agree, thumbs down=I disagree, sideways thumb=I'm not sure!  I saw many thumbs up around the room!  I observed how they were problem solving and noticed they didn't pay attention to how everyone else was responding!  We do this quite often for a variety of lessons and activities and not only do the kids love it, but I can do a quick scan to check for understanding, participation, and attention!

Here's hoping this small tip can be an addition to your classroom routines!  Thanks for checking in and have a wonderful weekend!!  

Motivating Monday/Class Decor

Happy Labor Day!  I hope everyone has been enjoying the time off!  I spent some time helping my mom and running errands!  When I got home, I got in the spirit of fall...who is this person? I love the 80-ish degree weather and do not want summer to end.  But, I wanted to burn a new candle, so a fall scent it is!  Anywho, I got to thinking this weekend about spicing up my classroom.  Although we have already started our new school year, I felt a change was needed.  As many of you know, it takes a long LONG time to set up a room and can also take a lot of $$$ in some cases too!  I've slowly changed the color decor/theme over the past couple of years.  After 15 years, a change is needed!  I headed over to the best way (in my opinion) for any teacher to get inspired ("pinspired") or a way that we SHOULD earn professional development hours: Pinterest.  Pinterest is an addictive awesome way to get inspired for sure! After searching around, I decided to start small.  So, for the motivation part!  I needed some motivation to head into the classroom everyday.  I love my room for sure, but needed something "else" to keep me inspired.  I think my classroom should be an inviting place that I feel happy to be in as well as others when they come to visit.  For that "small" idea...tissue paper pom-poms, flowers, whatever you'd like to call them!  This brought back a ton of memories making those small tissue paper flowers with the pipe cleaners when I was leading a summer camp.  Seemed easy enough...now I just have to figure out how I'll hang them on my bulletin board tomorrow.  I plan on putting them where I display the kids work.  Afterall, I want the kids to feel proud of their work and it should be displayed in a fun way!