Sources of History

The First Days of School

Posted on 17 August 2009

I’ve been thinking a lot these past days about the beginning of the school year: what to do the first day, how to get to know my students, how to introduce the classroom expectations, how to introduce the classroom material, etc.  These first days are crucial as they set the tone and dynamic for the rest of the year, so they must be well thought out and organized.  It is essential to think about the dynamic that you want to create in your classroom and ensure that you establish that sense right off the bat.

In the most general sense, hope to create and academically engaging and safe environment where the students feel comfortable to actively learn the material and work with each other.  But do I go about doing that?  I recently read this website hosted by the University of Hawaii Community College in Honolulu and originally compiled by the Teaching and Learning Center at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.  While its intended for college professors, the ideas are equally applicable to high school teachers (though some may just need a little tweaking to make the terminology relevant to our system.)

They are all useful but here are a few of my favorites that I am going to do this year:

• Hit the ground running on the first day of class with substantial content.

All too often it is easy to spend the whole first class just looking at a syllabus and classroom rules.  How boring!  Engage the students in something interesting right off the bat.  My cooperating teacher always went over her syllabus on the second day of class.  Especially if you meet at the end of the day, you are probably handing out the fourth or fifth set of expectations that they’ve seen that day.  Do something to engage them first and then go over your ground rules.  They’ll be more likely to remember them.

• Explain the difference between legitimate collaboration and academic dishonesty; be clear when collaboration is wanted and when it is forbidden.

We all talk about collaborative learning – and we’re all worried about academic dishonesty.  It is essential that we give our students clear guidelines on what is acceptable and what is inappropriate.  Rules can be very abstract, especially at this age.  Some well-selected examples can help illustrate the difference between collaboration and a dishonest act.

• Greet students at the door when they enter the classroom.

What an ice breaker!  I may have to try this.

• Have students write out their expectations for the course and their own goals for learning.

I have done this in the past and the instruction “write five goals” is much too vague.  You get responses like “get an A” or “come up with one more goal.”  This year I think that I am going to give students specific categories for types of goals (i.e. goals for in class group work, homework, etc.) and ask them how they will know if they have meet these goals.  Then we can check in over the course of the year and monitor our progress and change/update the goals as we work.  This is an excellent example of developing executive function skills.

• Organize. Give visible structure by posting the day’s “menu” on chalk- board or overhead.

Very helpful for you (to keep you on track) and the students.  I also make sure that the homework is written up at the beginning of class.  Then there is no excuse for not knowing what it was!

• Give students red, yellow, and green cards (made of posterboard) and periodically call for a vote on an issue by asking for a simultaneous show of cards.

Oh the possibilities for these cards!  You could use them for group work to see if everyone was ready to move on: green means “good to go,” yellow means “one more minute” and red would mean “we really need some more time.”  Or you could use this as a formative assessment.  There could be numbers or letters also on the cards or the colors could correspond to different possible responses to a quick check question.  You could monitor understanding as you progress through the class.

• Have students write questions on index cards to be collected and answered the next class period.

Another great method for formative assessment and a nice way to ensure that students know that their questions help to guide the class.

• Find out about your students via questions on an index card

I used to combine this activity with the goal making activity above – and collect the information on an 81/2 x 11 piece of paper that I kept in a folder.  Now that I’ve decided to make the goal making activity more of a continual process, I am also going to change how I collect the biographical information about my students.  When the students record the information on note cards, I can then use organize them in a card holder which will be much more easily accessible when I need to get in touch with a parent/guidance councilor, etc.

• Gather student feedback in the first three weeks of the semester to improve teaching and learning.

I have done this more on a unit by unit basis in the past – but setting a three week deadline is a great idea.  It’s still early enough to make some changes, but far enough into the semester that the “real work” of the classroom has begun.

I hope you’re getting as excited as I am for the start of the school year!  Thinking about some concrete plans for the first few days is a great way to get back into the classroom mindset.