First day of school! All of those mixed emotions, especially this year. But the overall feeling is the excitement of a new beginning. The first day is all about building relationships. And I have 4 phases that I go through on the first day.
I start off strong by greeting students at the door. It creates a connection, a sense of belonging and increases engagement within the classroom. When I greet students at the door, I always stop them, introduce myself by saying, “Hi, I’m Miss Kuiper. And you are?” Then I repeat the students name to make sure I understood correctly. Once I get the nod of approval, I say nice to meet you. I usually do this with a handshake. Then I hand the student a card with a number on it and let them enter the classroom.
You can tell a lot about a student based on what kind of handshake they give you.
The card corresponds to a group of 3 in the room. It’s like having a seating chart, but it gives the groupings a randomness. By grouping students randomly, I get to see how students interact with each other from an impartial standpoint. Plus when students know it’s random, it can alleviate comparison to others put in their team. Like “Oh, I’m in the smart kids group” or something similar. Whether we like it or not, students can carry the baggage of cultural norms & biases, social expectations and status into the classroom. Random groups can help send the message that we are all on an equal playing field and we are here to work together.
I know that seems to be a lot of analysis into the way to make groups, but anything to help students is worth it.
One other thing to note about Phase 1 is that I have something ready for students to do the moment they walk in the door. It’s a low risk optional distraction and students don’t have to be wondering what to do. Using my Daily Agenda Intro slides (which you can download for free here!) I put one of those math puzzles or a “Which one Doesn’t Belong?” I leave a sticky note on students desks for them to complete the puzzle if they want to. We’ll do something with that later in Phase 4.
Once the bell has rung and students are seated, I start the class as I normally would in the middle of the year. I stand up next to my teaching spot and call the class to attention. I use a doorman bell…a call bell to get the class’s attention. Then with my hand up, at a 90 degree angle, I smile and wait until I have everyone’s attention. Usually the first week, I get it almost instantaneously as it’s still the honeymoon phase. If you are wondering more about my attention getter, it’s called ABOVE, pause, whisper. I’ll leave the details in the show notes on my blog or you can listen to Episode 6 where I go into depth about it!
Then I do the BRIEFEST Intro. Literally I say, “Hello, I’m Miss Kuiper. I am going to be your math teacher this year. I’ll introduce myself more later, but right now I am going to explain your first activity!”
Boom, that’s it. I want to get students talking and building trust before I talk about who I am.
In Phase 2, I want students to get to know each other. Once students are talking, I can begin to see students’ personalities and how they work together. I help them get to know each other with a Get to Know You Activity. I never call them icebreakers. I internally cringed when I said that. Too much anxiety surrounds the idea of them. So I never call it that.
I prefer something lower risk and way more fun. Insert “A to Z, Get to Know Me.”
This activity has 26 wacky, serious, and funny questions for students to get to know who their classmates are. Like, one of them says: Queen of England grants you knighthood. What did you do to deserve it? How fun is that?
The way it works is this: Students will answer questions based on the letters in their names. Starting with the first letter in their name, students will answer the corresponding question.
Here’s an example using my name: The J question is “ Just so you know, my least favorite snack is _______. But my favorite is _______. ”
“I’m Johanna. Just so you know, my least favorite snack is _______. But my favorite is _______. My least favorite snack is soft & chewy chips ahoy. My favorite snack is chips and dip.”
Then the next person will go. Continue to go around until all the name letters have been shared or you run out of time. Students may use a nickname if they choose to.
I’ll model it first, similar to how I did with you. I like this activity because it’s fun and engaging because it’s not the typical get to know you.
This is where I take some time to introduce myself. I two slides of pictures. One of me and my husband. One with my family. And then my pets. That’s it. I introduce this by saying “Now that you know some things about each other, here’s a little about me!”
Then, I give students a True or False Quiz about me. Most of the questions are like “My favorite condiment is mustard.” or “I played soccer in high school”. I let students work together (which they do know that they know each other & have built a little trust). And I’ve set up hints around the room. So it does take some prep, but the majority of it is my normal set up anyway.
For example, the “I played soccer in high school” question, I have pictures from my track and field days (I did shot put & discus) in high school & college. But I have a picture on my wall behind my desk that showcases that.
And some of the statements are like “I’m excited to have you in my class” or “I have high expectations for my students.” This puts some genuineness into the activity.
This Teacher True or False is a free download in my TpT Store or on my website. It is editable, but also has an example or what I use as well as some ideas for you to use if you have writer’s block.
Then after time is up or students are done, we’ll go over it. My favorite part is asking students how they figured it out if it was T or F.
Most years, that’s all I get through before we have to do our closing out routine. I like to start and end the first day with some routine to provide some structure to the day. This closing it out phase is a routine phase where I show students how I need them to re-organize the classroom to prepare for the next class. I talk to them about how this classroom is a place of learning. And in order for it to be that way, it needs to be ready for the next class, just as it was for them. It may seem silly, but my goal, this year especially, is for students to feel ownership over the space and materials to a point that they want it to look good and feel good for themselves and others.
Then I show them how the lines on the floor match where their desks go. And how to properly tuck in their chairs. I also share with them how I want the teams exiting the classroom to avoid chaos and where the Parking Lot is for sticky notes. And we’ve made it full circle back to the sticky notes at the beginning of class.
The Parking Lot is a place to stick exit tickets, questions, or notes depending on the day & situation.
And that’s pretty much it! Day one in the books. Now only to do that 5 times throughout the day! Oof. That’s the one thing that is rough about the first week, is all of my classes have the same lesson plans.
To briefly summarize, I plan my first day into 4 phases:
And with that, I hope you are feeling more prepared for the first day of school and how it will go. And if you have already completed the first day of school, then these activities are still fun to do as a brain break, or as a fun Monday or Friday lesson.
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