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School Copy of  Tracy Dee's SEL Lessons (BC4E) 

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On Slide 8 of the Morning Meeting, the questions scaffold talk moves for use in Socratic Seminar and Philosophical Chairs.

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Having a beach ball with numbers. Then the students can throw the ball and answer questions based on where their thumb is sitting.

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Make a secret handshake with a friend. Practice all week and show the class on Friday.

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Use the Class Dojo Big Ideas Conundrums. They are great for team building and group problem solving!

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We teamed up with Astra Nova to create Conundrums! This learning series with Activities introduces the challenging idea that not all problems have a clear right answer. Each episode is carefully designed to develop problem solving and critical thinking skills.

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I have my students watch this video of "The Legend of Rock, Paper, and Scissors", then I have them get into pairs and have a RPS tournament. We do best out of three. Then the winners continue to move on until we have one champion. This is a great tool for building relationships and getting to know one another.

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🗿📃✂️The Legend of Rock Paper Scissors - Cinematic Read Aloud by Drew Daywalt

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Ask a connection circle question every morning! APS has some that were created years ago.

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Pair students up and have them create a special handshake. After giving them time to create, each pair shows their handshake to the class. Students can pair up with other students in the future for an alternate handshake.

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Meme of the Day to spark conversations!

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SplashLearn Blog – Educational Resources for Parents, Teachers & Kids

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45 Funny School Memes Every Student Will Love

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Discover funny school memes guaranteed to make kids laugh! Enjoy a fun break with these side-splitting memes. Check them out now!

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Give students a voice in logistics. "When should we have a reward for Raz-Kids growth?" "Should our projects be completed by Monday or Wednesday?"

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The Rhyming Game!

A fun rhyming game keeps students smiling and engaged. Example: A student says " Sunny, Funny" then the student picks another student to share a rhym. We play until all students have shared.

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Say something nice, give a compliment when saying "Good Morning". Ex: Good morning Ameila. I really like your shirt! I am glad your here today!

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Students sit in a circle and pass around a stuffed animal panda. When they have the panda they can share with the group, something they are excited about- upcoming game, birthday, trip.

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Have students stand up and do a quick Mix Pair Share structure. When they find a partner, ask them one of the morning meeting conversation starters. Let each partner have 30 seconds to share out and then repeat. You can get 3 to 5 questions in.

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Students take turns doing a dance move in front of the class. The class copies their movement as carefully as they can and then the student chooses someone to go next.

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Have students share a short, funny adventure they had recently. You might want to share your story first so that your students can get a feeling of the type of story they should share,.

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Have a small journal to write a short story. Then if the students want to share it in the following days they can. The teacher gives a sentence frame.

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Stand at the door and greet each student as they come in. They choose the greeting, high five, handshake, etc.

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Go to "Big Ideas" at the bottom of your Class Dojo. LOTS of really quick activities but also enough to theme it out for 1-2 weeks. Super fast and easy.

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Share morning meeting, read aloud. Students take turns and read a short book and the rest listen even if they are still eating.

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Have every student greet another student by name and share something that's on their mind.

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Gratitude Journaling- Write 5 things your grateful for.

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Share a mountain top and your valley at the end of your week.

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Name that Movie (Emoji Trivia Game) The kids will LOVE it!!

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Greetings: Since we have time in the breakfast line, I am greeting each student in line with a special handshake for the day. It's a way to do a quick check-in with students.

I have popsicle sticks with each student's name and students grab a stick on their way into the classroom. This is the person they are greeting in the morning during breakfast.

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Have a creative question for attendance each day.

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Heather Crespin shared a Slideshow with me called Project Kind. It shows a 2-3 minute On the Road with Steve Hartman video, has a word of the day related to the video, and has discussion questions.

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I read books that focus on different purposes, such as: Acceptance, Establishing Peer Relationships, Respect, Kindness, and Problem Solving. Students love to listen to books.

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Words are Powerful - Word of the Day

Instilling the love of language plus it helps build vocabulary.

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So what's all the hype about Word of the Week? It comes down to the simplicity of the idea and more importantly the huge impact it can make in expanding your students' vocabulary as well as improving reading and writing.

Vocabulary is a critical factor in the development of reading skills and comprehension. Unfortunately, not every student comes to school with an adequate level of vocabulary knowledge to support reading success. The more words your students know, the easier it will be for them to read and understand what they have read.

As we know, reading and writing skills are closely linked and each helps improve the other. Introducing your students to challenging words through Word of the Week can help to increase your students' confidence to use sophisticated language in their writing and begin to understand the power of words.

If Word of the Week is something that you would like to try in your classroom, read on to access our Word of the Week teaching resources and information that you need...

Word of the Week PowerPoints - Kindergarten to Grade 6

We have created a Word of the Week PowerPoint for each year level K - 6. Each presentation includes teacher notes, 40 slides, and activities that introduce new vocabulary. Each slide includes:

a new word

the definition of the word

an example sentence, showing the word being used in context

a question or activity for the students to discuss

words that are similar or relate to.

The vocabulary chosen for each year group has been carefully selected by our talented team of Resource Content Producers. There is a steady progression in the difficulty of the words across the year levels and the presentations for lower years include illustrations to support comprehension.

Word of the Week Flip Books

Our new Word of the Week Flip Books are a great addition to our Word of the Day/Week Collection. They are a brilliant alternative if you have limited access to an interactive whiteboard and a great addition to a Word of the Week classroom display. There's a flip book for each year level.

We recommend giving these flip books justice by printing them in a larger size. You can either bind the flip book or punch holes at the top and use binder rings to hang your flip book.

Word of the Week for Lower Years

For lower years, Word of the Week should be all about getting your students excited about learning new vocabulary, having fun, and exploring new words through play and discussion.
Word of the Week activities for lower years should include:

brainstorming other words that have a similar meaning

putting the word into real-world context

making connections between words and the lives of your students

exploring new vocabulary through movement, drama, and actions

games

music.

Movement, Drama, and Actions

Can you imagine the buzz in the classroom when you ask your students to show you what sort of actions a beast would make?

Here are some other examples of how you and your students can explore new vocabulary through movement and drama:

Word of the Week: giggle - What does your giggle sound like? How is your giggle different from your friends? Can you giggle like them?

Word of the Week: paddle - What action would you use to paddle?

Word of the Week: dance - What is your favorite dance move? Where did you learn it?

Remember that Word of the Week is all about loving language and having fun, especially for lower years.

Word of the Week Poster

For upper years, we have created a Word of the Week Poster that includes a variety of tasks to give context and meaning to a new challenging word. It is ideal to use as a whole class vocabulary activity or as part of your Reading Small Group Activities.

The teaching resource encourages students to deconstruct the word, identify its meaning, and to use the word in a written context. This activity works very well as a group activity or a whole class activity. You can easily support less confident students by encouraging them to work with a partner.

Word of The Week Homework Activity

Word of the Week provides a great opportunity for meaningful homework activities. Here are some ideas that you might like to include as part of your homework matrix:

Create a 'Word of the Week' poster to illustrate the word's meaning.

Find and cut out examples of the 'Word of the Week' found in newspapers or magazines.

Use the 'word of the week' in a conversation with your family and explain what it means to an adult.

Write a synonym for the 'Word of the Week'.

Find the 'Word of the Week' in a dictionary. Record the dictionary definition.

Word of the Week Roll a Dice Activity

Rolling dice is a great way to generate six different activities related to your Word of the Week. Use our Dice Roller Widget to take this activity to the next level.

When using the Dice Roller Widget, you could either roll 1 die for the whole class or roll up to five dice to assign different tasks to different groups. Simply roll the dice and ask your students to complete the corresponding activity. For example:

Roll 1 - Write your word in a sentence.
Roll 2 - Draw a picture to express the word.
Roll 3 - Write a newspaper headline that includes the word.
Roll 4 - Write the definition of the word.
Roll 5 - Find the Scrabble score of your word.
Roll 6 - Count the number of vowels and consonants in your word.

For an independent fast finisher activity, allow your students to collect a die and work through the tasks, rolling the die until all six tasks have been completed.

Word Tile Total Activity

Your kids will love building your 'Word of the Week' with these Giant Letter Tiles. They are available to download in Giant Uppercase Letter Tiles or Giant Lowercase Letter Tiles.

Word Tile Totals

If you are looking for a more structured task, why not try our Word Tile Total Activity? This teaching resource encourages students to think mathematically while developing their spelling skills. It can also be used as one of your Reading Small Group Activities or fast finisher activity to review and revisit challenging vocabulary from the 'Word of the Week'.

Each week, encourage the students to spell out the 'Word of the Week' using the word tiles and calculate the word score for the word. When you have recorded ten words, challenge your students to calculate their overall word tile total!

Word of The Week Review

Remember that children need to be exposed to new vocabulary multiple times before they understand it. A great way to do this is to use your 'Word of the Week' and revisit it daily by using our Word of the Day Spinner.

Simply add your 'Word of the Week' or create a list of words that your students have learned so far and press spin for instant activities. You can even customize the activities by selecting from lower, middle, or upper grade level activities.

Spin activities for middle years include:

using the word in a compound sentence

writing 3 clues that would help someone guess the word

writing a list of synonyms for the word

writing a list of antonyms for the word

brainstorming a list of other words related to the word

...and lots more!

Whole School Initiative

Be that person who is brave enough to suggest a 'Word of The Week' whole school initiative. Just think of the huge impact that you could create and the positive difference that you could make by expanding the vocabulary of the students across all year groups.

This is one of the easiest whole school initiatives to implement because everything you need is there at the click of a download button. All you need to do is provide each grade level team leader with the 'Word of the Week' PowerPoint and the corresponding 'Word of the Week Flip Book'! All your colleagues need to do is commit to sharing the word of the week on Monday morning and following it up with a few fun activities.

Ages: 4-7
Published: 4th September 2017
Hardcover available atBooktopia
eBook Edition on iBooks and Google Play, Kindle edition on Amazon

This New York Times bestselling picture book is a fun book to share with your students. For each letter of the alphabet, a sophisticated word and its definition is given. Your students will love to learn this adventurous vocabulary. You might even have some trouble reading some of these words! But hey, there presents another learning experience as you model how to sound out tricky words and decode them! Here's one for you...

Arachibutyrophobia (Ah-RACK-ee-byoo-tee-ro-FO-bee-ya)
Arachibutyrophobia is the alarming fear of peanut butter sticking to the top of your mouth!

Research suggests that vocabulary is enormously important to children's development and you as their teacher can make a huge impact on your students' vocabulary knowledge. A wide knowledge of vocabulary improves all areas of communication - listening, speaking, reading and writing.

Word of the Week is a quick and easy way to make a massive difference to your students' futures.

Don't hesitate, just do it. Try Word of the Week in your classroom and spread the word.

We love hearing from you and getting a sneak peek into your classroom!
Share your photos on Instagram @teachstarter_texas

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Word of the Week - Expanding Vocabulary in the Classroom

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Words! Words! Words! Vocabulary is critical to listening, speaking, reading and writing success! Everything that you need to set up Word of the Week and to...

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Start each week off with a different handshake or greeting...

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Group Juggling

Here’s how it works:

Get a few dodgeballs or soft balls for this activity. You probably won’t need more than four at first, but may need more once students get better at it. Depending on your class size, you may choose to split your students into two groups,

Students stand in a circle, and each has a number (we use our class numbers, but you can choose whatever numbers you’d like). Mix up the numbers, so they aren’t all standing next to each other. Let them know which students have numbers before and after them. (Ex: You are 1, you are 2, you are 3, etc.)

Pass Student 1 the first ball, and s/he tosses the ball to Student 2. This continues through all of the numbers, and the last student passes the ball back to Student One. This repeats, and as the first ball gets about halfway around the circle, pass another ball to student one for him/her to start tossing too. Now students have to keep track of two balls in the circle. If they get the two balls juggling well, try to add a third one!

If a ball drops at any time, they have to start over with one ball at student 1. At the end of the time you have, note how many balls was the record so that next time you play, you can try to beat your record!

Group Juggling is a fantastic morning meeting activity to build teamwork, coordination, and focus! It’s not as easy as it seems! But my fourth graders love trying to work together to juggle more balls each time!

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Morning Meeting is the best part of the day in my 4th-grade classroom, and I want to share some of my fourth graders' favorite morning meeting activities. These morning meeting activities are ones that we use all year to work on teamwork, classroom community, and just having fun building relationships together!

One of the Most Popular Morning Meeting Group Activities: Inspector Bullfrog

Inspector Bullfrog is one of our favorite morning meeting activities because it's silly and fun! It also requires observation skills! Here's how to play:

Everyone should start sitting in a circle. Choose one student to be the inspector and send him/her outside of the classroom for a second.

All students should close their eyes, and you tap one of them on the head or shoulder. That student is the bullfrog.

The inspector returns to the classroom and stands in the middle of the circle. S/he tries to figure out who the bullfrog is by looking at the students.

The bullfrog attempts to put the rest of the class to sleep by sticking out his/her tongue at them. But s/he has to make eye contact with the student, so the student knows it's him/her who s/he put to sleep.

The student who is put to sleep by the bullfrog dramatically lays down on the floor to tell the inspector that s/he fell asleep.

The inspector has three guesses to try to figure out who the bullfrog is. S/he wins if s/he guesses correctly. The bullfrog wins if s/he puts the whole class to sleep before being caught or not being guessed by the inspector!

One of Our Favorite Morning Meeting Team Building Activities: Group Juggling

Okay, I have to warn you: this mornings meeting activity is tricky! I definitely would not recommend this for students below Third Grade because it takes a lot of attention and focus! But I love the challenge that this morning meeting activity required of my 4th-grade students. Here's how it works:

Group Juggling is a fantastic morning meeting activity to build teamwork, coordination, and focus! It's not as easy as it seems! But my fourth graders love trying to work together to juggle more balls each time!

Freeze Dance - One of those Morning Meeting Activities that is just plain fun!

I don't know about you, but sometimes we just need a dance party! My fourth graders LOVE freeze dance just as much as my Kindergarteners did! (Did you know that I taught primary for three years before finding my true love of upper elementary!?) Freeze dance is perfect for those days when you don't have a lot of time for your morning meeting. Here's how to play:

For a challenge, once you've played a few times with your students, play opposite freeze dance and freeze when the music plays and dance when it stops. THAT is pretty hilarious!

STEM Challenges - Get Your Fourth Graders Thinking Outside the Box

I don't do them often, but I will include a STEM or STEAM challenge in our Morning Meeting plans now and then! These Morning Meeting Activities encourage creativity and problem-solving. You can use any materials you have on hand or choose to do a specific challenge and make sure you have specific materials ready to go. Here are some of our favorites:

This is the tip of the iceberg when it comes to STEM Morning Meeting Activities for fourth Grade! Let me know your favorites in a comment below!

Math Baseball - Morning Meeting Activities with an Academic Focus

I usually keep my morning meetings focused on community-building, social-emotional learning, and warming up for the day, but I will occasionally incorporate some content review. Math Baseball is one of my students' favorite games to play, and it's easy to use for whatever standards you need to review! All you need is some flashcards and three chairs. Here's how to play:

Line students up in two lines facing you. Put the three chairs around the classroom to look like a baseball diamond. Where the students are is home plate, then you'll have a first, second, and third base.

Show the first two students (the first in each line) a flashcard and have them solve the problem and say the answer. Whoever answers correctly first advances to first base. The other student goes to the back of his/her line.

Keep playing and advancing students - the student on first base will move to second, etc. When students move to home base, they get a point (they keep track individually) and go to the back of a line. Play as long as you'd like!

If you want to play this while keeping your distance, have students stand further apart and just stand by the "bases." You could play this with other content too - I think vocabulary baseball could be a great idea!

Active Tic-Tac-Toe - An Activity to Build Critical Thinking and Teamwork Skills

I picked up a tic-tac-toe board in the Target dollar spot, and it has been awesome to use in the classroom! This activity is a classic game with a twist that pushes students to think quickly and work as a team! I would say that this is best for 3rd Grade and up.

Before starting, make sure your students understand how to play tic tac toe. Split the class into two teams and have them line up in two lines on one side of the classroom. Give one team the X pieces and the other team the Os. Place the tic tac toe board on the other side of the classroom.

On your go, have the first student in each line run over to the board and place their piece in a square and run back to tag the next student. As they put pieces on the board, they are trying to get 3 in a row. If each team puts down all of their pieces without getting a tic tac toe, the next students in the lines go and move one piece into a different square. This continues until one team gets three in a row!

Alibi - One of My Top Pics for Morning Meeting Activities in Fourth Grade

I love Alibi because it requires students to be creative and listen to each other! It doesn't require any materials and is such a fun Morning Meeting game to have in your arsenal. Perfect for fourth graders who are working on justifying their answers too! Here's how to play:

I know that you have A LOT on your plate, and I want to help you spend less time planning outside of school. That's why I created Morning Meeting Slides for the school year! Grab the bundle here , so you have all the Morning Meeting plans you need for the whole school year!

What are your students' favorite Morning Meeting Activities and Games? If you need Morning Meeting ideas for the first day of school, download mine here for free!

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7 Morning Meeting Activities 4th Grade Students LOVE! - The Classroom Community Copilot

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Morning Meeting is the best part of the day in my 4th-grade classroom, and I want to share some of my fourth graders' favorite morning meeting activities. These morning meeting activities are ones that we use all year to work on teamwork, classroom community, and just having fun building relationships together!

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I like to have student share their "good news"- anything positive, big or small, that is making them feel happy right now.

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Morning Meeting content: From Goal 4 questions. I will include a quick greeting, an activity from Goal 4 questions, sharing through Huddle, writing, etc., then an oral message or written if time permits. M. Arvizo

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Having students share what they did in evening or what they are going to do.

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Our students each make a "secret handshake" that they do with their table group every morning.

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Character Trail of the Month: Optimism, Empathy, Integrity, etc.

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Learn different languages to say "good morning" and provide student choice.