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A podcast with great ideas, but you can read the transcript, too.

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Listen to the interview with Catlin Tucker:
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The pandemic pushed many educators out of their comfort zones as the teaching and learning landscape shifted beneath their feet. Teachers experimented with new technology tools, learning platforms, and instructional strategies to engage students online, in concurrent classrooms, and on hybrid schedules.

Those who relied primarily on the whole group, teacher-led model quickly discovered that talking for extended periods of time in a video conferencing session failed to engage learners. Students were no longer in a physical learning environment where teachers had a high degree of control. Instead, students had control. They decided whether they turned on their cameras, unmuted to participate in lessons, or completed assignments. The pandemic exposed the shortcomings of the whole-group approach to instruction.

By contrast, educators using blended learning prior to the pandemic had a smoother transition online because they were comfortable using technology to disseminate information, organize resources, and engage students.

Even though many educators are back in physical classrooms this year, blended learning models provide us with powerful structures we can use to weave together online and offline learning to position students at the center of the learning process. Instead of reverting back to a teacher-led, whole-group instructional model, blended learning offers a range of models that free us from the front of the room and allow us to work directly with individual and small groups of learners.

Blended Learning Defined

Blended learning is the combination of active, engaged learning online combined with active, engaged learning offline to provide students with more control over the time, place, pace, and path of their learning. This adapted version of Staker and Horn's (2012) often cited definition is rooted in constructivist principles. It emphasizes the student's role as an active agent in the learning process. They must be doing, making, thinking, discussing, questioning, problem-solving, collaborating, and reflecting.

This combination of online and offline learning can take many forms. For example, we can shift some direct instruction online via videos, allowing students to self-pace through lectures and mini-lessons. We can design a mix of online and offline learning stations that students rotate through, creating time for small group differentiated instruction or feedback sessions. The various models provide different avenues for combining online and offline learning, so we can select the best instructional approach to meeting specific student needs and ensuring all learners make progress toward learning objectives.

The "WHY" of Blended Learning

Teachers need a mindset, skill set, and tool set that allows them to navigate any educational landscape confidently. Blended learning offers educators this flexibility because the models work in a classroom, online, or a combination of the two. In addition to being flexible, blended learning addresses two aspects of education that will never change: a) learner variability and b) technology.

First, learner variability is the norm, not the exception. Students will always be different from one another in terms of their skills, needs, preferences, backgrounds, language proficiencies, and interests. If we want to make learning accessible and equitable, why would we use a one-size-fits-all lesson to teach a diverse group of learners? Instead, we must architect learning experiences that strive to remove barriers and provide flexible pathways so all students make progress toward firm, standard-aligned goals.

Second, technology has permeated every aspect of our society. We can use technology to shift students to the center of learning, giving them more opportunities to make decisions about what they learn, how they learn, and what they create to demonstrate their learning. Blended learning fundamentally shifts the teacher and student roles in a classroom. Educators shift from experts at the front of the room to facilitators working with students, and students shift from passive consumers to active agents. These shifts have a powerful impact on the quality of learning and the quality of relationships in a classroom.

The "why" driving my work has shifted as my work has evolved. When I began blending online learning into my low-tech classroom twelve years ago, my goal was to engage students. I was focused on integrating technology to give every student a voice, foster collaboration, and encourage them to make meaning as a learning community. Now, I facilitate professional learning for educators all over the world, work as a blended learning coach, and teach in the Master of Arts in Teaching program at Pepperdine University. My work with school leaders, teachers, and coaches combined with my doctoral research on teacher engagement in blended learning environments has caused my "why" to shift over time. The purpose driving my work now is to help educators reimagine traditional instructional models and workflows to make this profession more sustainable and rewarding. That way, they can invest their finite time and energy in the aspects of this work that are cognitively, emotionally, and socially engaging.

Addressing Common Teaching Pain Points with Blended Learning

In The Complete Guide to Blended Learning ( Amazon | Bookshop.org), I highlight student agency, differentiation, and control over the pace of learning as pillars of high-quality blended learning and demonstrate how teachers can weave these into each model. When teachers prioritize these three things in the design of their lessons, they create learning experiences that are more engaging, accessible, and equitable for students. They also help to address key "pain points" that teachers experience that can cause them to feel frustrated and disillusioned with this profession.

Pain Point #1: Low Levels of Students Motivation

One pain point I hear about in my work is a perceived lack of student motivation, which manifests in low levels of engagement. Research on motivation indicates that students are more likely to be motivated when they experience autonomy and agency, feel confident in their ability to complete a task, and belong to an inclusive learning community. It's easy to forget that many students spend all day in classrooms where they do not get to make any decisions about their learning. Blended learning provides a natural framework for offering students autonomy and meaningful choices. I encourage teachers to build student agency into each learning experience, inviting students to make content, process, and/or product decisions. They do not need to create a choice board full of options. Instead, simply offering students a "would you rather" choice between two options, as pictured in the table below, can be motivating.

Pain Point #2: Diversity of Skills and Needs in a Class

The second pain point teachers struggle with is the spectrum of needs and abilities in a class. It is daunting to meet this diversity of needs with a single learning experience. The good news is that blended learning models make it easier to effectively and consistently differentiate, and begin to personalize learning, because teachers are working directly with individual students and small groups. It is more challenging to differentiate when ushering a group of 30+ students through a lock-step learning experience.

As teachers architect their lessons, they should consider differentiating the content, process, and product. These questions can help us identify places in the learning experience that will benefit from differentiation:

How can we ensure students can access the content?

What supports and scaffolds will they need to process the information and begin to make meaning?

What level of academic rigor and complexity is within their zone of possibility?

What do they want to create to demonstrate their learning?

The more consistently we differentiate, the more confident we will be in our ability to meet learners where they are in their journeys toward mastering specific concepts and skills.

Pain Point #3: Classroom Management

The third pain point is unproductive and distracting behaviors. Classroom management has always presented challenges, but the last year was particularly rough as students transitioned back into physical classrooms. One factor that contributes to classroom management issues is the misalignment between the pace the learning is moving and the pace the learner needs it to move. If the pace of learning is too fast, students get frustrated, may not feel valued, and disengage. If the pace of learning is too slow, students get bored, make their own fun, and disengage. As teachers design learning experiences using the various models, it is critical to consider where in a learning experience we can give students more control over the pace they consume and process information and navigate complex tasks.

If teachers prioritize student agency, differentiation, and student control over pace in their design work, they are more likely to architect blended learning experiences that allow students the flexible pathways they need to be successful. The result is classrooms where students are active agents engaged in the learning.

Four Rotation Models

The phrase "blended learning" is an umbrella that encompasses a range of different models that combine online and offline learning in various ways. Each model gives students different degrees of control over the time, place, pace, and path of their learning. When working in traditional school settings, I focus on the rotation models because they work beautifully in a classroom, online, or a blend of the two. There are four main rotation models: a) station rotation, b) whole group rotation, c) flipped classroom, and d) playlist or individual rotation.

1. The Station Rotation Model

The station rotation model rotates students between online and offline learning activities. In this model, the teacher works with small groups of learners while giving students more control over the pace and path of their learning at the other stations. Grouping students at stations creates smaller learning communities within a larger class and makes it more manageable to effectively differentiate instruction and models, supports and scaffolds, and the academic rigor and complexity of practice and application.

A station rotation lesson is composed of three types of stations: a) teacher-led, b) online, and c) offline. The number of stations may vary depending on the optimal number of students at each station or the length of the class period. It's important to note that a station rotation can span a couple of days and does not need to happen in a single class.

Teachers can facilitate a range of activities at each station. The table below provides some ideas for how they might use the different stations.

2. The Whole Group Rotation

The whole group rotation rotates the entire class between online and offline learning activities. In the original taxonomy of blended learning models, this was called the lab rotation because students worked offline in a classroom and then rotated into a computer lab for online learning. The ubiquity of devices in schools, thanks to 1:1 initiatives and Chromebook carts, has eliminated the need to leave the classroom to get online, hence the name change. Ideally, the whole group rotation model gives students more control over the path of their learning during the online learning portions of the lesson.

The goal of the whole group rotation is to pair each learning activity with the best learning landscape and mode for that activity - online or offline, individual or collaborative. It allows for some whole-group instruction (e.g., mini-lessons) while making it possible to differentiate and personalize elements of the lesson by pulling small groups for additional instruction and support during the online learning portion of the lesson and assigning personalized practice. The table below provides an example of what a whole group rotation could look like in practice.

3. The Flipped Classroom Model

The flipped classroom model uses video instruction to shift the transfer of information online. The benefit of presenting information in a video is that students can control the pace they consume and process that information - pausing, rewinding, or rewatching as needed. They may also be able to add closed captioning and slow down the pace of the video to increase accessibility.

Teachers often ask, "When should I make a video, and when should I provide live instruction?" I suggest they make a video if they plan to say the same thing the same way to all students. If they plan to differentiate the way they present the information (e.g., using problems or prompts at different levels of academic rigor), I encourage them to use the station rotation model and lead differentiated instruction at their station.

Teachers may worry about assigning video content for homework since some learners may not have reliable internet, a device, or a quiet space to work. It is important to note they do not need to send videos home with students. Instead, they can use video instruction in the classroom to spend less time transferring information and more time supporting students as they practice and apply. In The Complete Guide to Blended Learning, I share my approach to designing a three-part flipped lesson to guide educators in designing dynamic lessons around video content, as shown in the table below.

The pre-video activity can serve as the "welcome task" at the start of class to engage students before they watch the video instruction. As students transition to the video lesson and engagement activity, it's important to build a buffer of time around the video so students can control the pace they consume and process that information. When we use video instruction in class instead of sending it home, students lose control over time and place, so it is critical they maintain control over the pace, rewinding and rewatching the video as needed. Since learners will pace through the video lesson at different rates, some may move onto the post-video activity in class while others may need to take that work home to complete or have time the following class to finish. If time is provided at the start of the next class, those students who completed the post-video activity can work on an extension opportunity designed to challenge them further.

4. The Playlist/Individual Rotation Model

The playlist model presents students with a sequence of learning activities designed to move them toward a clear learning objective or desired outcome. A playlist can be used to teach a concept, strategy, skill, or process, or to guide students through a multi-step performance task, writing assignment, or project. This model gives students control over the pace of their progress through the playlist, so it is ideal for any task where students will benefit from variable time on task.

Teachers can also differentiate the path of a playlist. If they build a playlist in a digital document or slide deck, it is easy to copy and modify it to create differentiated versions. For example, they may make a "middle of the road" version they think most students will be successful with, an advanced version, and a more scaffolded version. The different versions may include different degrees of embedded support, and students may work on different products to demonstrate their learning.

A playlist should function as a one-stop-shop, providing students with on-demand video instruction and models, review and practice activities designed to collect formative assessment data, discussions (online or offline), reflective prompts, self-assessment activities, etc. I encourage educators to include "teacher check-ins" at strategic moments in the playlists when students would benefit from feedback and support. These check-ins provide the time and space for us to sit with individual students to review their formative assessment data, discuss their progress, and make additions or modifications to their playlists to ensure each student continues to make progress. Teacher check-ins make personalizing each student's playlist sustainable and create opportunities to pull time-consuming tasks like giving feedback and assessing student work into the classroom instead of taking that work home. When done with students, these tasks present opportunities for us to connect with learners and develop our relationships with them.

Below is an example of a math playlist created by Diego Torres, a graduate student I had the pleasure of working with in my advancing methods course. The left-hand column displays the "path" or learning activities in the playlist and integrates "would you rather" choices. The right-hand column is where students capture their work.

Blended learning provides us with a robust toolbox full of models that are flexible enough for any teaching and learning landscape. Instead of feeling limited to a single model that positions the teachers to do the lion's share of the work, these blended learning models shift control to students and create more time and space for human connection in the classroom.

The last two and a half years have taken their toll on educators. The rates of burnout and attrition are alarming, and districts are reporting teacher shortages all over the country. Too many educators are exhausted and disillusioned - they need better ways of approaching this work. They are doing too much of the work in classrooms, and students aren't doing enough. I believe blended learning is the life raft educators need to reimagine their approach to this work and rediscover their joy in this profession.
Reference:
Staker, H., & Horn, M. B. (2012). Classifying K-12 Blended Learning. Mountain View, CA: Innosight Institute. http://www.christenseninstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Classifying-K-12-blended-learning.pdf

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Instead of the teacher doing the lion's share of the work, these models shift control to students and create more time and space for human connection.

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Great ideas to use at the end of learning to make sure it sticks!

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by Terry Heick

Reflection is a natural part of learning.

We all think about new experiences-the camping on the car ride home, the mistakes made in a game, or the emotions felt while finishing a long-term project that's taken months to complete.

Below I've shared 15 strategies for students to reflect on their learning. Modeling the use of each up front can go a long way towards making sure you get the quality of work you'd like to see throughout the year-and students learn more in the process. (This post pairs nicely with 8 Reflective Questions To Help Any Student Think About Their Learning.)
15 Reflection Strategies To Help Students Retain What You Just Taught Them 1. Pair-Share
Pair-share is a classic learning strategy where students are paired, and then verbally 'share' something that will help them learn new content, deepen understanding, or review what they already know. It can also be used as a quick and dirty assessment tool, as the conversations generally reflect a level of understanding the teacher can use gauge mastery and plan further instruction.
2. Sentence Stem-based responses
Sentence stems are great because they're like training wheels-or to mix a metaphor, tools to coach students into thinking and speaking in certain patterns. For example, you can implore students to 'think critically,' but if they don't have even the basic phrasing of critical thinking (e.g., 'This is important because...'), critical thinking will be beyond their reach.

You can also see our sentence stems for critical thinking here for other examples (you don't have to buy the materials to see the samples).
3. Layered Text
Layered text is something I've meant to write about for years and never have. A layered text is a digital document that is filled with hyperlinks that communicate, well, just about anything: Questions students have, opportunities for further inquiry, odd references and allusions that reflect the schema students use to make meaning, and so on. (Rap Genius does a version of this.)

By adding 'layers' of meaning to a text through meaningful hyperlinking, students can reflect back on anything, from a pre-assessment journal entry that demonstrated their lack of understanding, to a kind of 'marking up' of what they learned when, and from where.
4. Tweet
140 characters forces students to reflect quick and to the point-great for brief bursts of reflection or hesitant writers who would struggle to write meaningful journal entries or essays. In fact, you can combine twitter with #6 for twitter exit slips.
5. 3-2-1
3-2-1 is a tried-and-true way to frame anything from a pair-share or journal entry (e.g., ask students to write 3 things they think they know, 2 things they know they don't know, and one thing they're certain of about a topic) pre-assessment to a post-assessment (e.g., list three ways your essay reflected mastery of skill X, two ways skill Y still needs improving, and one way you can make your argument stronger in the next five minutes) to a reflection of the post-assessment.

Read more about using the 3-2-1 format for critical thinking.
6. Exit Slips
Whether you call them exit slips or exit tickets, asking students to briefly leave behind some residue of learning-a thought, a definition, a question-is a powerful teaching strategy. In fact, 'exit-slip teaching' literally drives how I use data in the classroom. Asking students to drop some bit of reflection of the learning process on a chair by the door on the way out is a no-brainer.

Some examples?

How did you respond emotionally to something you struggled with today? What did you find most surprising about _____? How did your understanding of _______ change today? What about _____ still confuses you or makes your curious?
7. Write-Around
I love write-arounds-easy ways for students to write asynchronously and collaboratively. And the writing fragments students use don't have to be prose-certain key vocabulary and phrases can help students reflect, but most importantly in a write-around, help students learning from one another as each student is able to read other responses before creating theirs.
8. Sketch
Whether by sketch-notes or doodles, allowing students to draw what they think they know, how they believe their learning has changed, or some kind of metaphorical pathway towards deeper understanding is a great learning strategy for students that tend towards creative expression, and a non-threatening way for struggling students to at least write something down on paper you can use to gauge understand and plan your (their) next step.
9. Podcast
Through podcasting as a reflecting strategy, students will talk about their learning while recording. If you want to keep it 'closed-circuit' (not published), or actually push it to a public audience of some kind depends on the learning and students and privacy issues and so on.

This can also be simply an audio file recorded and uploaded to a private YouTube channel that's shared with teachers or parents.
10. Brainstorming
Brainstorming can be an effective reflection strategy because it disarms issues with other approaches. For hesitant writers, journaling may not work because the writing process could overwhelm the learning. Podcasting may not work for shy students, Pair-Share may not work well if students are paired effectively, and so on.

Brainstorming is much simpler. Students could take an allotted time to write down everything they remember about a topic. Or, they could brainstorm questions they still have (things they're confused or curious about). They could even brainstorm how what what they learned literally connects with what they already know by creating a concept map.
11. Jigsawing
Jigsawing is a grouping strategy where a task, concept, or something 'larger' is broken down into small puzzles pieces, and students in groups analyze the small puzzle piece, then share out to create the puzzle at large. Using this approach for reflection is seamless: Among other approaches, you can prompt students in groups to gather and share questions they have (you could group by readiness/ability, for example) in groups, and then choose one question that they weren't able to answer among themselves with the whole class (anonymously-no one has to know who wrote the question).
12. Prezi
Think of a cross between a sketch, collage, and presentation, and you have a prezi. Engaging-though distracting and overwhelming if the reflection you need is minor-reflection tool that allows students to create an artifact of learning for their digital portfolios.
13. Vlog
This reflection strategy is close to 'Podcasting' and even has something in common with pair-sharing. By reflecting through vlog'ing, students simply talk about their learning to a camera.

This approach would be successful for students that love talking to a camera, but less so for others (who, if they have to talk at all about their learning, may prefer podcasting-or simply recording audio files that are never published.
14. Collage
You could do a normal collage of learning reflections, but a multimedia collage is also possible-maybe a sketchnote with a voiceover recorded as a YouTube video to share as a quick presentation with the class (or absent students).
15. Journaling
The University of Missouri-St Louis offers 3 kinds of journals that demonstrate the different possibilities of the otherwise vanilla-sounding 'journaling.'

1. Personal Journal - Students will write freely about their experience. This is usually done weekly. These personal journals may be submitted periodically to the instructor, or kept as a reference to use at the end of the experience when putting together an academic essay reflecting their experience. (Hatcher 1996)

2. Dialogue Journal - Students submit loose-leaf pages from a dialogue journal bi-weekly (or otherwise at appropriate intervals) for the instructor to read and comment on. While labor intensive for the instructor, this can provide continual feedback to students and prompt new questions for students to consider during the semester. (Goldsmith, 1995)

3. Highlighted Journal - Before students submit the reflective journal, they reread personal entries and, using a highlighter, mark sections of the journal that directly relate to concepts discussed in the text or in class. This makes it easier for the instructor to identify the student to reflect on their experience in light of course content. (Gary Hesser, Augsberg College)
15 Strategies For Students To Reflect On Their Learning; image attribution Flickr user woodleywonderworks

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Strategies To Help Students Retain What You Taught Them

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by Terry Heick Reflection is a natural part of learning. We all think about new experiences-the camping on the car ride home, the mistakes made in a game, or the emotions felt while finishing a long-term project that's taken months to complete. Below I've shared 15 strategies for students to reflect on their learning.

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Great video that helps you improve your interactions with students

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4 steps to engaging students with effective questioning

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Ten Great Strategies for Student Interaction

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Ten Great Strategies for Student Interaction

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Descriptions and videos so you can implement these strategies in your classroom.

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Every teacher strives for an active classroom buzzing with engaged and eager students. However, even the most experienced teachers face days when it seems like they're the only one talking and the students have simply tuned out. Or, perhaps your students are so engaged and so eager to participate that you're having a tough time making sure that all student voices are heard.

Silence can bring even the best lesson to a screeching halt and the hand that never seems to go down is certainly a challenge. But whatever the reason behind your participation woes, if you have 12 minutes, we have 10 top-notch strategies you can learn today and try out tomorrow to boost active learning and student participation for all students in your classroom.

The Warm-Up

So you want your students to engage, but how do you prepare them to actively participate in class? Watch Madeline Noonan describe how the SLANT strategy helps her students learn basic communication skills and get ready to learn. Then check out how Sarah Brown Wessling encourages active participationthrough the Stand-Up Game.
VIDEO: The Stand-Up Game: A Classroom Strategy
A warm-up activity is often a great idea to get students up, moving, and instantly involvedin the learning activity. Look in on Emily Davaney-Graham's class as they engage in an agree/disagree strategy called Pick a Side.
VIDEO: Pick a Side: Warm-Up & Discuss
Student Accountability

How do you incorporate students into the class when they don't exactly participate actively by choice? Check out how Chris McCloud holds his students accountablefor participating in class with playing cards and, at the same time, shapes his class culture to take away the fear of not knowing the answer.
VIDEO: Participation with Playing Cards
Similarly, Tammy Ritter uses index cards to create a Card-O-Matic that helps her to hold students accountable in a positive wayand provide additional think time to the students who need it.

Engaging Students

If your students have a lot of great ideas, it may be difficult for you to make sure each student has an opportunity to share during a classroom discussion. Novella Bailey often relies on a strategy called Popcorn Share to build classroom community, increase student engagement, and foster accountability.

Just providing some time for your students to prepare notes for a discussion could really make a difference for students who are shy or reluctant to participate. Take a look at how Stacy Brewer puts a spin on traditional note-taking in Post-its: Little Notes for Big Discussions.

And some students become almost invisible in a class discussion because they tend to shut down when it's their turn to talk. What can you do to lower the risk of participating for these students and keep them actively engaged in the lesson? Watch Sean Paris use the Wingman strategy to tweak the rules of engagement and help his students learn from one another.
VIDEO: The Wingman: Engaging Reluctant Students
The Introverts and the Thinkers

Both speaking and listening are critical when a student is actively participating in a lesson. But how do you teach speaking and listening skills? Elizabeth Iwaszewicz uses Second Set Partners for these essential communication competences. This strategy works great for ELLs and can also help students who are anxious about participating when learning in a large group.

Sometimes when we ask questions in class, students may want to participate but aren't ready to answer in the moment. A little wait time can be the answer! Watch how Tita Ugalde uses wait time and then gives her students the space to say, " Get Back to Me," allowing for a little more time to organize their thoughts and summon their confidence.
VIDEO: Get Back to Me How do you encourage active participation in your classroom? What strategies have worked to help you find the right balance?

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10 Top-Notch Strategies in 12 Minutes: Student Participation

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Every teacher strives for an active classroom buzzing with engaged and eager students. However, even the most experienced teachers face days when it seems like they're the only one talking and the students have simply tuned out. Or, perhaps your students are so engaged and so eager to participate that you're having a tough time making sure that all student voices are heard.

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Ways to encourage curiosity in all its forms in your classroom.

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How to Cultivate Curiosity in Your Classroom

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What makes your students curious? When do you see their faces light up with interest at school? At home, my teen stepson is all about cars, all the time. My daughter is currently obsessed with astrology, while my husband can talk for hours about Roman history (really!).

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Great ideas you can use to encourage student interaction and discussion.

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For teachers seeking to facilitate rather than lead discussions, these strategies empower students to share their ideas.

Sometimes, as teachers, we struggle to help our students connect what they know to what they are learning. When we face this challenge, it can be helpful to examine our practice under a different set of lenses to uncover ways to reinvigorate learning. One of the easiest ways to do this, especially if you're new to the profession, is to take a closer look at how you manage discussions.

When facilitating a discussion, do you direct your students toward specific outcomes, or is there room for them to take ownership of the conversations and make them their own? There are differences, however subtle, between leading and facilitating discussions. The following five strategies, which are particularly suited for middle and high school students, empower student agency and offer a fresh approach to discourse.

CoFounding Environments of Shared Inquiry

When you lead a discussion, you begin with the end in mind-that is, you determine exactly what you want your students to know and guide them with focused questions.

Rather than provide you with a list of strategies that you can use to increase student engagement, our intention is to demonstrate how combininggold standard discussion strategies, such as Turn & Turn or Think-Pair-Share, can energize your teaching practice and produce powerful results.

The following discussion sequences, or dialogic archetypes, can be applied to subjects across the curriculum. They can be disassembled, rearranged, and reconfigured to create new instructional arrangements that appeal to your students' strengths and needs and to your own teaching style.

1. Quick Write, Turn & Talk, Modified Jigsaw, Quick Draw

Here's a sequence that works well when discussing short texts such as case studies: Distribute a number of short texts (three or four should suffice) and blank note cards among your students, so that each student has one text. Ask students to read the texts and respond on the lined side of their note card; you might invite open responses or offer a prompt.

Once students have responded, pair them by text, and ask them to share what they wrote. You might also create discussion groups in which students have read different texts and invite them to explore similarities and differences in themes, characters, conflicts, or other relevant topics, moving from pair to small group work.

Finally, ask students to draw something they learned from their discussion group on the blank side of their note card to share with you, their group mates, or the class as a whole.

2. Four Corners, Think-Pair-Square, Sticky Chat, Gallery Walk

To integrate kinesthetic engagement into classroom discussion, post images related to what you are teaching in the corners of the room, and direct students to stand next to the image that they find most appealing.

Pair students by image, and ask them to conduct some independent research about their chosen picture. If your students do not have ready access to computers, you can provide them with books to explore, or simply ask them to record their thoughts on the images. Create discussion groups of four by combining pairs assigned to the same image. Finally, ask students to write what they learned on sticky notes, and post them on the images. The class might then engage in a gallery walk to learn from one another's findings.

3. Group Roles, Team Pack Discussion, Classroom Mingle, Classroom Poll

For a discussion sequence that connects students with multiple classmates, create groups of three, and provide each group with a different discussion prompt on a note card. Assign each member of the group a role: speaker, scribe, and timekeeper. Ask students to respond to the prompt on their note card before passing it to the next group.

Then, rotate speakers one group to the right and scribes two groups to the right. After the timekeepers have discussed all of the prompts, poll the class for their favorite.

4. Pick a Side, Snowball Discussion, Debate, Graffiti Wall

To lower the stakes and boost participation during classroom debates, ask students to pick a side on a given issue and to write their thoughts on a piece of paper. Direct half of the students to fold their papers lengthwise, the other half widthwise. Collect the papers, assign a side of the issue to each type of fold, and redistribute the papers randomly.

Facilitate debates of two, then four, then eight students, with each side evenly represented. Ask students to record their thoughts on the paper again, and then tape them on the wall to showcase students' engagement.

5. Stoplight Sticky Notes, Affinity Mapping, Gallery Run, Web Discussion

Make learning visible with an archetype that centers the use of maps: Provide students with a prompt connected to a short video or text. Ask them to write their thoughts on color-coded sticky notes: green might mean "interesting," red "challenging." Create small groups, and direct participants to identify similarities and differences between their notes. After small group discussion, arrange the class in a circle, and have them create a "web" by passing a ball of string when they connect with a fellow student's reflection.

Moving Beyond These Discussion Sequences

These instructional sequences can be followed by whole group discussions or some other kind of low-stakes assessment to measure student understanding. However you decide to progress, the point is that strategies that usually stand on their own, or that are simply framed as standing on their own, can be combined to create unforeseen opportunities for engagement. While it is important to have a plan, good teaching is about leaning into the unexpected. It's about taking risks and creating space for your students to actively participate in the meaning-making process.

Even if the archetypes presented here do not appeal to your particular style of teaching, we encourage you to experiment with the strategies that do. It doesn't matter if you've been teaching for three months or 30 years. Education is unmapped terrain, and there will always be something new to discover.

The strategies in this article were developed with Cayla Cosner, an elementary and special education specialist.

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5 Discussion Strategies to Deepen Student Engagement

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For teachers seeking to facilitate rather than lead discussions, these strategies empower students to share their ideas. Sometimes, as teachers, we struggle to help our students connect what they know to what they are learning. When we face this challenge, it can be helpful to examine our practice under a different set of lenses to uncover ways to reinvigorate learning.

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Rethink how you approach lessons in your classroom to meet learning needs

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A Student-Centered Model of Blended Learning

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When educators at a Washington, DC, high school ditched their lectures and devised a self-paced blended learning model, their students thrived.

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Thoughtful ideas about the first 5 minutes of class.

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Openers matter and set the tone for the lesson that follows. Here's how to start strong when you need to.

The first few moments of class, like the opening lines of a novel, are critical. For teachers, they're the starting gate for the lesson that follows and "the key to enlivening-or extinguishing-student interest and learning," writes Curtis Chandler for MiddleWeb. Making sure that your warm-up activity is both substantive and highly engaging, or even downright fun-drawing students into the classroom and the lesson-takes practice and some trial and error, but veteran teachers say it's worth the effort to get it right.

"The battle against student disengagement and disinterest is winnable when we work to infuse the opening minutes with experiences designed to pique student interest, activate prior knowledge, have some fun, and prepare them for the day's learning," writes Chandler, a professor at Brigham Young University-Idaho and former middle school teacher.

Class warm-up strategies aren't new-but they can get less attention than they should, especially when the focus for teachers is on moving quickly into the content. Middle school math teacher Jay Wamsted says he began his 8th grade math class the same way for more than a decade: with a warm-up problem on the board and the expectation that students immediately get to work solving it. Except, he writes, that's not how things went most days.

"What really happened was that out of 30 students, maybe five of them would diligently engage in the problem. The rest would delay with tactics ranging from pencil sharpening to grabbing a few extra winks," Wamsted writes. After greeting his students at the door, he says he'd have two choices: "Go over the warm-up problem for less than 20 percent of the class-typically the 20 percent that didn't need it in the first place-or waste time for the on-task students by giving the less proactive students a few extra minutes."

How can you do better? Some days, of course, you'll opt for keeping things low-key with a traditional warm-up activity, but other times, you might want to change it up. Here are seven warm-up activities, sourced from Chandler, Wamsted, and our Edutopia archives, designed to build connection, activate prior knowledge, and be engaging enough to pull kids into the content.

LINK TO WHAT THEY KNOW
Taking a few moments at the beginning of class to help kids connect what they already know to new content-a strategy known as previewing-helps create more durable learning, "especially for students with limited background knowledge," Chandler writes.

Bait and switch: Begin by briefly discussing common misconceptions students may have about the topic of the day's lesson, Chandler writes. For a lesson about oceans, for example, everyday misconceptions might include statements like "all oceans have the same salinity," or "nothing lives in anoxic mud." Have students take a quick true/false quiz focused on statements that "all seem plausible but are all false," he suggests, before revealing to the class that all the quiz statements are in fact false-and that they're about to learn why throughout the lesson.

Informational hooks: Designed to get kids interested in the lesson ahead, informational hooks can be any type of short, targeted media: videos, clips from a podcast, news headlines, photos. Even a great anecdote might work. To vet relevant hooks, Chandler suggests considering the following questions:

What concepts or skills will the hook highlight?

What is "truly unique, novel, or useful" about the hook?

Will the hook grab their attention-but not distract from the lesson?

Productive failure: Inspired by the research of learning scientist Manu Kapur, consider occasionally designing a short problem-solving activity, perhaps focused on crucial target concepts, as a warm-up exercise before jumping into instruction.

The problem should be just beyond students' reach and designed to activate prior knowledge, motivate them, and surface what they do and do not know. Explain to students that the exercise is designed to be confusing and frustrating and that struggling is normal-even expected. Though a regular productive failure exercise might take 30-40 minutes, a warm-up is clearly much shorter. Allow students to wrestle with a problem for a few minutes, and then step in and build off their ideas and solutions, comparing and contrasting, and then teaching how to correctly solve the problem.

Vocabulary splashes: Present key vocabulary terms and concepts, along with brief definitions, and ask students to sort the words in ways that make sense to them. With a partner, or in small groups, have them discuss their sorting rationales. "The teacher then leads a discussion of how the terms and concepts are related to each other," Chandler writes, and connects them, if possible, to students' "interests and prior knowledge." Consider closing out the lesson by having students sort and explain the words once more.

Rapid review: Have students partner with a classmate, discuss what they learned during the previous class, and then present to the group. It's a quick, effective way to "get students active, and helps the teacher know what actually 'stuck' from the previous day's lesson," Chandler writes.

OR, MAKE IT CHATTY
Sometimes, warm-ups don't need to be overly complicated and a few minutes of chatting about things unrelated to content can be enough to get class started. In Wamsted's math classroom, he's found that "just about any investment in actual conversation-whether it's about doughnuts or spiders or the ramifications of this being the one-year anniversary of the U.S. pulling out of Afghanistan-will pay off mightily in the long run," he writes.

Cold opens: Remote learning pushed Wamsted to reevaluate his staid warm-up routine and now that he's pivoted to a new approach where "we hit the ground running," once math class begins, he writes. "All I've missed is the time when I used to wheedle them to 'do the warm-up problem, please.'"

At the start of class, students see a playful message on the board that's designed to start conversations: "Wednesday? Wow! Halfway through!" or "Test next week? Probably!" for example. He then briefly shows the day's agenda on the board and follows up by showing a slide of some type of non-sequitur-he calls it his "cold open"-designed to generate more chatting: "It might be a picture of my dog. It might be a trivia question about the top five fastest land animals," he notes.

Attendance questions: Once the chatter dies down, Wamsted introduces an attendance question. "At its best, the attendance question connects to the cold open. ... It lets me share something about myself and opens the door for my students to share a little bit with me," he says. If he showed a photo of a dog during the cold open, his attendance question-inspired, he notes, by Jessica Kirkland, a 9th and 10th grade ELA teacher-might involve asking about his students' pets, for example.

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How to Engage Students the Moment They Enter the Classroom

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Openers matter and set the tone for the lesson that follows. Here's how to start strong when you need to.

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Fun ideas you can start using tomorrow!

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It's always the first thing my principal does when she walks into my classroom. Quickly scanning my students, she counts how many are on task and how many there are in total to compute my engagement percentage. Student engagement has become our school's number one focus. If our students are not actively engaged in their learning, how much are they actually learning? There are so many great student engagement strategies to keep your students on task throughout your entire lesson. #13 is always my go-to!

Student Engagement Strategy 1 - Pair/Share

You can call this a variety of things. (Peanut Butter/Jelly, AB Partners, Talking Buddies, etc.) First, decide how you are going to pair your students. You can choose partners strategically, or randomly. I recommend you choose the partners. This is the person that they have to sit by on the carpet during whole group. It helps to limit behavior issues during instruction.

The benefits of this strategy are that everyone gets a chance to share their ideas and you get the chance to "listen in" on their responses. After partner talk, I always call on a few students to share their answers with the class, just as a quick check. Pair this strategy with Morning Meeting Slides or Math Warm-ups and you can have students partner sharing their responses while you walk around and listen to their conversations.

2 - 4 Corners or 2 Sides

This student engagement strategy gets your kids up and moving while still learning. It is also a great activity to use when reviewing. If you are using 4 corners, pose a question with multiple choice answers (A-D). Your students will go to the corner that is their chosen response to the question.

The same concept applies to 2 sides, as you pose a question (yes/no or true/false), your students will choose the side of the room that corresponds to their response. 2 sides is also a great engagement strategy to use with statements. Do they agree or disagree with what you are saying?

3 - Whiteboards

There are so many activities you can have your students engaged in using whiteboards. As a matter of fact, we create an entire blog solely on whiteboard engagement activities and ideas. Read up on more than 30 Ideas for Whiteboard in Your Classroom.

When using whiteboards, your students are able to show you their work. Just like pair/share, it is an easy way for you to check for understanding, as they hold up their whiteboards with their responses. Or you can walk around and take a peek at their work while all of your students are answering the question.

I also love using whiteboards during writing time. My students construct their sentences on their whiteboards first, we edit them together, and then they return to their seats with their whiteboards and rewrite their sentences on paper and illustrate them.

Student Engagement Strategy 4 - Physical Response

Another way to get your students moving and engaged in learning is with physical responses. It can be as simple as thumbs up or down, showing a number to a math problem on their fingers, or making hand motions to symbolize vocabulary words. So that students can keep their responses private, I will have them hold their hand signals against their chest instead of up in the air.

Your students can also have larger movements, like stand up or sit down, reach up high or touch your toes, and jump up or lay down. Just a note of caution, make sure that students have enough personal space to make these movements without bumping into one another.

5 - Choral Chants or Songs

Okay, who doesn't like to sing or recite a chant?! Your students will have an easier time remembering content when it's in a song or fun chant. They can repeat after you, or it can be something that you practice every day and becomes a part of your warm-up. By having to say something, your students will be engaged in the lesson.

6 - Whip Around

This engagement strategy is an easy way to review a skill or set of skills and it quickly gives everyone a turn to share an idea with the class. Students can sit in a circle, or stay at their desks. You pose a question to the class, such as "Tell me a word that contains the bossy e". Start with a student, they will quickly state a word and then you move on to the next student in the circle, or at the next desk. Keep whipping around the classroom until every student has had a turn to share.

(Thing to remember... after asking the question, or saying the category, give your students a little bit of think time before starting. This gives your students time to put together an answer before it is their turn.)

Student Engagement Strategy 7 - Pass the Page

Writing can be a difficult time to keep your students engaged in the lesson. It tends to be a lot of teacher instruction and less student doing. Passing the page is a great way for your students to be active participants in the writing lesson! Give each student a piece of writing paper and have them write their name on the top. Display or state the prompt, along with the particular writing skill you want to focus on for this lesson. (ex. dialogue, extended sentences, punctuation, descriptive language, etc.)

Each student will have a few minutes to start their story based on the prompt and inclusion of the skill. When the given time is up, they will "pass the page" either to the student on their left or right (your choice). Set the timer again for a few minutes. Then this student has the opportunity to add to the story started by their classmate, remembering to include the target skill and have the story make sense. Continue these steps for as long as you like.

Once the last student has written the ending to the story, they return the paper to the original author (whose name is at the top). Your students will have fun reading the additions their classmates made to the stories. As an extension, you can also have them go through the text and circle, underline, or highlight the examples of the target skill used. I pair this student engagement strategy with Writing Mini-Lessons. The lessons help me teach the target skills, and passing the page helps my students put them into practice.

Student Engagement Strategy 8 - Bring in a Ball

So this student engagement strategy definitely comes with some classroom expectations, as well as teach discretion. There have been some years that I didn't use a ball to engage my students in a lesson because they had a very hard time sticking to the rules. Depending on your class dynamic, you can use a beach ball (preferred), rubber ball, squishy ball, etc. as a way for your students to respond to different questions.

First, decide whether they are going to toss or roll the ball to each other. As a teacher of young learners, I've found that it is much safer/easier if they are sitting in a circle and rolling the ball during this activity. Ask a question and hand the ball to a student to answer. Once they've answered, another question can be posed, or they can roll the ball to a classmate to add on to or elaborate more on their original answer.

I've also used this when we are reading a group text. The person with the ball reads then passes it to a classmate to pick up where they left off. You can give students some choice and allow them to read as much or as little as they want before passing.

9 - Write the Room

Another "get up out of your seat and move around" engagement activity. Write the Room can be used for both ELA and Math concepts. Place the cards for that particular skill around your classroom. (If you plan to use this activity during centers, you may want those cards away from your teacher's table.) The recording sheet goes in the basket for your students, or you can pass them out. They will move around the classroom, locating the card with the corresponding number on it, and recording their answer to the question on their paper. Your students will be learning while getting a bit of a movement break at the same time.

Student Engagement Strategy 10 - Games, Games, and Games

I'm not talking about board games, but web-based games. There are so many web game makers out there you can use to keep your students actively engaged in a lesson. Create a Jeopardy Game to answer comprehension questions about story elements. Use Kahoot to identify different parts of speech. Bingo Cards can have the answers to math problems on them. Spin the Wheel to practice producing words with various Phonics Skills. The possibilities of using technology to create games for your students are endless.

11 - Brain Breaks and Dancing

Not necessarily an academic engagement strategy, but something that your students need throughout the day to stay engaged in the academic lessons you are teaching. Put on a quick video or song and have your students get up and move around. They get their wiggles out, blood gets flowing again, and afterward, they can come back and focus on new learning. Don't spend your time searching for brain break videos, just save this list and have immediate access to 25 videos you can play today.

12 - Partner Match

Just like number one, this engagement strategy is done in pairs, but your students have to find their partner instead of you assigning them. They also have the opportunity to move around the room here too. Pass out the matching game cards randomly to your students. When you give the signal, your students will start moving around the room, looking for the classmate that has their matching card. You can do this with skills such as rhyming pairs, letters of the alphabet (upper/lowercase), math facts, singular/plural nouns, and any other skill that works in pairs.

I like using this as a warm-up and whoever their matching partner is, that is the student they are paired with for this particular lesson. Another great way to randomly assign partners in your classroom.

Student Engagement Strategy 13 - Sticky Notes

Sticky notes are a great engagement tool. Students love writing notes down and sticking them places. Use your sticky notes as a warm-up, where you pose an introductory question and students write down their responses. Hold a Gallery Walk and students write their thoughts on sticky notes and put them on the different posters around the classroom. Check for understanding by putting a question on the board and students answer it on their sticky notes. Then you can sort by who understood the lesson and who needs extra practice. (Great for targeted small groups, especially in math.)

My favorite way to use sticky notes is to keep my students engaged during transitions with an "Exit Ticket" board. Have your students write either their number or name on the sticky. Once they've written their response, they leave the sticky on your designated Exit Ticket board in the classroom. Use this at the end of the day, on your way to lunch or specials, or while everyone is cleaning up and moving on to another subject. You get to see who "got it" and who needs extra practice. And your students have something to do, so it keeps behaviors at bay.

Student engagement strategies are so much more than just making sure your students are doing something when the principal walks in. LOL They help to ensure that everyone in the class is working, producing responses, and learning. We are not just calling on those with their hands raised. Student engagement strategies help to keep behaviors in the class to a minimum by providing a task for every student throughout the entire lesson. I hope that you found a few strategies you can put into place tomorrow in your classroom. And I am always looking for new ways of engagement with my students, so if you have a favorite please share it in the comments below.

Written by - Janessa Fletcher

At Education to the Core, we exist to help our teachers build a stronger classroom as they connect with our community to find trusted, state-of-the-art resources designed by teachers for teachers. We aspire to be the world's leading & most trusted community for educational resources for teachers. We improve the lives of every teacher and learner with the most comprehensive, reliable, and inclusive educational resources.

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13 Student Engagement Strategies That Work

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If our students are not actively engaged in their learning, how much are they actually learning? There are so many great student engagement strategies to keep your students on task throughout your entire lesson. #13 is always my go-to!

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Edutopia is a free source of information, inspiration, and practical strategies for learning and teaching in preK-12 education. We are published by the George Lucas Educational Foundation, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization.

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Student Centered World: Engaging Classroom Activities for Middle Schoolers

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Student Centered World: Engaging Classroom Activities for Middle Schoolers

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Great blog to read/listen to with some useful activities.

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Student-Centered World: A Student-Centered Learning Resource

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Click above to listen to this podcast episode. Below is the transcript for Student-Centered World Podcast Episode 55: "Engaging Classroom Activities for Middle Schoolers"

There are many engaging classroom activities for middle schoolers that can be used in school, at home, or at after-school activities. Developing engaging classroom activities for middle schoolers which are fun and interesting can help increase the flow of learning, which is always the goal in your lesson plans.

However, sometimes it is difficult with this "too cool for school" age group to find an activity or a fun game that they will engage with. It is hard to find the balance between too childish and too mature to get to that sweet spot that gets the students excited about participating each day. Developing engaging classroom activities for middle schoolers can be a challenge, but finding a fun way to excite your middle school students be it in small groups, whole class, a scavenger hunt, class discussions, or even a memory game can help challenge students to engage within the learning process in some of the best ways they don't even realize they're doing.

Engagement is so important during these years and grade level since it will influence whether or not they enjoy learning, their perception of school, and most likely whether or not they will continue to pursue further education. Finding effective ways and great ideas for engaging classroom activities for middle schoolers can play a big role in these things.
Don't forget to check out our feature on

Brain Breaks for Middle School, too!
What makes Engaging Classroom Activities for Middle Schoolers intriguing?

Developing engaging classroom activities for middle schoolers is finding a classroom activity that appeals to their interest and provides enough challenge for them to learn, but not so much that it becomes too difficult. Finding engaging classroom activities for middle schoolers is a balance of keeping them in a comfort zone that makes them okay with student participation while also giving them something new to grow into. They can be tangible things like classroom games or an interactive graphic organizer as well as experiences that are fun and exciting, but also educational.

It is important to not just look at these students too superficially. Although these older kids may dress differently and act differently than their younger counterparts, they need the same things- attention, care, help when needed, but mostly it is hearing about how much you care and want them to do well; because although engaging classroom activities for middle schoolers are important, stimulating their minds as well is equally as vital.

They're not high school students, so they still have that element of being younger kids and, as we know, can still be so much fun.

Initiating student engagement as the classroom teacher is the best thing when you know you have your students' attention and they're surprised when the end of a class period comes. Imagine finding a way to get them excited about a vocabulary word or current events by using a simple game, short video, or another outside-the-box way to encourage critical thinking. These types of activities can be found anywhere depending on the way you look at them and within your own passion. Your students are going to respond better if the topic interests them, so finding things that do just that will make your job easier, but no less important.
Materials/Resources Needed:
Here are some engaging classroom activities for middle schoolers that will get the students involved in education and participation while learning their ABCs:

ABC's of What? ABC's of Anything!

Poster Board, Chalkboard or whiteboard to project

Construction paper, markers, and glue to make construction letters

Black sharpie marker for free-hand writing, although templates could be added if you want. Either way is effective.

These Engaging Classroom Activities for Middle Schoolers can be utilized with any subject matter.

It is a great way to reinforce the alphabet before learning it with a more important subject matter. It also can be used as a show and tell activity. You basically give each kid/student something to talk about and then have them share their "ABCs of" with the class using the black sharpie marker for writing on the whiteboard. This is a very simple Engaging Classroom Activities for Middle Schoolers that will end up actually being used in the school hallways or classrooms.

Get the kids to write their ABCs on construction paper and then tape it to the wall around the classroom as they continue with "ABCs of" something else.

This can be added to the end of any lesson to reinforce what has been taught and for students that need extra practice or help.

This is a great way to get them excited about learning. They think they are being involved in something out of their ordinary, but in reality, they are just getting extra help and following simple directions.

There is no better feeling than seeing the light bulb go off in their heads. It's Awesome!

Let your students lead the way with Engaging Classroom Activities for Middle Schoolers and watch how they gain new confidence in their abilities to learn and then teach others what they know. They will be so proud of themselves that when you do return to more traditional teaching methods, they will have no problem following along. You can do this through a variety of ways with your Engaging Classroom Activities for Middle Schoolers.

Learning how to lead is an important skill that will help in almost every aspect of their life, from choosing friends and deciding what activities they want to engage in, as well as where they want to go or what career path they may want to take.

Through the activities you set for them, they will learn to take control of their learning, which can set them apart from everyone else and give them the skills necessary to do well and be happy in life.

Given that kids are more likely to follow directions when they understand why you have given them those directions, it is important that they know what it is that they are doing and how it is that you expect them to do it.

For this reason, many activities should have a variety of ways in which you can present them (and they can present them back to you) so that everyone in the class has an opportunity to get everything out of it that you are hoping they get. This is why student choice is so vital.

Creating their own questions and answers

Have them write their own questions and answers to tie Engaging Classroom Activities for Middle Schoolers into the curriculum or real-life situations that they can learn from, will help them figure out how things go together better than having it done for them every day. If you do choose this route though, make sure to have someone go over the questions at least one time so that they are answerable.

All throughout the day you are teaching your students. What they don't know is that these little lessons are building up inside of them and at an unconscious level they are soaking it all up like a sponge, and having them create questions based on content is a great way to see this in action.

You can also have them write out their own ideas about things that you have been covering so far or things that will be coming up in the near future and use those as a review source for a few minutes before moving on to something else. They can then keep them posted in their notebooks or in organized places within the classroom.

One idea that I have used in creating a tip sheet of different times of year that you can put up on the board for all to see. Maybe it's a tip for Valentine's Day, or a tip for the 4th of July, etc. It doesn't even have to be something that you are covering within the lesson plan.

If you can find a way to tie it into what you need to teach them at the moment, then that is even better! These small little tips can help the students to be better prepared and give them a sense of independence. It can even help with respect since you are letting them take on more responsibility for what they learn in your classroom.

Have them help on their homework and then have them teach it to a younger sibling who may be having trouble with the same concepts, or a parent who has no idea what it is they do all day in school. It will not only help them understand what they are doing better, but it will also help their younger sibling or parent to feel part of the process and less like "the one who has no idea what is going on".

Have students help with a project that they have done for school. For example, if you are a teacher, have your students make posters and charts about your lesson or their projects to display in the classroom. If you can have a collaborative relationship with a business professional, I suggest having the students create small posters to hang around the office that define vocabulary words used in meetings or that share strategies that are being discussed in class that could help.

Have them go online and take an assessment to see where they are in each subject, which can be a powerful source of motivation.

Ask the students to pick out some books that explain a certain topic or subject. Have them read the book(s) and then create flashcards for each chapter to review the information from each book.

Have students use YouTube videos, TED talks, and other online resources to get more in-depth on a topic you are studying.

There are so many possibilities that can utilize the time at home in a way that has them "learning by accident", reinforcing what is going on in the classroom but in a way that isn't monotonous.

Plan how many activities you plan to execute per day and week

It is important to plan for a number of engaging activities throughout the unit because chances are your students are going to be more engaged with a problem related to what they're studying. If you have an idea how to make the subject you're teaching that week more interesting, it will galvanize your students' learning.

A great example of this is having them cook or do gardening activities. The math involved in cooking and gardening oftentimes has a hidden meaning behind what they're doing which makes it easier for the student to see what they're doing and why it matters. Having these kinds of activities planned as often as possible will make sure your students have a better grasp of their subjects.

When you are planning, try using different methods to decide what kind of activities or projects you want to do. For example, how have you planned out which activities and subjects to cover? The first thing I do is divide the class into different categories of students and see if their interests coincide with what I want them to know.

If a student shows great interest in cooking or computers, for instance, I want to find a way, even if it's ever so slightly, to incorporate that into the class. By doing this, you are able to find more uses for your subjects and engage the students further.

The other thing that helps me figure out what projects and activities will keep my students engaged is when I divide them into groups based on how different their interests are. This way I can have them work on projects that cover a topic about which they're interested and more inclined to study.

The last thing I do is plan certain activities for certain days of the week or month. These activities will help me test my students how well they've been learning what they were supposed to do and will help me figure out if I need to go over things again.

Requiring students to show their progress and engagement with certain activities can be really hard for students. Instead of using test scores, try getting them to show their progress by writing about what they've learned. For example, telling your students that you'll be asking them to write journal entries based on certain projects or activities will make it easier for those who haven't been able to grasp how to do something in class.

I've found that the students who are struggling or feel like they aren't learning anything will find it easier to write about what they learned about and used in one of these projects or activities. This way, you can tell which students aren't grasping how to do something and then allow them to make up for it by doing the journal entry.

If a student isn't grasping the material because they're feeling discouraged, this will be a good way to ease their anxieties about school work.

Similarly, you can use this as a way to learn about which students are having trouble and then teach them more or spend extra time on that project or activity.

To make it easier for a student to write up this journal entry, I recommend sending home the directions ahead of time. This will allow them to know what they're supposed to go about doing and will make it easier for you when you grade them.

In addition, I recommend that you have the students do these journal entries based on a specific topic or project so that they can be graded the same way. This makes it easier to grade everything and see if they really learned what you wanted them to.

All students learn differently and having them show their progress in different ways is a great way to cater to their needs while also trying to figure out which methods of engagement work best for them. This will help them make progress in their schooling.

Fostering ALL the relationships

The last thing you can do to engage your students is trying to get them more involved with each other as well. Survey them about what they think of the subject you're covering or bring up something they learned from one of their favorite books or how to do something.

Wherever you go, there are bound to be people who have either learned or know someone who has learned the best way to learn something really easily. By finding out what they did while learning, you can use that as a way to let your students learn about something easily.

All you really need are a few decent listening skills to make sure that the student is explaining themselves clearly. Most of the time, these people will get excited about their ability to teach you what they've learned and you'll be able to see how you can apply what they did to your student.

This way, it will be easier for you to find a way to connect with your students on the subject matter that you're teaching them. They'll see that they are able to explain things in their own words and this will make it easier to understand what they're saying and therefore learn the material you're trying to get them to learn. All this is done through empowering the students to realize they can teach anyone, even you.

As a teacher, I've found that my students enjoy hearing other people talk about what they know. When I ask them if they want me or another student in their class to tell us how to do something - they always respond with a resounding yes!

It's also a good way to get them excited about learning something. If everyone in their classroom is engaged, they'll be more likely to participate in whatever activity you layout for them in the days ahead.

And of course, the best engaging classroom activities for middle schoolers include the 4 keys

There are four keys to student engagement that I discuss in my video training challenge that releases twice per year. It is called "Finding Your Student Engagement Formula" and it walks you through those four keys and how to implement them in the classroom. If you are interested in registering (it's totally free), visit the Finding Your Student Engagement Formula Challenge registration page and you will be notified the next time the series is available.

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6 Easy & Engaging Classroom Activities for Middle School Students

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There are many engaging classroom activities for middle schoolers that can be used in school, at home, or at after-school activities. Developing engaging classroom activities for middle schoolers which are fun and interesting can help increase the flow of learning, which is always the goal in your lesson plans.

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WOOP improves students’ effort, attendance, homework completion, and GPA.

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WOOP improves students’ effort, attendance, homework completion, and GPA.

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WOOP is a practical strategy that helps people imagine possibility and identify potential obstacles they need to overcome.

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Declare a Wish, then contrast the positive Outcome it would bring with the negative Obstacle that stands in its way. Create a Plan to get around the obstacle.

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Article with practical techniques to increase student independence in class.

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6 Strategies for Promoting Student Autonomy

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These techniques foster independence and show students how to help themselves—and their peers—understand and complete tasks.

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One of my favorite reflection lessons is the Reflect 'n' Sketch activity. When I began teaching, I only saw my students as readers and writers. I could see their struggles and successes within my subject alone. Then, after teaching tone and mood to a group of eighth graders, I asked students to draw a picture of the mood of a poem. Through this activity, I saw my struggling readers excel with beautiful artwork. I realized that my subject, English, is not the only skill to be had. Many of my students excelled in other areas, especially those who struggled in my class. This experience inspired my Reflect 'n' Sketch activity. This gives students the option to draw their reflections on a project or activity. Guiding questions guide their artwork, and students can still deliver deep reflections with a medium that inspires them.

5. Reflection Vlog

I tried this for the first time this past fall, and my students absolutely rave about the Reflection Vlog. I gave students the guiding questions found within the Reflect 'n' Sketch activity, and asked them to create a personal Vlog. After each major project or assessment, I asked students to add to their Vlog. Some students chose to upload their videos to YouTube, and others preferred the privacy of simply creating an iMovie or Windows Moviemaker video. With this medium of reflection, students were free to speak about their work, display their work, or add videos and pictures of the process of creating their work. Not only did students find this engaging, but they found that they were able speak freely about their learning. They have commented that they did not feel bound by words, grammar, structure, and organization within the reflection, so they felt that they were better able to express their truest feelings. I can attest to this as I watched their Vlog videos. They opened up more through this 'on camera' experience, than in any other reflection technique!

6. Analyze your work from the teacher's perspective.

When introducing a writing assignment, I would often provide exemplars, or mentor texts, and ask students to assess these using the rubric that would assess their own work. Not only did students better understand the rubric, they better understood the expectations for the writing. This inspired me to have students assess their own work in a similar manner. I ask students to assess their own work from my perspective. This can be via rubric or by simply providing feedback that they believe I would give. Once students get to know me, this feedback can be eerily correct! This helps students to see their work from a new perspective, and often will encourage students to make revisions before they submit their final work!

7. Scrapbook

I have asked my students to create a scrapbook reflection on larger projects; this is especially effective for group work. Students take pictures of the process of their work, students working in their group roles, and of their final project. Each group member can showcase their own pictures or drawings of the groups work. Then students can reflect on their roles within the group, the process of collaboration, their impact on the groups success/failures, and on the learning that was derived from the project's completion. Some students get very creative with this process, and truly enjoy this as much (or more) than the project itself!

8. The Cube of Reflection

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10 Unique and Creative Reflection Techniques & Lessons for the Secondary Student - TeachWriting.org

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As educators, we know how critical reflection is to the learning process. Getting students to reflect- deeply and meaningfully- is often one of the most challenging lessons we teach. I have found that both my middle school and high school students will often scoff at these reflection activities, pro

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42 Goal Setting Activities for Students and Kids

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42 Goal Setting Activities for Students and Kids

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Great site with games and awesome downloads

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Do you remember when you learned how to set goals?

If you have trouble answering that question, you're not alone! Most of us don't spend much time thinking about how we set goals.

In fact, many of us don't even think of goal setting as a skill; rather, it's just something we do without reflecting on it much.

However, goal setting is a practice that operates on a set of specific skills-and luckily, these skills are relatively easy to teach.

As with most skills, it's best to start teaching goal setting early. Although parents are perhaps the best source of skill-building and development for their children, it's vital to have some goal setting material in the school curriculum as well. Learning how to set goals in school and seeing goal setting modeled by peers and teachers is a great way to encourage effective goal setting in children.

This article will explore why goal setting is a great addition to the curriculum from elementary school all the way up to college, and how it can best be incorporated.

Before you continue, we thought you might like to download our three Goal Achievement Exercises for free. These detailed, science-based exercises will help you or your clients create actionable goals and master techniques to create lasting behavior change.

A Look at Goal Setting in Education

Setting goals is a vital practice that can benefit anyone with a dream or a vision for their future. Young people who are just starting out on the grand journey of life are at a particularly opportune time to start building their goal setting skills-not only will these skills serve them throughout their lives, but building them now will help them mold their future into one that they desire.

Parents can encourage goal setting in their children-and absolutely should do so-but the importance of this skill justifies its inclusion in our schools' curriculum. The world of education is an excellent place to introduce children to goal setting, lay the foundations for effective goal setting, and begin to practice setting and striving towards personally meaningful goals.

Why is Goal Setting Important for Youth?

Not only will a curriculum that includes instruction in setting goals teach kids the mechanics and techniques of goal setting, but it will also give them early wins and help them develop belief in themselves. Anyone who has worked with children will recognize the importance of self-belief and self-confidence for early life development.

Further, research backs up the effectiveness of goal setting, both for the children themselves and for schools and systems overall (O'Neill, 2000). When teachers practice good goal setting, the benefits for their students are two-fold:

1. The students see effective goal setting modeled, and

2. The school itself is likely to become more effective at facilitating learning.

How Do Children Benefit from Goal Setting?

Aside from helping them believe in themselves and setting them up for success in school, goal setting also benefits children and students in many ways, including:

1. Improving self-image

2. Increasing awareness of one's strengths

3. Increasing awareness of one's weaknesses

4. Providing an experience of success

5. Facilitating effective visualization

6. Clarifying the path ahead

7. Encouraging prioritization

8. Defining reality and separating it from wishful thinking

9. Building responsibility for one's self

10. Improving decision making (Goucher College Office of Student Engagement, n.d.)

These are generic benefits of goal setting that anyone who engages in smart goal setting and striving can attain, but a few of them can be particularly effective for children; for example, the benefits of goal setting for youth include:

Provides direction, which most youths are either seeking or trying to nail down.

Helps children clarify what is important to them and focus on it.

Facilitates more effective decision making through better self-knowledge, direction, and focus.

Allows children to take a more active role in building their own future.

Acts as a powerful motivator by giving children something to hope for and aspire towards.

Gives children a positive experience of achievement and personal satisfaction when they reach a goal.

Assists children in finding a sense of purpose in their lives (The Peak Performance Center, n.d.).

Using Goal Setting Effectively with Kids and Teens: A Look at the Research

According to Education World, there are six key secrets to successful goal setting that you can communicate to your students:

1. Write clear and measurable goals.

2. Create a specific action plan for each goal.

3. Read your goals daily and visualize yourself accomplishing them.

4. Reflect on your progress to see if you are on target.

5. Revise your action plans if needed.

6. Celebrate your accomplishments.

The research on this topic provides some extra tips and tricks for maximizing the effectiveness of goal setting curricula:

Set upper and lower limits on students' goals to teach realistic goal setting (they can always be removed later).

Use games to teach goal setting in a context with low pressure and high engagement.

Hold one-on-one goal-setting conferences with students to give them individual attention and help them learn to assess goal difficulty (Schunk, 1990).

Encourage students to write down their goals rather than simply creating them and leaving them floating around their mind (Matthews, 2015).

Make extensive use of models (teachers and/or peers) in the classroom to show students how it works.

Teach effective goal setting strategies (like setting SMART goals) to increase the likelihood of success and provide feedback on student progress.

Provide direct instruction on goal setting and include instruction on self-evaluation.

Provide instruction on effective learning strategies in general, as students will need these broader skills to build their goal-setting abilities (Schunk, 2003).

How to Best Teach Goal Setting to Students

If you're looking for some concrete examples of the best ways to teach your students' goal setting, you've come to the right place. Read on for lesson plans, exercises, activities, and examples.

Examples of Goal Setting for Teachers

The Children's Center for Psychiatry, Psychology, and Related Services provide five great examples-one per each aspect of the SMART goal setting method -that teachers can use to teach their students about setting SMART goals:

A Lesson Plan for Teachers

There are tons of lesson plans available to help teachers incorporate goal-setting into their curriculum. Here is a popular and widely-used lesson plan outlined below.

Growth Mindset Goal Setting Lesson Plan

This lesson plan from Mindset Works is intended to meet one important objective: Students will (learn how to) set growth mindset learning goals.

The objective will be met through guiding students as they:

You'll need the following materials to implement this lesson plan:

Goal Setting Template (found here)

Assignment list(s) with scores

Recent rubrics (holistic or analytic) that have feedback from a teacher

Recent reports from benchmark tests

Examples of their own work that the student has produced over time

The lesson plan outlines three mini-lessons, each with their own activity:

1. Mini-Lesson 1: Setting a Goal
Activity 1: Goal Setting

2. Mini-Lesson 2: Creating an Action Plan
Activity 2: Action Planning

3. Mini-Lesson 3: Reflection on Progress
Activity 3: Reflecting

Click here to see this lesson plan and download it for your use in your classroom.

4 Goal Setting Worksheets and Templates (PDF)

Templates and worksheets are a must-have for teachers going over goal setting in the classroom. Use the four listed below to help your students learn about and practice effective goal setting.

1. Goal Execution Plan

The Goal Execution Plan template is an excellent resource for older students due to the considerations it includes and the level of detail.

It includes space for up to three goals, with six steps per goal, and provides the following columns for each step:

Goals and Action Steps

Date Start

Responsible (who is responsible for it)

Starting Metrics (metrics measure goal progress-this is the starting point for these measures)

Budget (if any)

Notes

Final Metrics (endpoint for the measures of goal progress)

Date End

You may not need all of these columns, but it's helpful to have prompts to think deeply about each goal. You can find the template here.

2. Student Goal Setting Worksheet

This worksheet is quick and simple, making it a great choice for young children.

The Student Goal Setting Worksheet has space for the student's name and the current date, then poses these five prompts:

1. I am good at...

2. I am bad at...

3. What I will improve?

4. How will I make these improvements?

5. If my plan doesn't work, what will I do?

Working through this activity will help them start thinking about what goal setting is as well as what direction they'd like to go with their goals.

You will likely need to walk your students through these prompts, so be prepared to provide assistance as needed. You can find the worksheet here.

3. Simple Goal Setting Worksheet

This is another simple worksheet-as the name implies-that can be used with younger or older students to help them figure out the basics of setting and working towards their goals.

The worksheet provides space for students to answer the following prompts:

If you use this worksheet with younger students, you might need to help guide them through it or provide examples, but older students should have no trouble completing it on their own.

You can find the worksheet at this link.

4. SMART Goal Setting Worksheet

If you want to focus your students on setting SMART goals, this worksheet is a great choice. It's a bit more involved than the previous worksheets, making it more suitable for high school students than younger students.

Here's the gist of the worksheet:

1. What is the goal?

2. Why is the goal important?

3. SMART goal checklist:

1. S - Specific - Is the goal clearly written, with no ambivalence? Is it clear who needs to accomplish the goal, and any support they might expect?

2. M - Measurable - Does the goal answer the questions of how many, how much, and/or how often?

3. A - Achievable - Can you get the support needed to achieve the goal by the target date? Do you have all the resources needed to achieve the goal? Are the results expected realistic?

4. R - Relevant - Does the goal make a difference in your career? Is it going to make an improvement in your personal life? Is it going to significantly make a difference to your business/academic career?

5. T - Time-Bound - Does the goal state a clear and specific completion date?

4. List potential problems that might keep you from completing your goal.

5. Goal Completion Date.

At the bottom of the worksheet, there is space to list up to 7 action items and determine when they need to be completed by.

Click here to see this worksheet and download it for your classroom.

2 PPTs to use in the Classroom

If you want some ready-made positive psychology PowerPoint presentations (PPTs) that you can use in your classroom or as templates for putting your own unique spin on goal setting, these slideshows are a good place to start:

A Look at Goal Setting in Elementary and Middle School

Goal setting is a bit trickier in elementary and middle school than in high school. Younger children generally need a bit more guidance and supervision when setting and striving towards goals, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't give it a shot!

Use the games, worksheets, and activities below to teach goal setting to your elementary and middle school students.

5 Games and Worksheets for Elementary Students (PDF)

1. Pressure Cooker

This game is a great way to get your elementary students to use their critical thinking skills.

It was designed to:

It takes only 15 to 20 minutes to play, keeping it within the attention span of the average elementary school student. You can have up to seven players.

Here's what you'll need to play:

A long rope (around 7 meters)

One numbered spot marker per player

A stopwatch

Here's how the game works:

In advance, lay a long rope on the floor/ground to form a large circle.

Collect and number as many spot markers as you have people in your group.

Randomly distribute the numbered spot markers inside the circle.

Ask each person to stand on top of one of the spot markers.

When ready, instruct each individual to move to and touch every other spot in the ascending order of the numbers.

For example, the person standing on spot #8 will move to 9, 10, 11 and 12 (presuming there are 12 people in the group,) before moving

to 1, 2, 3 through to 8.

As soon as an individual has touched all of the spot-markers and returns to their own, they will exit the circle.

Challenge your group to perform this task as accurately and as fast as possible.

Furthermore, challenge your group to solve this problem without stepping outside of the (roped) circle or touching any other person in the process (touching elsewhere within the circle is permitted.)

Encourage your group to make as many attempts as possible within a specified time period, aiming to improve their performance with each attempt.

Allow ample time for planning and problem-solving.

Click here to download the activity sheet and see popular variations on the game.

2. Cat on Yer Head

This silly game was designed to work with crowds and can accommodate medium to large groups.

The benefits of this game include:

It only takes 2 to 5 minutes to play, making it an excellent warm-up game. All you'll need to play is some balloons and a stopwatch to keep track of time.

To play the game, follow these instructions:

1. Choose or invite two volunteers seated in opposing corners of the room.

2. Nominate one of these people to be the Cat, and the other person to be the Mouse.

3. Announce that the Cat and the Mouse will soon move positions very quickly.

4. To help identify where the Cat (or Mouse) is at any time, they must say the word "CAT" (or "MOUSE") loudly over and over.

5. The Cat and Mouse move whenever the person with it taps any person close to them on the shoulder.

6. Practice this calling and tapping movement for 5 to 10 seconds to gauge understanding.

7. Remind your group that both the Cat and the Mouse can be moved around the audience in any direction, at any time.

8. Announce that the Cat has 30 seconds to catch (tag) the person with the Mouse.

9. When ready, call "GO."

10. If the Cat catches the Mouse before the time expires, the Cat wins.

11. If the Mouse survives for 30 seconds, the Mouse wins.

12. Play several rounds and/or try a variation.

If you'd like to give this game a shot with your students, click here for the full game description and more information.

3. Longest Shadow

This is a quick problem-solving game that requires nothing but the sun! It's good for up to 7 players and only takes 5 to 10 minutes to play.

Why would you choose the Longest Shadow?

1. It's simple to set up.

2. It inspires creativity.

3. It fosters collaboration.

4. It requires no props!

Here's how the game works:

1. Invite your group outside on a bright, sunny day within a wide open space.

2. Challenge your group to work together to position themselves in a manner that casts the longest shadow possible.

3. Each group starts with their shadow touching a common starting line.

4. To heighten the challenge and govern fair-play:

1. The shadow must be one continuous line (i.e., all shadows must be connected); and

2. Only bodies may be used to cast a shadow (i.e., no clothing or other props).

5. Allow the group to have as many attempts as possible within 10 minutes.

6. Measure and record the longest shadow.

To see the full game description and learn about popular variations of this game, click here.

4. Paper Holding

This fun and easy game is great for small groups and facilitates team-building.

You might want to try this game if you're looking for something that:

1. Is an innovative challenge.

2. Fosters cooperation.

3. Inspires creativity.

4. Is very playful and fun!

It takes only 5 to 10 minutes to play and all you need is some paper.

Follow these steps to play the Paper Holding game:

1. Form into teams of three to five people.

2. By way of demonstration, ask two people from a team to volunteer and hold one sheet of paper between the palms of one of their hands.

3. Each team is challenged to assist two of their group members to hold as many pieces of paper
off the ground by using only their bodies.

4. To guide fair play, announce that:

1. Only one sheet of paper can be affixed between any two body parts.

2. No adhesives can be used to hold paper to one's body.

3. Folding the paper is not permitted.

4. Each sheet of paper must be in contact with both team members.

5. No two sheets of paper can be touching.

5. Distribute sheets of paper to each team, and announce "GO."

6. Allow up to 10 minutes and survey the results.

If you want to play this game with your students, you can find more information by clicking here.

Click here to see more games you can use to help students learn about and practice goal setting and goal striving.

5. My Goals Worksheet

It's not as fun as the games described above, but this worksheet is a great way for your students to practice identifying and planning for their goals.

It only requires them to set two goals and gives them ample room to write them down (although they may need your help with this).

After they have identified two goals, they answer the following prompts for each of them:

This goal is important because...

Steps I'll take to reach this goal are...

It's simple, easy, and won't take more than 10 minutes or so, making it an excellent addition to the goal-setting curriculum either before or after one of the games above.

You can find the worksheet here.

8 Goal Setting Activities for Middle School Students (Incl. Worksheets)

If you're a teacher of middle schoolers (or anyone else that interacts with several middle schoolers on a regular basis), these activities and worksheets will provide you with plenty of options for adding goal-setting into the curriculum.

1. Make a Family Bucket List

Making a bucket list is a great way to set goals, and this activity involves the whole family in the goal-setting practice. It's a great way to both model goal setting and encourage your children to practice it themselves, all at once.

Here's how to do it:

Get your family together and collect a piece of paper and some markers.

As a family, brainstorm a list of accomplishments, experiences, or achievement goals that you want to work towards as a family over the next year.

At the end of the year, look back over your list and see what you've accomplished. Celebrate the goals you accomplished as a family.

Encourage your children to use online tools like Trello or Evernote to help create this bucket list and/or to create one for themselves.

2. Draw a Wheel of Fortune

The wheel of fortune is a fun way to introduce goal setting in different areas of life. It will show your children that you don't need to keep your goals limited to school or work, you can set goals in all life domains.

Follow these steps to create and use a wheel of fortune:

1. Draw a circle and divide it into even segments (like you're cutting a pizza into slices).

2. On each segment, write one of the important life domains; for example, you might write "Family," "Friends," "School/Work," "Hobbies," "Health," and "Fun."

3. For each domain, have your child write out the goals she would like to accomplish. Make sure she keeps the goals to a specific timeline (e.g., a month, 3 months, a year).

Make sure to help her keep track of her progress throughout the timeline you chose.

3. Create a Vision Board

Vision boards are a great way to plan out your goals, especially the big ones that are especially meaningful to you. Helping your children or students create a vision board will challenge them, get them thinking about what is most important to them, and encourage them to stay motivated in striving towards their goals.

Here's how to create an effective vision board:

Gather some old magazines (you can also draw pictures, use newspapers, print out some pictures, etc.) and have your students cut out some pictures that represent their hopes and dreams for the future.

Help your students arrange the pictures on a piece of cardboard and use glue to secure them in place. You can also provide glitter, stickers, ribbons, markers, and anything else they might like to decorate their vision board with.

Ask your students to describe what each picture represents and how he or she plans to work toward that goal. If your class is too large or you have some shy students, ask them to write it down instead of sharing it out to the group.

Send them home with their vision board or hang it somewhere in the classroom if there's space for all of them.

4. Play 3 Stars and a Wish

This is a fun and easy game that you can play with your students or your children to help them start thinking about their goals.

It's a simple activity with simple rules:

1. Ask your students or children to come up with three "stars," or things that they do well. The sky is the limit for this activity-the thing they're good at can be anything from a subject in school to a quality that makes him or her a good friend.

2. Now that they have their three stars, tell them to come up with a "wish" to complement their stars; the wish should be something that the children need to work on or would like to get better at. Again, they are only limited by their imagination. They can pick any goal, as long as it is meaningful and important to them.

This activity will not only help them come up with important goals, but it will also help them develop the self-belief they need to succeed.

5. Ask Fun Questions

Asking questions is a great way to get your children or students thinking about what is important to them, what they'd like to achieve or accomplish, and how they can get there.

There are tons of fun questions out there, but here are a couple of examples to get you started:

Ask your students "What would you do if you won the lottery?" or "If you had a superpower, how would you use it?"

Listen to their answers and encourage them to be detailed.

Discuss how they can take their fate into their own hands by making a plan to achieve the hopes, goals, and dreams they identified in their answers.

Continue the discussion as often as you can to make sure they are still thinking about their long-term goals and actively planning ways to reach them.

6. Interest Maps

Interest maps are best for older students, so you may want to save this for upper middle school or junior high students.

Here's how to help your children or students create an interest map:

1. Ask your students to think about what they like to do. Do they like art? Science? Writing? Sports? Have them think about all of their interests and favorite things to do, and write them down.

2. Help them look through their list of interests and see if they can find any patterns; for example, maybe most of their interests involve helping other people or being outside.

3. Have them create an interest map by creating a web of circles and filling them in with their interests in a way that makes sense (e.g., similar interests by one another).

4. Based on their interest map, assist them in creating goals that are relevant and meaningful to them.

This activity will help your students learn more about themselves, which is a vital prerequisite to setting good goals.

7. New Year Reflections and Resolutions

Middle-school-age children will likely have a grasp of the ritual that is setting New Year's resolutions. They will also be at an age where they are demonstrating more agency and preferences in regards to their studies and extracurricular activities.

Making a ritual out of setting New Year's resolutions not only serves as a great opportunity to set goals, but it provides an opportunity to encourage children to reflect on the challenges and triumphs of the previous year, fostering gratitude and a sense of accomplishment.

To facilitate this activity, ask your child to reflect on some of the following questions:

What are you most proud of having achieved in the past year?

What do you think you could have done better in the past year?

What's something you felt particularly passionate about in the past year?

What new goal would you like to accomplish in the new year?

What's a behavior you'd like to stop in the new year?

What's a behavior you'd like to start doing in the new year?

What's something new you'd like to try in the new year?

This is a great exercise to do together as a family. This way, you as the adult can also describe your reflections and set new goals in your personal or professional life. This will allow you to set an example for your kids, who may wish to set goals regarding their schooling, sports, or other extracurricular activities.

For a range of useful worksheets to help your child set goals for the new year, take a look at the templates available at Charts4Kids.com.

8. My Goals Worksheet

This worksheet is an effective tool for encouraging children to think more about their goals and plan on how to meet them.

At the top of the worksheet, there is a box for them to identify their goal and a box to note the target date for completion of their goal.

Next, they are asked to identify three actions that will allow them to reach their goal. These should be relevant and realistic actions that will lead them to completing their goal by their target date.

At the bottom, there is space to explain how they will know they've reached their goal (e.g., what will it look like when they achieve their goal, what the outcome will be). Plus, they are prompted to come up with two things that will help them stick to working towards their goal (e.g., an encouraging friend, a motivating thought).

To see this worksheet or download it for use in your classroom, click here.

Goal Setting for High School Students

At the high school level, goal setting gets a bit easier to teach, but not necessarily easier to learn and implement for the students! High school brings with it all kinds of distractions that can make setting good goals a challenge.

5 Activities and Worksheets for High School Students (PDF)

Use the activities and worksheets described below to help your older students navigate effective goal setting.

1. Smarties Warm-Up Activity

You can use this activity to get students warmed up and ready to think about goal setting. All you'll need is two rolls of Smarties candies (or a similar round, stackable candy) per student and 5 minutes.

The students' task is to stack as many Smarties as they can in one vertical column in one minute-but they can only use one hand. Before they begin, have them set a goal for themselves by estimating the number of Smarties they think they'll be able to stack.

Start the timer and have the students start stacking! Once the timer hits one minute, instruct your students to stop stacking and count up their candy.

Next, you'll guide them through the scoring guidelines:

The Smarties must be standing 5 seconds after the time ends to count.

If the goal is NOT reached, each candy stacked is worth 5 points.

If the goal IS reached, each candy stacked is worth 10 points up to the goal, and 5 points for each additional candy stacked over the goal.

For example, say a student sets a goal of 15 Smarties stacked.

If the student stacked 10 Smarties, they would score 5 points per candy for a total of 50 points.

If the student stacked 15 Smarties, they would score 10 points per candy for a total of 150 points.

If the student stacked 18 Smarties, they would score 10 points per candy up to 15 (150 points) and 5 points per candy up to 18 (15 points) for a total of 165 points.

Have the students calculate their score then determine who stacked the most candies and who had the highest score-due to the scoring, this may not be the same person. Discuss any unusual approaches students used, if any.

See more activities and a full lesson plan on setting goals with high schoolers here.

2. Action for Goals Worksheet

This worksheet is a great reminder for students that setting goals on its own won't get you anywhere-you need to set mini goals and identify action steps on the way to your larger goal.

The worksheet provides an example of a larger goal and the mini goals and action steps that will lead to it:

Overall Goal: I will learn to play a musical instrument proficiently in 5 years.

1. I will determine which instrument I would like to play.

2. I will find a tutor/teacher and begin taking lessons weekly.

3. I will practice daily for 60 minutes.

Using this as a template, students are given the space to write down four goals and come up with 3 mini goals or action steps per goal and provided with these instructions: " In each box below, state a goal that is important to you and then identify the mini goals/action statements needed."

Completing this worksheet will help your students get in the right frame of mind for goal setting and goal striving, and keep them cognizant of the effort required to actually meet their goals after setting them.

You can find this worksheet at this link.

3. My Goals Worksheet

The My Goals worksheet is a good way to help your students figure out what their goals are and refine them into ones that are relevant, meaningful, and motivating.

Here's how it works:

There are 4 boxes on the worksheet:

Healthy Living

Finance

Friendships

Work or School

These boxes surround one oval marked "Me."

Students are instructed to "Describe your needs in each of the following categories below; from those needs, determine what good goal statements would be. In the middle box, describe yourself."

Good goal setting requires healthy reflection and an understanding of who we are and what we want, which this activity is sure to help your students build upon.

View, download, or print the My Goals worksheet by clicking here.

4. Rate Yourself Worksheet

Another great activity to try before setting goals is to rate yourself on your need for goal setting in each life domain-in other words, to determine how much you are in need of improvement in each area.

This worksheet provides you with an easy way to get your students to rate themselves in 12 different life domains. The instructions at the top state:

" Before setting goals for yourself, determine where the need is by completing the scale below. Once completed, prioritize them from greatest to least need."

The scale given to students for their use in rating is as follows:

1. Very Dissatisfied

2. Somewhat Dissatisfied

3. Neither Satisfied nor Dissatisfied

4. Somewhat Satisfied

5. Very Satisfied

The 12 domains listed for students to rate their need are:

1. Money

2. Family Relationships

3. Friends and Relationships

4. Fitness

5. Diet

6. Career or School

7. Social Life

8. Spirituality

9. Sense of Belonging

10. Hobbies / Sports

11. Knowledge

12. Other

To use this worksheet with your high schoolers, follow this link.

5. Goal Setting: Learning from the Past

It's also important to think about your past goals and taking inventory of what went well, what didn't, and any other lessons learned. This worksheet can guide your students through that process.

It opens with an explanation of why it's an important practice:

"Before setting new goals, it's important to look back to previous goals you have set and learn from them. Analyze why you reached those goals or why you didn't reach those goals."

Next, the worksheet presents several questions and prompts to help the user think it through:

Be ready to help your students with useful prompts or examples in case they need help, and discuss their answers with them after they've completed the activity.

Click here to see this worksheet.

Goal Setting for College Students

By the time students reach college, they are generally at least somewhat familiar with goal setting techniques and have a minimum level of competence in setting effective goals; however, that doesn't mean they have no work left to do!

Goal setting and striving are made up of a set of skills that can be increased and enhanced throughout life-there is no maximum level of skill one can have in setting good goals.

9 Activities and Games for College Students

The activities and games described here can help you give your college students the push they need to further develop their goal-setting skills.

Goal Setting for the First-Time College Student

This is a great activity for new college students, as it shows them the importance of setting good goals and planning to achieve them.

Here's how to get your new students thinking critically about their goals:

1. Ask them to answer the questions in this activity as profoundly and honestly as they can.

2. Instruct them to think of at least categories of life goals:

1. Relationships with other people (family, friends, work relationships)

2. Work or career goals

3. Other personal achievement activity goals (hobbies, travel, athletics, etc.)

3. Have them take a few moments to visualize what their life would be like if it was perfect.

4. Hand out six 3 x 5 index cards to each student and have them number them 1 through 6.

5. Allow one minute for Part 1:
On the first card, have your students answer this prompt: "How do you want to spend the rest of your life? Make a list of activities and goals for the rest of your life."

6. Allow one minute for Part 2:
On the second card, have them answer this prompt: "What do you want to do the next 5 to 10 years? Again, list activities and goals."

7. Allow one minute for Part 3:
On the third card, have them answer this prompt: "If you had six months to live, how would you spend it? List activities and goals."

8. Allow one minute for Part 4:
Have them go over the first three cards and add or delete any item that has come to mind since the beginning of the exercise.

9. Allow one minute for Part 5:
Card 4, line 1: Have your students select the goal or activity from card one that they most desire to achieve and write it there.

10. Allow one minute for Part 6:
Card 4, line 2: Have your students select the goal or activity from card two that they most desire to achieve and write it there.

11. Allow one minute for Part 7:
Card 4, line 3: Have your students select the goal or activity from card three that they most desire to achieve and write it there.

12. Allow three minutes for Part 8:
On card 6, have your students write as many things as they could do in the next 7 days to further the goals they wrote down on card 4. This part isn't about feasibility, but creativity and comprehensiveness, so tell them not to worry about how possible or likely these things are yet.

13. Allow one minute for Part 9:
Instruct your students to scratch out any item on card 5 that they don't actually intend to do or think they can't do.

14. Allow one minute for Part 10:
Have your students choose three items from card 5 that they will do in the next 7 days and write them down on card 6.

To further the goal-setting practice, you can share the worksheet at the end of this activity with your students.

It poses 8 prompts for students to answer:

1. My long-range goals to complete in the next 2-3 years are:

2. Steps I need to take to achieve these (long-range) goals are:

3. My mid-range goals to complete in the next 1 year are:

4. Steps I need to take to achieve these (mid-range) goals are:

5. My short-range goals to complete by the first day of the semester are:

6. Steps I need to take to achieve these (short-range) goals are:

7. My immediate goals for the next month are:

8. Steps I need to take to achieve these (immediate) goals are:

To see this activity and the worksheet attached to it, click here.

8 Activities to Think About Goal Setting

This list of activities to help students think about goal setting comes from the Supporting Transition and Education through Planning and Partnerships (STEPP) Program, a program designed to help students with learning disabilities succeed in college. It's not just helpful for students with learning disabilities though-the activities can be helpful for anyone who wants to improve their goal setting skills.

The activities include:

1. Thinking About You - What qualities do you like most about yourself? What qualities would you like to improve?

2. Thinking About Others - What qualities do you admire in others (i.e., qualities you see in specific people, and/or those you admire in general)?

3. Values - Identify your top 5 values. What is most important to you? Why?

4. Strengths vs. Weaknesses - What are you good at? What is difficult for you?

5. Likes vs. Dislikes - Identify things you strongly like and dislike (e.g., places, activities, classes, foods, events, people, etc.). Why do you like/dislike these?

6. Super-You - Imagine you are a superhero? What would your superpower be? What would your "kryptonite" (vulnerability) be?

7. Back to the Future - Picture yourself 5 years from today and consider where you would like to be, who you would like to be with, and what you would like to be doing. Then ask the same questions for 10, 20, and even 50 years down the road.

8. Pushing Up Daisies - Imagine that you have passed away at the age of 100, and someone close to you is about to give the eulogy at your memorial service. What do you most want them to say about you?

These 8 activities will give your students a great head start on thinking about their goals and how they plan to reach them.

Click here to see these 8 activities and other helpful tips and tricks on goal setting for college students.

Recommended Books on the Topic

To learn more about goal setting for children and students, check out these six popular books on the subject:

My Happy Place: A Children's Self-Reflection and Personal Growth Journal with Creative Exercises, Fun Activities, Inspirational Quotes, Gratitude, Dreaming, Goal Setting, Coloring In, and Much More - Sheleen Lepar and Helene Pam (Amazon)

Future Lady Boss: Goal Setting Journal - Suzie Luv (Amazon)

Student Achievement Goal Setting: Using Data to Improve Teaching and Learning - Leslie Grant and James Stronge (Amazon)

Every Kid's Guide to Goals: How to Choose, Set, and Achieve Goals That Matter to You - Karleen Tauszik (Amazon)

Levi's Great & Wonderful Life: A Child's Story About Overcoming Fears, Setting Goals, & Achieving Success Through Visualization - Brandon Vannoy (Amazon)

My Simple Book of Goals: Goal-Setting Journal for Youth - Alicia Hadley (Amazon)

Then we have an additional article where we take an in-depth look at the best goal-setting books.

3 Recommended Videos

If you don't have time to read a full book at the moment but want a little more knowledge about goal setting for children, give these four videos a try:

Setting Goals - McMasterUTV

CashVille Kidz Episode 11: Goal & Goal Setting - CashVilleKidz

Goal Setting Growth Mindset - Michelle Turner

A Take-Home Message

In this piece, we described goal setting for children, explained why it's important, and provided some resources to help you teach your children or students about goal setting.

I hope you found this piece helpful and that you have some ideas about how to encourage successful goal setting and striving in your children or students.

What are your thoughts on goal setting for children? Does it need to be approached in a different way than goal setting for adults? How do you think it's best to get started? Let us know in the comments section!

Thanks for reading, and happy goal setting!

We hope you enjoyed reading this article. Don't forget to download our three Goal Achievement Exercises for free.

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42 Goal Setting Activities for Students & Kids (+ PDF)

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Learning how to set goals in school and role model the right behaviors that can encourage effective goal setting by students and kids.

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Social & Emotional Learning (SEL)

When middle and high school students set short- and long-term goals, they can see a path to the success they hope for.

"If we did all the things we are capable of, we would literally astound ourselves."
-Thomas Edison

I learned that quote from Wendy Beth Rosen's Self-Smart. Taking it seriously, Wendy suggests some areas where students'-and adults'-self-assessments can lead to greater accomplishments and personal satisfaction. Many distractions and challenges in our lives threaten to throw us off our path, or keep us from knowing what our path is. Setting explicit goals for success and tracking our progress toward them is a way to increase our chances of finding the success we hope for.

I'd like to share a method of goal-tracking that can be used by students and educators in ongoing ways, as well as at specific points when they're experiencing uncertainty or setbacks. These also have value for promoting positive mental health in school.

Setting and Tracking Goals

1. Academics

2. Social life

3. Sports and exercise

4. Healthy eating

5. Family and community

6. Hobbies and interests

7. Screen time

8. Long-term plans

Middle and high school are particularly important times for students to become consciously aware of and intentional about key choices: what they're putting into their bodies; how the way they are spending their time helps them reach their larger purposes; who they're spending their time with; and what they're doing to contribute to their families, schools, and communities.

At the beginning of the school year and at each marking period, students in middle and high school should record in a journal their goals in these eight areas:

In working with middle school students, for example, I have seen them set goals ranging from "eating better food at lunch" to "being a great guitar player" to "being an NBA star." In all cases, we want to help students be clear about their goals (in the first case, "to be a healthy person") and to set realistic short-term goals on the way to their long-term goal (for the guitar and basketball players, finding time for regular practice with feedback). For these students, and all students, goals provide anchors, especially valuable in high winds and rough seas.

All of the eight areas of life above matter, and academic success is related to all of them. Having a way to separate them, document progress, and create priorities is important. Students need help to be successful even when they have positive aspirations. A sure way to not succeed is trying to make progress in too many areas at once, so help students find one, two, or three areas to prioritize for a marking period. Revisit these priorities with them and see if follow-up goals need to be set in these areas or if new areas should be prioritized. Keeping to no more than three at a time is vital, because even if we might need to change in eight areas, we can't track that many. Slow and steady wins the race.

Tracking also helps ensure that a given area is not neglected. When we see that things might have been neglected, we can make some adjustments.

The main point of setting goals is to help students take realistic steps to achieve them. Many educators find that using the SMART format -goals that are specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and timely-is practical and reasonable, and keeps students on track.

When Can This Happen?

This kind of journaling is ideally suited to advisory or extended home room periods. Advisory periods are supposed to focus on the whole child, and the eight areas provide broad coverage. Journaling also fosters communication between advisory teachers and those who focus on these areas in schools, including subject area teachers, "specials" teachers (including health and physical education teachers), and staff running extracurricular activities. In addition, the advisory period can be used for pair and group problem-solving to help overcome obstacles students face as they pursue their goals.

One way to help students achieve their goals is to pair them up to help one another with goal-setting and monitoring. Students see each other in various school contexts and can be helpful outside of formal class time.

Having communal, whole-class conversations about goal-setting creates a new mindset in students and fosters cooperation and mutual improvement because students' goals are not solely their responsibility. We all get better when each of us gets better. So there is an expectation that goals set will be shared-perhaps with classmates and certainly with other teachers. (This expectation of sharing should ensure that personal goals related to family issues stay out of these conversations, as they require more professional and confidential follow-up.)

A helpful way to introduce the journaling is to ask students to reflect on the opening quote from Edison, taking a position as to whether they agree, disagree, or are not sure about it, and why. Have students share their rationales in small groups and then share out with the larger class. Ensuring that students understand they have more potential than most of them realize is a critical preliminary step to making goal journaling an authentic activity for them.

The Same Goals Are Useful for Adults

This activity is also relevant for adults. Educators have a lot on their plates, and having a way to make sure that one's learning, family, health habits, interests, and long-term plans are front of mind (even if not always front of action) keeps us grounded.

Devoting regular time in professional learning communities and faculty meetings to discussing goal-achieving strategies can provide a power morale boost in schools. In particular, discussing long-term plans can stimulate broad faculty collaboration to shape the school. And sharing with students that you're doing the same thing you ask them to do makes it more likely that they'll value the activity.

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When middle and high school students set short- and long-term goals, they can see a path to the success they hope for.