Check out this awesome and simple interview template that can be used to get to know your students! This is an awesome activity to sue the first weeks of school to help build relationships, rapport, and understandings. This can be adapted for students to interview each other, for the teacher to interview the students, or for the students to fill out on their own. Because of the variety of formatting of implementation, this is easily differentiated!
This awesome and kid-friendly template will change the dynamics of your classroom! So many of our kiddos just need to get some things of their chests and this is their ability to do so! By placing a stack of these templates somewhere in your classroom and having a teddy bear near by (not included :)) students can use classroom procedures to vent about things they want to share related to tattling. It will be awesome documentation for you, and allows you to address the issues as time allows, which we all know is rare!
Check out this awesome student-friendly inventory to gain insight into the culture in your classroom. This assessment of culture includes 20 questions that students respond with a smiling emojiy, straight faced emoji or a frowning emoji based on how much they agree or disagree with the statements. There are then seven short answer questions. These 27 questions will allow the teacher to understand what the students are feeling and how they erceive themselves in the grand scheme of the classroom as well as their relationship with the teacher. It can be implemented as regularly as possible in order to reflect and adapt based on student responses.
Check out this awesome form that students can use to self-reflect about classroom rules that they have broken. The infused questions will prompt the students to redirect their thinking as they are able to construct a better alternative to their situation and identify how they are feeling which is aligned with the Conscious Discipline behavior management program. Students will be able to reset and redirect their behaviors in a positive way. This also serves as great documentation of incidents!
Wondering how you can reward and incentive your kiddos without hurting your wallet? Check out this invaluable list of 50 ideas that you should be able to do for free, or at the very least, call on some favors from colleagues to help you out!
The same 50 ideas are also presented in ticket form, which can be cut and then picked at random, or given to students. Whatever fits best with your pre-existing classroom reward system! These rewards can be adapted for any grade and will leave students on the edge of their seats to earn them!
This backwards life planning research is great for students of all ages. I have found it most useful as an end of the year project for students to apply what they have learned. Students will have to begin with the end goal in mind and think about their goals and what they will have to do to get there. Students will research the job they want, the college they want to go to and the costs associated with them. Students will research costs such as utilities, automobile prices, college tuition, and then will figure out how much money they will make from their dream job. Students will apply math concepts such as finding an average, estimating, addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. This fun research project allows students to think through their career goals and identify the steps they will have to take to be successful.
Please know that this 3-day activity will require technology in the classroom since it is very research-based. There are ample websites that provide salary estimates, price quotes, etc. which are embedded in the guided worksheets. Best of luck and I hope this helps your students think about where they are going and what they will have to do to get there! :)