I
hope your school year is off to a great start!
I
have been so busy that I have found it hard to post. I have been working with some teachers on
some classroom strategies and the one I like best so far is morning meetings!
So, today, I will be blogging about morning meetings and their value and how I
implemented them into my classroom.
A Morning Meeting can also be called
community meetings. They are usually
done in the morning and can incorporate lots of different things such as social
skills, grammar and math.
I
have found that the most important part of our meeting is sharing
expectations. We have morning meeting expectations that we
review quickly every day. It lets me
know that the students are aware of how they should behave, and they know what
they are expected to do during our meetings.
Most
morning meetings consist of four main components; a greeting, sharing, group
activity, and morning message.
1.
Greeting: The students greet
each other and are happy to see one another.
We usually sit in a circle and go around shaking the hand of the person
next to us. At the end I always say
"good morning, class" and the kids respond with an awesome "good
morning!” This is an easy way to incorporate listening and speaking skills and
encourages students to really notice each other.
2.
Sharing- This can be random
sharing or focused. I tend to go with
the focused response and I ask something related to our story of the week. I pose the question and then I use popsicle
sticks to call on a random selection of students. I call on about 5 students to share a quick
sentence about the topic. The sharing helps student learn important skills such
as learning a sense of community and encourages caring amongst the class.
3.
Group Activity- This is the
part of the meeting that the students absolutely LOVE! I try to use fun
activities that will keep them engaged and get the excited about the day! I
will share some activities with you that you can incorporate in your meeting.
This encourages cooperation and allows students to work together.
4.
Morning Message- This is the
message that they read every morning. It
usually talks about how I am happy to have them at school, what skills we will
talk about for the day, and sometimes I squeeze an error or two into the
message to see if they can catch them. The students appreciate this because
they learn about what their day will be like and what they can expect.
There
are tons of morning meeting books
that will help you go in depth with this topic. Check your school's book room
or have your school order some. This is
a great way to build community in your schools.
Thanks for stopping by!
