Prepare for Better Learning!

05 July 2015 / 2 comments
Hi all! It's Pam from Mrs. P's Specialties here to talk to you about preparing your schedule for better student engagement.



There are lots of great articles and statistics on why it is imperative that kiddos are allowed to move more in school. Click HERE for an article from the Washington Post about the rise in attention problems in students. 

As teachers, we can make small tweaks to our schedules to give students the movement they developmentally need. Through careful planning and scheduling, we can meet our students developmental needs & reduce behaviors and interruptions in our classrooms. Did I mention that your day will be more fun?! WIN!

There are activities and subjects that we have to plan and do at specific times of the day, so I focus on the times between set in stone activities. In my classroom, my students are engaged and on task more when I alternate movement and non-movement tasks. For example, I do direct teaching for an hour straight. By the end of the period my kiddos NEED to move, so I schedule snack or centers afterwards. 

For some classes, just the moving that comes along with moving to a new area of the room is enough for students. That is rarely the case in my room. To meet the needs of my students I look for ways to adapt academic activities and add in moving. One of my class' favorite math centers is bowling for subtraction.




Other ideas for adding movement into your day:

*Have students do a gross motor move to get into line. For example, "If you are wearing blue, jump like a kangaroo over to the door (or line)."

*Brain breaks

*Use over-sized materials so students need to move their bodies to manage materials.

I hope you have gotten some ideas on how to add movement into your classroom. Do you have an idea about adding movement? We would love it if you left it in the comments so we can all learn!





2 comments:

  1. The bowling pin math game is a great activity to engage students in meaningful math. Thanks for sharing.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Great ideas! I love that 1st photo - a true picture of engagement! This is such a good reminder to look for ways to get the kids moving. Thanks!

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