Classroom Management Before Break? No Problem! Use Incentives!

The time between Halloween and Winter Break can be so difficult!  Build in positive reinforcement incentives to keep lessons moving forward and classroom management under control.

What's the problem?

You don't really need me to answer that do you?!  There might not be a more frustrating period of time to teach content than November and December.  Students are distracted by school programs, secret Santas, decorations, countdown to break, social events, more school programs, time off for Thanksgiving.... Okay, we know what the problem is!

What's a teacher to do?

Build incentives into your teaching that will motivate students to stay on track and work for you.  Incentives also provide students with a positive reward that will help improve your classroom management.

1.  Find what they like

By this time of year, you know your students.  You know what activities they've delighted in and have begged for more of.  Maybe you had a cool art project that went with a novel study.  Maybe your students loved the "pass back" story activity or had a blast with your bingo vocab game.

Choose an activity you think your class will work for.  It can be a bit of a trial and error process, but that's the great thing -- you can do something different every time.

2.  How can you incentivize it?

Take you idea to your students.  I wanted to have a "game day" every other Friday.  I proposed the idea to my students.  What if we had a "game day" if we finished all of our scheduled work?  My students loved that idea.

3.  Get organized

My students formed groups and chose what game they wanted to play.  I discovered that many of my students had board games at home that they have never played!    I made sure I had information from each group:  who was in the group (making sure it was a reasonable number for the game and that everyone was in a group), what game they were playing, who was bringing in the game, and if they knew how to play the game or not.

4.  Working toward a goal

I let my students know what we needed to complete before we were eligible for the game day.  For ELA, it included writing goals that I posted on my board each week and broke down for each day.  

The daily goals for the class helped reduce student talking and off-task behavior that wasted class time -- students used peer pressure to work for their goal.

While I originally wanted to stretch out the goal for two weeks, the first time we tried this, I had the game day at the end of the week.  This gave students a taste of what game day looked like and why they wanted to earn it.

5.  Keeping it fresh

Having a game day every Friday would quickly lose its novelty for middle schoolers -- no matter how much they try to convince you it wouldn't!  

After the first week, I stretched the reward out two weeks.  I also asked students to change games and groups.  

I also kept a few games in my closet.  Students would forget to bring in a game, or they became bored with the one they brought.  You could also have a whole-class game day to play that Bingo game you have stashed in your cabinet.

6.  Kicking it up a notch

My original game day evolved into an annual Scrabble Tournament.  Even my principal was impressed!  Words!  What could possibly go wrong?!!

If you're interested in hosting a Scrabble Tournament, here's how I did it Scrabble Tournament.

Give it a try!  Lots of fun!

What do you think?

What incentives would work for your students?  Share your ideas in the comments below!  

Happiness always!

Back to School Activities: Getting to Know Your Students with Google Forms & Kahoot!

Hi all, It's Shana from Hello, Teacher Lady here. Today I'm going to share with you one of my favorite back to school activities -- it combines my trusty Google Forms/Sheets with everyone's favorite techie game, Kahoot!

In the past, I've had students fill out short little "inventories" at the beginning of the year -- which have been helpful to a certain extent, but I found that I didn't look at them as closely or as often as I should have. Stacks of paper usually don't survive long with me and ultimately end up tucked away in the filing cabinet of doom.

Since I started drinking the digital Kool-Aid and had been using Google Apps for Education for just about everything else in my classroom, last year I decided to nix the paper and create a Google Form for my students to fill out instead. That was a pretty good idea on its own, but then I had a lightbulb moment: why not turn the obligatory getting-to-know-you form into a class game! And that's where Kahoot! came in.

On the Google Form, I asked students to list three "fun facts" about themselves and made sure to note that some or all of the information collected would be shared with the class. I also mentioned that we will have to guess who's who during a Kahoot! game in a later class period, so I encouraged students to be creative and try to list things that aren't super obvious or that others might not know about them.

The results of the Google Form were then displayed nice and neatly in a Google Sheet, and it was a lot of fun reading through these facts and seeing what each student wanted to share about themselves. It also provided some unexpected insight, as I had one student write that he was a "good liar" who is "very lazy" -- yeah, definitely expect that one; we had an interesting year together. Anyway...

This next part was a little time consuming, but totally worth it. I took the information shared and compiled them into statements about each person (without using their name, of course) in a Kahoot! game for each class period. Sometimes I used all three facts, sometimes I only used one or two; it just depended on the type of information. For my smaller classes, I created extra statements based on some of the unused information, so some students' names appeared more than once.

Below are a few screenshots of statements from one of my classes last year:

In the answer section, I included the correct student's name and then chose three other names at random. I also included a statement for myself and sprinkled my name in some of the choices throughout the game as well. So not only was I getting to know my students, but they were getting to know me too! Pretty sure no one expected to learn that their teacher is a Star Trek nerd who played Rugby for 5 years. :)

Guys... we had SO. MUCH. FUN. playing this game!  I can't wait to play it again this year with my new students. It can get a little rambunctious, but again -- so worth it. 

For the record, since I'm an ELA teacher, I also gave students a separate reading/writing interest survey, which was crucial in getting to know their interests and habits on a more academic level. However, this year I am going to utilize Google Forms for that as well. I just don't seem to get along with paper, and Google Sheets can be accessed from anywhere! 

Tomorrow's post by Lyndsey from Lit with Lyns will go into more detail about using digital student interest surveys, so stay tuned!

Psssst -- there's a giveaway happening on my blog right now. Come on over to check it out. :) 

3 Tips for a Fun Last Quarter of School

Hi all,

Marypat from Just Add Students here.  

Like Caitlin, I taught in a private school, so statewide tests weren't an issue; however, I think squirrely middle school students are universal! And the last quarter of the school year is always a challenge.

Here are three ways to smooth out your last quarter of school and actually have fun!

1.  Tap into the passion.  You know how each class has something they are passionate about?  One year, my students loved to play "Cherry Pie" (8th graders!  no kidding!).  Another year, I had students who wanted to have an art activity attached to every writing assignment.  Then, there was the year my students loved to put together news shows (we all knew these middle schoolers were an interesting group!).  

By this time in the school year, you know your class (sometimes too well!), and you know what projects they've enjoyed.  Create a meaningful small group project that will showcase what they love. 

Drama day was a huge hit with my students.  One year students were tasked with creating a dramatic performance of "The Jabberwocky."  We had everything from a musical rendition to a puppet show!

Don't forget to give them the opportunity to share their project with the rest of the school and parents.

2.  It's all fun and games...  A quick game can get students out of their chairs for a few minutes and recharged for whatever task is at hand.  Even my eighth graders loved a goofy games like "Four Corners" or charades (have charade cards that you've created of characters from books and stories you've read this year).  

One year I implemented Fun & Games Friday during the last quarter.  Students who had completed their work could participate in the game on Friday. This built in a reward for those who weren't motivated by grades (and by April, that was just about everyone!).  

You can choose a different game each week (Bingo, Scattergories, Scrabble), or hold a tournament.  I chose the game since I wanted it to be somewhat educational!

A favorite was an annual Scrabble tournament the last few days of school.  This became an 8th grade tradition -- even former students would come back to help at the end of the year! 

To get students ready for the tournament, we played quick games on Fridays; this way students could learn the rules and strategies before the tournament.  Students played with a partner and only two teams were at each board.  That way the game moved quickly.  Using a timer, an official dictionary, and  the real rules are also critical!

No matter what game you choose, a successful game day means you'll need to be organized and have enough of the same game for everyone to play.  Bored kids can ruin the experience!

The key to playing games is to stop while the students are still having fun!  You want this to be a reward they look forward to.

3.  Sample size. I always loved to try something new the last quarter of the school year.  It was a great way to test something out to see if I wanted to add it the next year.  If  I'd heard or read about something and wondered if it would work in my classroom, I tried it in the last part of the school year.  

Introduce your students to something fun and creative like Storybird or have them create podcasts of themselves reading books for younger students. Just make sure you don't try out too many new things at a time since that can confuse your students.

By stirring up what is happening in your classroom at the end of the year, you'll keep your students guessing and interested...and it will be fun for you as well!

Happiness always,