Starting the school year on a positive note

      Every year for the last six years, I have spent the week leading up to school having nightmares about my upcoming class. They all have major behavior problems. None of them can read. They hate school with the fiery passion of a thousand suns. In essence, they are the worst class in the world. I have this same nightmare literally every year.

   The worst part? Every year, for the first month of school, I believe my nightmare has come true.

     To be clear, my kids are not actually the worst in the world. It just feels like it when they arrive each August unable to work collaboratively in groups, unable to resolve conflicts peacefully, and unable to critically think with the depth that I know that lies dormant within them. I am constantly comparing them to the kids to who just left at the end of May, the kids who used their writing about important issues to inspire a US Representative to come visit our school, and who could run the classroom by themselves (as they proved to me on "Silent Day"...aka, I was silent all day and they ran the class). Every year, come August, I spend a month despairing that my students will ever again be as competent, compassionate, independent, and self-motivated as last year's group was.

Silent Day, 2017-2017

    This year, I resolved to go in knowing and remembering that, while my students may not be perfect yet, I have never failed to create a classroom where learning, respectful discussion, and collaboration are valued. The first day (or month) may not have the depth that so uplifts my soul, but I darn well let students know from the first moment what my class will look like. Here are my five steps to starting the school year on a positive note:

1. Make sure that students have something to do from the moment they walk in the room. 

Make it simple, so that students can experience success from their first day in your room. Make it something that shows that you value students' interests, ideas, and experiences. I have often used this sheet to begin getting to know my students, or, for a more in-depth look, this one

2. Be a person. 

Your students have no idea who you are, and you are a person who is going to have a large amount of influence over them for the next ten months of their life. However you choose to do it (I generally make a Prezi), show your students that you are a real person with interests, vulnerabilities, strengths, and weaknesses. I am not shy about letting my students know that I struggle with a disability, or that I have a brother who died, or that I used to study monkey psychology before I began teaching. These are often the things that strike students the deepest--too often, students believe that success is out of their reach because of their difficulties. If you can succeed despite yours, then students will know that you expect them to succeed despite (and sometimes because of) theirs.

3. Immediately start teaching the procedures that matter most to you. 

As students walk in the room, a greeting and simple directions for what to do (find any seat, and begin quietly working on your getting-to-know-you page) are posted on my board. This sets the tone that, in my room, students can expect clear directions. Any student who fails at this task is gently and firmly directed to read the directions. We also practice my silent signal, in the context of having students share their summer activities, or hopes and fears for the school year, with table mates.

4. Make your yearly priorities first-day priorities. 

As a teacher, I passionately believe that my purpose is to teach students to be active, involved citizens who have the reading, writing, speaking, and listening skills they need to change the world. In the process, I also seek to guide students towards a love of reading and writing. Therefore, I begin building an understanding that collaboration will play an enormous role in our year together, by teaching students to reference their academic discussion cards (more on these in this post) during a partner conversation and by having a book frenzy, an idea that you can read more about in Donalyn Miller's fabulous book The Book Whisperer. From day one, students should know that your classroom is a place where reading and collaboration are valued.

Some bins from my library, ready for our book frenzy!

5. Don't stress. 

It's hard to avoid the feeling that you didn't get nearly enough done on the first day (or every day thereafter). What with handing out schedules, going over bathroom procedures, first-day tours, and the infinite number of other mandated rituals that you will be required to go through, it is likely that you may not get through everything you planned. That is perfectly okay, because no one else did either. An amazing, awe-inspiring year starts with a first day, but it doesn't end there, so don't despair if yours doesn't go perfectly.

Happy back to school!

Cheers,