Community Building
I know that creating a community in a classroom is a lot of work but the result of having it is amazing. I believe that having the feeling the classroom is like one big family is good for the students because then they know everyone in the classroom and become comfortable with them. I also believe that community building isn’t something that should just be done the first couple of days or weeks of school; it needs to be ongoing throughout the year. Before the school year even starts I would want to send each of my students a welcome letter introducing them to their new classroom and telling them what I have planned for the year (this would be directed towards the student, wouldn’t be like the letter to the parents that would go out on the first day). Along with the letter I would send home I would also prepare a surprise for them for orientation/open house night. I would want to put together a bag of goodies and a little note (like a pack of smarties because you are so smart, a piece of gum so that you stick with it throughout the year, etc); I feel like this along with the note would let them know that their teacher cares about them. I would also let each student leave a positive little note on the desk of another student (obviously they wouldn’t know what student it would be because they haven’t met anyone yet) so that on the first morning of school each student would have a note from a classmate sitting on their desk and then I would do an activity and introduce them to the person who wrote them a note. I would want to have a morning meeting every morning like we do in management and how we do in my mentor’s classroom. I would want to spend about ten to fifteen minutes every morning, on the carpet and have each student turn and say good morning to the student sitting next to them in the circle then we would transfer in to our morning message telling them what activities/specials they will be going to that day and what they have to look forward to in science and math. This is what we do in my mentor’s classroom and the kids absolutely love it. In addition to my morning meeting, that I would do every single day, I would like to have fun activities planned for the beginning of the year, preferably the first week of school so that the students can learn each others names and a little bit about their classmates. Some activities I would like to implement would be somewhat like a bingo sheet that had twenty squares on it and little things like find someone who has brown eyes, find someone who owns a dog, and little things like that and have each student initial next to one thing so that they would learn something about each classmate and would have fun doing it and then when their sheets are filled I would give them candy for doing so well on the activity as long as they followed all directions given. I would also do an activity like we did in management and have my students connect to each other if they can relate to what the student before them said. Activities I would implement later in the year would be to have them pick someone in the classroom and write an acrostic poem using that persons name and positive things about that person then we can hang them up in the room. I know from experience that the activities listed above will help me to build a community in my classroom and I cannot wait to implement all of my ideas. I know that the longer I teach, the more ideas I will come up with for community building activities.
I know that creating a community in a classroom is a lot of work but the result of having it is amazing. I believe that having the feeling the classroom is like one big family is good for the students because then they know everyone in the classroom and become comfortable with them. I also believe that community building isn’t something that should just be done the first couple of days or weeks of school; it needs to be ongoing throughout the year. Before the school year even starts I would want to send each of my students a welcome letter introducing them to their new classroom and telling them what I have planned for the year (this would be directed towards the student, wouldn’t be like the letter to the parents that would go out on the first day). Along with the letter I would send home I would also prepare a surprise for them for orientation/open house night. I would want to put together a bag of goodies and a little note (like a pack of smarties because you are so smart, a piece of gum so that you stick with it throughout the year, etc); I feel like this along with the note would let them know that their teacher cares about them. I would also let each student leave a positive little note on the desk of another student (obviously they wouldn’t know what student it would be because they haven’t met anyone yet) so that on the first morning of school each student would have a note from a classmate sitting on their desk and then I would do an activity and introduce them to the person who wrote them a note. I would want to have a morning meeting every morning like we do in management and how we do in my mentor’s classroom. I would want to spend about ten to fifteen minutes every morning, on the carpet and have each student turn and say good morning to the student sitting next to them in the circle then we would transfer in to our morning message telling them what activities/specials they will be going to that day and what they have to look forward to in science and math. This is what we do in my mentor’s classroom and the kids absolutely love it. In addition to my morning meeting, that I would do every single day, I would like to have fun activities planned for the beginning of the year, preferably the first week of school so that the students can learn each others names and a little bit about their classmates. Some activities I would like to implement would be somewhat like a bingo sheet that had twenty squares on it and little things like find someone who has brown eyes, find someone who owns a dog, and little things like that and have each student initial next to one thing so that they would learn something about each classmate and would have fun doing it and then when their sheets are filled I would give them candy for doing so well on the activity as long as they followed all directions given. I would also do an activity like we did in management and have my students connect to each other if they can relate to what the student before them said. Activities I would implement later in the year would be to have them pick someone in the classroom and write an acrostic poem using that persons name and positive things about that person then we can hang them up in the room. I know from experience that the activities listed above will help me to build a community in my classroom and I cannot wait to implement all of my ideas. I know that the longer I teach, the more ideas I will come up with for community building activities.