Monday, September 7, 2015

Hopes and Dreams

During our first few days of school students were asked to reflect on the things that they accomplished last year and the things that might have been challenging. Following a discussion about these reflections students were asked to think about what they hope to accomplish this school year. They generated a long list and were then asked to narrow it down to their most important one or two. These were written down and are on display on the bulletin board outside of our ELA classroom. Following this activity students were asked to think about what they need in order to achieve these hopes and dreams. This lead to a discussion and the creation of our classroom rules.

Team-Building


Welcome to our first week of school! A focus for our middle level is on creating a healthy, effective middle level learning community. As a whole group we have discussed our expectations for our behavior and participated in some fun team-building activities! This carried over into our individual classrooms. In our literacy class we participated in a hands-on team-building activity where students had to construct a structure from playing cards. They were limited in resources, time, and were asked not to communicate for the first 15 minutes. Following this activity students brainstormed a list of the qualities of an effective team-member! Students worked extremely well together and produced some very interesting structures. Make sure you look for these at Open-House!