First Days of School Activities
1. Do You Know Your Teacher?
Create a Who Is Your Teacher? bulletin board to use with your introduction.
In a small school with a close-knit community I “know” the students in my class prior to them actually being in my class, and in turn they think they “know” me.
As an icebreaker/opening activity we do a tried and true activity, KWL, with the topic being “Mrs. Krause.” For those unfamiliar with the activity, the students make a list of things they already “K”now about the topic, things they “W”ant to know about the topic and after the “lesson” the students list what they have “L”earned about the topic. We generally get a pretty good list going about what they know about me (common knowledge) …. I drive a Toyota Highlander, I have three kids, I like to run…. Then we get a list of what they want to know… in the past, the students have wanted to know what do I do for fun, what kinds of music do I listen to, and if have I ever met anyone famous ….
Now for the lesson… I prepare a list of facts about myself, ranging from where I was born to I Have run six marathons, and other similarly “interesting” facts.. I fold each one and put them all in my fact jar. I have a large piece of white butcher paper taped to the board with my name circled in the center. (This introduces the free-form concept mapping activity I use regularly in class.) I ask for volunteers and one by one the students illustrate the fact and students guess what it is… when someone gets in right, they illustrate the next fact! I tell them that they will need to learn this valuable information about me.
The next day – I leave the class map of me up, and pass out a 20 question “quiz” in multiple choice format, and tell them to feel free to use the “visual resource” on the wall. Auughhhh a quiz on the second day, they groan…. good news for them is that after I “grade” the quizzes, I return them the next day with a coupon attached… I grade the quiz based on 10 questions and for every question they get right over the 10, they get a coupon worth that many extra credit points on a real quiz!
We then go back to the KWL list and I have the students contribute things they learned about me… So now, the mysterious teacher at the front of the class seems to be more like a real person to everyone, and for homework they are to create their own free-form concept of themselves (7-10 facts illustrated on a 81/2X11 unlined paper), and viola, I have great “stuff” for a bulletin board just in time for open house.
2. Fun Ways To Learn Classroom Rules
Create a crossword puzzle using classroom rules as the clues. The Criss-Cross Puzzle at Discovery School’s Puzzlemaker will make the puzzle for you; you just need to enter the information.
Create a different word search puzzle with a hidden message for each student. The hidden messages can be rules or policies for your classroom or positive words of encouragement for the new year. The Hidden Message Word Search Puzzle at Discovery School’s Puzzlemaker will make the puzzle for you. You tell it what the message is to be and what words you want the students to find.
