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I use a ball for each of my students to introduce themselves. We form a circle. I give the ball to one of my students, who first says their name and throws it to someone else. After everyone does this, the second presentation is with a different introduction. This way, they get to know each other.

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At the beginning of the school year, I like to do all sorts of ice breaking activities, even if they were my students in the past years as well. What I like to do is to use the picture of a jar and ask them to tell me a positive thought/idea starting with the first letter of their name. Or, I like to use the Two truths and a lie game in which they  write down three sentences with information about themselves and one, however, must be a lie. Other students then ask them follow-up questions to discover which statement was a lie.

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At the beginning of the year, when I get a new class, we first introduce ourselves to each other, for example

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At the beginning of each school year I have some icebreaking activities with newcommers to get to know each other.
Another occasion for exploring language diversities is celebrating International Day of Languages when I start preparing activities for organizing event in my school, We explore how many different languages we can speak or write a message in the classroom and the students come up with different languages they speak either because some of their ancestors are from different nationality or because they succeeded to learn some phrases and expresions by watching different TV programmes.

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I start with a read aloud of "The Name Jar"; this book is a great way to introduce everyone and their languages in the class

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,,Bingo`` to know each other, or ,,Cross the river``. These are 2 activities to find out information about each of us.

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I use to propose to my students, generally, ice-breaking activities, activitie in small or large groups to "meet" each other. I they have a good knowledge of the foreign language, they can "teach" other students, how to use language to express themselves.

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At the beginning of the year, when I get a new class, we first introduce ourselves to each other, for example: I am Daniela, I am a history teacher. I love hiking and walking in nature, traveling and meeting new places and people. It is the task of each student to present himself in a similar way, stating what he likes to do or what he would like to do in life, what makes him happy. Since these are students who live in a homogeneous environment, a specific dialect, I try not to correct them, but to allow them to express themselves freely, even though they know that we speak the standard Croatian language at school.

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First of all i am introducing myself and i encourage my students to introduce theirselves , telling about their interests, hbbies or they have to say something about them using the first letter of their name.

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At the beginning of a school year, I try to create a friendly, pleasant environment so that all students feel comfortable. First I let them know me, I ask myself various questions, curiosities, we play games with a character of self-knowledge and mutual knowledge.

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I form a circle with my students and every morning we say something to each other in different languages. Each student prepares in a language of their choice.

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The activities depend on the students' level, if they are in primary or secondary level. If I work with primary students I use balls or characters to introduce myself and then pass it to them. If they are in secondary maybe I use the Snowball Game or the self-portrait.

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One of the activities we are doing at school is to ask all the students that are not from Portugal to write on their own language this phrase "I am welcome in my new school". We have students from 23 countries.

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One activity I like to do in order to get to know them is the following:
Each student writes three facts about their lives, but one has to be false. They move around the classroom and share this information with their classmates. The aim is to guess which fact is not true about themselves.

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Maybe there is another name for this activity in different sources but I like to call it like this. I believe that at school the most wondered thing at school is the mystery of the teachers' life. Students want to know more about their teachers. Where the teacher lives, what the teacher likes, what kind of music the teacher listens to and so on. After the first lesson of each course I check the searches with my name-surname on academia and I see nearly 10 searches. This shows that students want to learn about their teachers and they ask very clever questions during the activity. And it becomes a genuine conversation.
Guidelines:
- Write some info about yourself on the board such as your birthday, your shoesize, age, the license plate of your hometown, the initials of your highschool etc.
- Ask students to ask you Yes/No questions to guess what the info on the board stands for.
- Answer their questions.
- Help them build up the questions when necessary.
That's all. It's so much fun. Once you introduce yourself, they share mor info about themselves with you and with their friends. You get closer to your students.

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Icebreaker activities like games to get to know with each other, greetings in mother tongues, making posters with food/flags/maps/famous people from all the countries of the pupils, etc., are some of the ideas used.

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Icebreaker activities are so important for many reasons: to build the group of learners, to learn from each other, to find out similarities and differences, to understand that even the teacher is a real human being, with his/her personal life.
I usually start a new school year introducing myself, with some details that pupils can find interesting (my favourite colour, some photos of my family and some photos of me at their age). Then I throw a ball, previously written with a lot of questions (what do you fear most, have you any brother or sister, what would you do if you get lost in a wood...) and they play. When the ball gets to you, you answer the question under your right thumb. It is funny!

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I use some interesting activities.

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I give importance to warm-up activities.
In the first meeting I introduce myself with a puppet and take a small ball. I throw it to a student and this student introduce herself/himself. Then s/he throws it the others one by one.

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It is very important to motivate students for studying.There are a lot of diffrent activities but my favourites are  Find someone who,
Aeroplanes -This activity will be a good laugh and a good start for new students and old ones.

Prepare a lot of sheets of paper.

Give two sheets for each person in the group.

Ask your students to write one question on each sheet.

Ask the class if anyone knows how to make a paper plane. If somebody says “yes”, ask them to the front to show how to make one.

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I use some ice-breaking activities such as making pairs and do interviews so that they can discover things in common or things that take him/her by surprise. Then, each pair describe to the class the similarities (such as likes and dislikes, hobbies, favourite colour...) and the most interesting fact of his/her classmate. Finally we can create a class grid with the information provided

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Warm-up-activity:

Students get up and move around to some music. When the music stops, gather in groups of three or four and lead a conversation to find out something all of you have in common. The teacher tells the subject of the conversation, for example: „a song you like“, „a country you would like to visit“, „what you hate to do in the morning“, … Each group presents the results.

This activity con be adapted to the linguistic level of the class.

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Mutual knowledge activities - icebreakers

Let's jump straight into the first circle activity. (Place all the children in a circle with you and instruct them to present themselves in this way, n.n.) -

My name is ………………, and if I were an animal I would be ………………. for…………….

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Usually, at the beginning of a school year, I try to create a friendly, pleasant environment so that all students feel comfortable. First I let them know me, ask me various questions, curiosities, we play a fun game "Mirror" in which we say various things about ourselves, as we see them.

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I usually give them space and time to familiarise with the school and then I try to learn along with the rest of their students some things about their background.

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At the beginning of school year I try to motivate learners for learning and using the language. Sts introduce themselves, express likes and habits. I usually talk a little bit of myself, my family, kids, pets, hobbies so that they may follow the example and get to feel comfortable and motivated to do it themselves in class.

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Usually, at the beginning of the school year we have ice-break activities (adjectives that describe them and start with letters of their name, throwing balls to one another with shouting the name and one characteristic of the person who threw the ball to them...), we play games like TV interview when one students asks one or more questions about ther lives, they write short texts about themselves or draw themselves, their likes and dislikes.

quallities

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The first day of class I do and activity called  “SHARE YOUR RAINBOW NAME”. Each student has to cut as many strips of colored paper as letters contained in his/her name. Starting with each letter of his/her name they have to write and adjective that describes his/her personality or how he/she is, the name of their favourite film, something that the fear, something that makes them feel embarrassed, etc. With the help of the safety pins they have to hang each written strip from his chest, making his/her name visible.

After that, one by one, they have to introduce themselves in a different way:  the first person gives his or her name with a descriptor with the first letter ( example: sweet Sara). The second person gives the first person’s name and then his own name: Sweet Sara, Cranky Carla. The third person starts at the beginning, reciting each person before her and adding her own: Sweet Sara, Cranky Carla, nice Niko, … If someone fails remembering everything this student has to start over, until he/she says it. You can continue playing doing the same but starting now reading or telling the second letter of the student´s name.

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Generally at the beginning of the year I always like to create an atmosphere of sympathy and trust with my students. I start with fun activities to introduce them to each other and to express their preferences. Through class dynamics, games and play activities I always manage to make a success of my first sessions with the students.

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I form a circle with my students and every morning we say something to each other in different languages. Each student prepares in a language of their choice.

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Having often foreign students, some of the activities I do to make the class multicultural is to sing "happy birthday" in all the languages ​​spoken by the children, as well as the good wishes for the other various holidays.

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Ice-breaking activities, pair and group work activities work well on this level, I think.

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At the begining of the school year, most of my students already know each other, from the primary school. Usualy, I start with the pair presentation. Each student have to tell the group the name of the student beside and some curiosities about him/her.

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This year I started by having collaborative working stations:
Station 1 - they had to choose a value word they thought they could stick to throughout the school year (Trust, respect, integrity...)
Station 2 - They had to play detective and find out things about me (I had some specific clothes and brought objects to school)
Station 3 - They had to talk about a student in class, describing him/ her in as much detail as they could

This worked out as a great way to have them working together, using English as a communication language and letting them know about me. I also got to know really important details about them - language awareness as well.

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Getting Started on the First Day of Class

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Getting Started on the First Day of Class

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If I were to have my own classroom, I would have a roundtable meeting on the first day of class and introduce myself to my students before allowing them to take turns introducing themselves. If students wish, the roundtable meeting can be done on a carpeted floor that is similar to circle time in an early childhood classroom, where letting students feel comfortable is essential when getting to know them. The beginning of the school year would involve asking questions to students as a way of knowing them while providing an opportunity to share fun facts, in which their fun facts can be used to spark conversations between the educator and their peers while knowing how to engage with students in lessons based on their favorites and interests. Since I am an aspiring educator, I am not sure how well it will work out, especially if students with linguistical differences will be involved.

—Austin Nicholas Dragoș [United States of America]

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I normally make them create a presentation to introduce themselves and we also play bingo with prompts that are meaningful to them.

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This is a Google Doc I invite my 10th year students to fill in during the first week at school. The questions refer to school subjects, their opinion of what school is for, the role of foreign languages, their FL learning history, the FL skills they want to develop, their preferred learning strategies across subjects, what they want me as their FL teacher to do in class with them and finally how they envisage the ideal school.
Besides, we use video making apps (Flipgid or Tiki Toki) for self-presentation and an experiential activity which involves them to create imaginary new identities for themselves aiming at overcoming trauma and boosting interlanguage.

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In the beginning I try to get an impression concerning the language skills. For most of my lessons are based on cooperative and collaborative activities, I try to find partners to support those in my classes, who need support. 

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In the beginning I try to get an impression concerning the language skills. For most of my lessons are based on cooperative and collaborative activities, I try to find partners to support those in my classes, who need support. 

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Most children are experts in their native language practices and come with an important amount of knowledge that should be respected. As an English teacher I try to provide space and time for multilingual children to use all of their languages to think and express themselves.

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Every year the first school day is a special day. We always organise ice breaking activities to create a familiar atmosphere.
This year, in order to start building an affective environment, we started  by asking them to write on a cardboard their own talent they could offer to their classmates all year long. Then each student  has tied his card to another classmate card through a red wool thread, and so creating a very long talents chain hanging on the wall.
It was very nice and very inclusive too!

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I ask my students to draw their self portrait and provide a couple of information about themselves underneath

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Introducing myself and encouraging my students to introduce.
Finding common interests and similarities between me and them to create a friendly environment.

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From the beginning of the school year we propose regular activities (dynamics) to increase the social cohesion inside the group. These activities include the presentation of their background, interests, hopes and dreams, etc. and through them, we observe that their confidence is reinforced, they back their mates in relation to their insecurities, and we get much information to lead our activities to draw their attention and make profit of all their language background.

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My students usually know each other when they get to my school, because most of them have known each other ever since pre-school. Anyway there are plenty of things they can find out about themelves. I usually try to do funny activities that they can enjoy and make them feel comfortable and confident. I use some activities to get them in pairs or in groups of three or more people. For example, proverbs cut in a half are great to organise students in pairs. Groups can have people with the same features. For example, I can ask them to get together with other students whose favourite colour is blue or students who have cats or dogs as pets, for instance. Next step is put them to talk to each other. I like cootie catchers. It's fun and you can prepare questions in advance or let them ask their own questions.

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Since I work as a school librarian, I am not in the mode of getting students to know each other, but nevertheless, when I do my educational work with students, especially with the first graders which I am not familiar with at the beginning of their schooling, I always try to get to know them by the things they like the most: food, their pets, their favorite songs etc.

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My students work in paris, or in teams to get to know each other better and then they present in front of the others their projects so me and the other members of the group can get to know each other and they can ask questions from each other.
Sometimes I ask them to make a short video with the help of an online site.

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I introduce myself and after that I let my students to present themselves orraly.I also teach them how to present themselves in a few sentences in French and then I let them two by two ask themselves their names and answer.

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We use the common languages arts and sports to make these students feel better in the school environment. In our sports, dance, painting and music activities, we give special place to students whose mother tongue is different from the language of instruction.

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This year I have decided to celebrate the European Day of Languages with my first-year students of the linguistic course reading fun facts about various languages and learning a bit about the languages they have studied at school or speak at home.

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I use real life situations in order to determine speaking activities, I involve their empathy and the sense of humor.

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I normally use quotes by Lewis Carrol giving students the perspective of Alice in the wonderland.
Then I share some information about me which I consider relevant as I was born in Mozambique and finally I throw a ball and each student has to talk a little bit about himself/herself, which is not as simple as that. However, I only use this strategy if I know that students are comfortable with that. If they don't want to talk, they sometimes write and then they read.
I also ask them to give me five or six words that would describe them as far as their personality and competences are concerned and this works quite well.

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I introduce myself with a 'Guessing game'. ı write some important numbers about my life on the board and I want the students guess what are they about. Then we play 'That's Me' game. I write some sentences on a flashcards. If the sentence is true for a student s/he has to shout 'That's Me'. For the next lesson we play 'Find someone who' game to let students learn more about their classmates.

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I use collaborative and cooperative activities so students can help each other...

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I usually, at the beginning of the year, explore in class the essential vocabulary, use the online dictionary; for students to present themselves to make an acrostic with the letters of their name

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I use some interesting and fun activities...

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ice breakers to bring the student community together is the best way :)

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I always introduce myself with a game. I normally write 5 things about me and they have to ask me questions, and then, they do the same.

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This document by ILEA has a section of activities related to language awareness. 

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I used to teach German and Spanish (and some French, a bit of Greek and supplied in Swedish) over the years before becoming a central lead. I always liked to do a discussion on language awareness and also to get students to demonstrate their own commitment to language learning - to avoid them thinking there was some magical solution and that they would just only absorb without their own efforts outside of the class. I would often give them some assumptions for us to discuss with them. For example, if students had felt limited success with French (that all students take automatically) before taking my German or Spanish class I would hear : I am just not great at learning languages. Many adult learners too would say such things - that they cannot learn well. I would explain that everyone has the ability unless there is some developmental issue at play. We would analyze assumptions and think about how they learn best and how they could commit to a few things that they could do with the language outside of instruction - many of them are located in the ILEA website as I was part of the writing team for the documents there. So for EDL day we get ALL of our learners registered in the language program that is available on weekends here to take a sample lesson in ANOTHER language than the one they are enrolled in and then discuss the experience, fill out an exit card etc. This has allowed us to get the right mindset for our journey in language teaching and learning.

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At the very beginning of the school year, I really enjoy knowing about my students. I normally ask them their name, age, and hobbies they like to do. Afterwards, I am interested about their families and where they are from. Then, I let them to ask me any question of their interest about me. I think they really like to get closer to the teachers, and know something if their lives.

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The best way is using web 2.0 tools

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At the beginning of the school year I introduce myself and then I ask my students to do the same with their classmate. That's a great opportunity to get to know each others and find out similarities and differences. As students tend to be embarrassed when they are obliged to speak in public in a foreign language, I tell them jokes to break the ice.

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I did this activity: "Stand up if you agree". I uttered many sentences like "I can cook" or "I love sushi" and asked SS to stand if they agreed. One could say "I speak/understand more than one language" and then discuss about their answers.

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I use google forms, google docs, kahoot quiz or quizziz...

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On the first day of school I organize fun introduction games (couple, group and classroom level).

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Introductory activities like "Find someone who...": students are given a number of sentences with the subject missing. By asking their classmates questions they must complete their worksheet, and in the process find out something about their classmates

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For lower grades (age 11) I use the first two weeks to get to know the students. In 4th grade (13/14 yo.) the students aren't usually into playing lots of ice breakers anymore. With the first graders I do a lot of ice breakers and let them ask as many questions about me as they can think of. They are always very eager to find out as much as they can about me. Since I teach English, I often use English to get to know the students' cultural background. This week I'm doing lessons on countries and nationalities during which every student will have the time to speak about their home country and the languages they speak/understand. They can then draw the flag/s of the home country/ies on some paper and add simple English phrases, e.g.: "I am Olivia and I live in Austria. I am from England. I am English and Austrian. I speak English, German, and French".

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“Language teaching and learning is always about acquiring new identities in a context where learners’ previous identities are respected and leveraged in the service of acquiring new ones” (Hawkins) This quotation is really useful to understand the importance of identity, so in the first period of a new course it is crucial to work on identity with posters with pics and short texts or personal Vlogs of the students.

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I usually directly ask students about their background.

I could ask them to fill a form and than present themselves to the class. If the language level allows it, this activity could also be done in target language.

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I usually do no activity to get to know my students, this is something that happen subsenquently during the school year as language training brings a lot of personnal material.

The fact is that my students usually have known their schoolmates very well for years, because they have followed the very same class of a rare language since the beginning of middle school until the end of highschool.

I've never thought that knowing them beyond their past learning experience, their classroom behavior and performance would help in anyway.

The only idea I can come up with right now would be an activity of mutual interview beteween the students at the beginning of the year.

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Icebreaking activities are a good way to get to know people

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Multilingual learners are experts in their home language and come with a wealth of knowledge and experiences so it is important to provide them with the time and space to use their HL practices in class. During tasks, invite multilingual learners to express their thoughts and opinions in HL and pair them with a peer that speaks both HL and target language to facilitate comprehension - this will demonstrate to multilingual learners that you value their HL and experiences

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To get to know the students better, I put myself in a circle with them. I pick up a ball of yarn and I say my name. Then I say something I like a lot and another I hate. After that, randomly, I pass the ball of yarn to another student who will do the same, until everyone has introduced themselves, forming a web of affections, where we are all connected!

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On day one, I present myself, trying not to be restrictive. Then pupils present themselves orally in a short or long version.
One week after, they have to complete a survey (first in class, then with the help of their parents) about them : the origin of the name, surname, their qualities and defects, what they except from the new school year... The purpose is to create links between pupils, parents and shool. The school is interseted in who you are.
They also have to do researches about their school, district and town. All this work participate in the goal to know better themselves and their environment.
I also tell us that a new school year is new for everyone. It's time to get some objectives ans to try to change what is not working !
By the past, I was asking them to tell about their holidays but this kind of writing exercise seemed unfair to me for the poorest children in the classroom. Then I decided to change the topic : "What holidays would you have liked to have ?" The real one for some of them ; and imaginary for others...

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On day 1 of the schoolyear, I introduce myself and explain what I expect them to do throughout the year. Then I have them talk about themselves for a couple of minutes each.

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Usually at the beginning of the year we welcome the students with the "welcome dance". It is a funny song that with sing and we use to learn different language words to say WELCOME!

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I draw empty circles on the white board and fill each circle with a word about my life. Then I ask my students to try to guess their meanings for me. We do this activity in target language. They also draw their circles and try to introduce themselves. They are really eager to know about me and identify themselves.

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At the beginning of the year in order to get to know students I usually start with an ice-breaking activity which involves saying their name and something they like (the word has to begin with the first letter of their name). I usually say "I'm Ana and I like all of you!"

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Introducing myself and encouraging them to introduce. Finding common interests and similarities between me and them to create a friendly environment.

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First, I introduce myself through different dynamics, in that way we bond, I can assess their linguistic competence and model their own introduction in the next tasks. We usually do games, music and art because it makes students feel comfortable and it is an universal language.

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At the beginning of the school year I use ice-breakers to break the icy atmosphere, I invite each student to introduce himself/herself so that their common interests and hobbies can be identified, we play Find someone who..., I ask them to raise their hands if... This year, I allowed the entire class to ask me one secret question and they were very surprised when I answered them all. It was very interesting for me to discover what aspects of a teacher's life they were curious about.

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Self-introduction is a classic and works well..,.

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Greeting students in their home language in the morning sets the tone for the rest of the day. Children sometimes want to play a guessing game when they name object in their home langugae and the teacher and other students try to guess the meaning. Birthday songs in different languages are also popular.

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The first day of school is a festive day. When students arrive in the classroom, they greet them with small suggestive gifts. For example, this year I made them small paintings with a strong motivational message. They have the role of remaining in the memory, but especially to create bridges of emotional connection between all members of the class. There are different games to find out what they did on vacation. We talk freely, those who want. Knowledge games to introduce new students.

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Introduce yourself, present the cities of origin (in the case of foreign children or newcomers), play to get to know each other, pronounce the same words in different languages, work and collaborate in groups.

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Balloons with Music event
I prepare music, balloons as much as the number of participants, felt-tip pens, A4 paper, needles. A small piece of paper for each student.
I want them to write their names on these little pieces of paper and put them on their collars. I then give the students an uninflated balloon. Each student writes their name on the balloon they inflated. As soon as the music plays, everyone tosses their balloons into the air. He tries to catch the balloon when the music stops. He finds his friend whose name is written on the balloon he is holding and starts chatting with him. Thus, they have the opportunity to get to know each other better.De har det gøy og lærer.

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Enrique Labajos, Salamanca, Spain  How to ice break the first day at school?

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Enrique Labajos, Salamanca, Spain  How to ice break the first day at school?

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Every year the first day at school is a memorable day for most students, especially when they start a new stage or a new school. They are eager to know who the different teachers are going to be as well as their new classmates.
The suitable activities to build connections with and among your new students are icebreakers and community-building activities.
After introducing myself, the first day of the year I organise my students in small groups so that they can interact among each other by introducing themselves, talking about their background, interests and expectations.  If there are new students from abroad, I can check if they can speak the target language and the Spanish language or maybe they only speak their mother tongue. This is the precise time of language awareness.
Next they write their answers in a kind of poster( they can use pictures and any other non-verbal language) and later display it for the rest of the class to know.

Finally, I elicit their personal information by asking them to give a short speech about themselves.

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At the beginning of the year we speak about the holidays. What did they do.... for this, the children bring a holidayroll with some souvenirs and memorys (like stones, tickets....).  For this I use a Pringlesroll and during the holiday the eat the chips and fill the roll with memorys. During the first week we speak about adventures and they show the things they collect. I do it too... 

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At the beginning of the year we speak about the holidays. What did they do.... for this, the children bring a holidayroll with some souvenirs and memorys (like stones, tickets....).  For this I use a Pringlesroll and during the holiday the eat the chips and fill the roll with memorys. During the first week we speak about adventures and they show the things they collect. I do it too... 

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I present myself and ask them to do the same about their hobbies, the languages that they speak, their origins. I have a small talk with everyone or/and speak in pairs.

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At the first days of school I use Getting to know you board games, The students play it with dice and printed board Game. They answer the questions and find out information about their classmates too. It is a funny and interactive game.

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I use different activities. For example: snowball fighting where they write 3 interesting facts they want the other students to know. All about me, where students bring 2 or 3 objects that are important to them and explain why. I also tell them to create a talkative avatar who tell the things students want really their classmates know about them.
All of them are quite effective, but the last one is especially useful for shy or low level students.

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The first thing I propose on the first English lesson is to introduce ourselves to the rest of the class. Many of the children already know each other, as they have studied together before, and they are usually very interested in the new classmates. Another activity consists of a series of questions about things they've done, people they've been with, places they've visited... in the summer.
Example: Did you play any sports? If so, which ones? Who with? Where? All students are happy to participate. When they don't remember a word, there is always somebody ready to help.

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Beginning of Year activities. Inés, Spain.

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Beginning of Year activities. Inés, Spain.

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At the beginning of the year I first introduce myself with three or four photos that represent me. For example a flower. the title of a song or film, a name ...whatever you can think of. Then I get my students to figure out why I have chosen those names/items, and they make their guesses. They can be very funny because they imagine all kind of different things that of couse are nothing to do with the real reason! After that I explain why I have chosen them so that they can get to know me better. I then give them time to do the same activity about themselves and we all make guesses. It can be fun!

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Bingo class!
You need to find as more things in common as possible with the rest of your classmates.

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At the beginning of the introduction, I carry out activities in which the students first get to know each other, work in pairs and try to find out as many things as possible about the person sitting next to them in a certain time frame. They then introduce themselves to the rest of the class and me in a way that they introduce themselves as a couple. No one talks about himself but about the person next to him. He recounts everything he remembered and learned about that person. In this way, they are not embarrassed to talk about themselves, and at the same time we learn all sorts of interesting things about each other.

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the first day I meet my students I usually ask them to intruduce themselves and talk about their hobbies and their favourite books/tv series/films. At the end each student is asked to repeat what the previous one said. It's fun and it usually works

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An icebreaking activity with a think-pair-share task [name, fav school subject, languages they speak, desires from this year] really works since they try to say more details about their linguistic backgroud in most cases.

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Like most of you, I often start the school year using oral interaction.
Basically, my personal introduction, then, the students briefly introduce themselves while I check the group list.
Sometimes, I use a kind of game where you write on the blackboard three statements about you or your abilities/skills, and ask the students to guess which one is false. It is usually fun. Students can be asked to play it as well, so we can learn about our students hobbies/ abilities.

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What I do in my class at the beginning of the school year is a speaking activity, in which students present themselves, saying their name, nationality, reason of choosing my subject, what do they expect from these classes, where they see themselves after graduation.

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The first days of the school year I always do welcome activities.
- When I see my students for the first time, I propose them some activities to know each others. For example, I ask them to draw an animal / flower / object on a piece of paper that represents themselves and to write why they have chosen that one. (If they don't know the language of schooling they can just draw) Then they stick the drawing on the blackboard and introduce themselves to the class.
Otherwise I propose them to do mutual interviews in pairs and then I ask a student to introduce athe partner.
- In geography, one of the first activities I propose is "The place of the heart": the children have to choose a place (a city or a region o r a State) that is really important to them, they bring an image and then locate the place on a map... Usually students who come from another country choose that Country: so it's an opportunity to know more about that.
I think they work.

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On the first day with my students, I did an icebreaker activity by making each student get to know each other, and then after the time elapsed, I asked each student to introduce his colleague.