Kindness Counts

After you have taught your rules, opened the door for communication, and worked on team building there is still one piece to the first week of school missing. 

TEACHING KINDNESS! 

I loved this quote and it made me realize not to forget this important part to the success of our classrooms. 

Last year I started a kindness challenge and every week we tried to do one thing to spread kindness.  I know you are thinking when did she have time to do this! We completed these acts for morning work and believe it or not they would ask to stay in for recess to work on their kindness challenge. 

I began by having a discussion about what kindness is. We made an anchor chart that listed what they thought kindness meant. 

Here is an example:

TIP: I like using visuals when making anchor charts so my ESL students have an image to see. After your students have said what kindness is you can later print out pictures that represent the words they used for them to refer to. 

Next, I showed the video below and followed the lesson plan on The Ned Show.  This lesson has great discussion starters and activities to pay it forward. 

Then, I read the story Kindness is Cooler, Mrs. Ruler and followed the discussion questions and lesson from The Ned Show.  They loved being able to share their writing responses and playing Pay-It-Which-Way that is all provided on the lesson plan.  

Here is a link
  for an online version
 from youtube.

Sorry this picture
 isn't the best but gives
you an idea of how I displayed
our acts of kindness last year.

This year instead of counting the first 100 days of school we are going to count 100 acts of kindness and place them on to a Kindness Counts wall. Each day I will write the act we will complete for the day on a heart and place onto the wall. 

I also read the books below and completed some of the activities on The Ned Show kindness lesson plans.

Here is a link
for an online version
on youtube.

Some of my favorite activities from the Each Kindness lesson plan is the human pay-it forward chain, the pay-it forward kindness chart, and the ripples of kindness. 







I love the story The Kindness Quilt and having the children to design a quilt that shows kindness to display in the classroom.

TIP: Remember these are all things that can be done through out the year. They don't have to be completed the first week. I like pulling these books back out when I see my class starting to exhibit behavior towards each other that doesn't represent kindness.


My last favorite kindness activity is the kindness rock project. This year I had my students design a rock that promoted kindness, inspiration, and love. We used rocks that I had bought from Dollar Tree. First, they painted them then used sharpies to finish decorating them. Then, they placed the rocks around the school to promote their love for the people inside our building.

More ideas on how to promote kindness.

Confetti Kindness Challenge

Spreading Smiles

30 Days of Kindness Challenge

Videos for Teaching Kindness:

How do you promote kindness in your classroom? 

Leave a comment to help share ideas to teachers from all over.

Part 3: Are You Ready for the BEGINNING OF THE YEAR?

Tips, tricks, and Team Building

For the beginning of the year

Raise your hand if you are ready to start your first week of school?  If you are not then by the time you leave this blog you will be! I plan to give you lots of great ideas to begin your first week of school that will include stories, get to know you activities, and lots of team building. 

The last two posts we covered creating an open and safe classroom to talk and building strong relationships. The final piece needed to have a great first week is for your students to learn how to work together, struggle together, and encourage each other when lessons get tough. Team building is a great way to accomplish this. It also helps to see how students interact, what makes them tick, and they begin to learn more about each other. Here are a few of my favorites.

1. Hula Hoop Challenge: Have your class stand in a straight line holding hands. The challenge is for the class to pass the hula hoop once down the line without anyone letting go. Once you do it as a class you could split them into teams and see which team can work together the fastest to pass the hula hoop down the line. If you are looking for more hula hoop games Lead by Adventure had some great games to play.  

2. Marshmallow Tower: The marshmallow tower challenge consists of 20 spaghetti noodles and 1 large marshmallow. The challenge is to be the first team to build the tallest freestanding structure holding a marshmallow at the top using only the items provided.




3. Can You Save Fred?: Poor Fred the gummy worm his boat has capsized! He doesn't know how to swim and never wears his life preserver. He is stuck and his life preserver is caught under the boat. If he reaches for it he will fall into the water and drown. Can you save Fred?  This is also a great first-week activity to teach the scientific method and the expectations of a science journal. All directions and printables are provided on the link above. 

4. Spaghetti Races: Split your class into teams. The challenge is to be the first team to transfer all their spaghetti to a bucket across the room in 4 minutes. If they drop the spaghetti they must start over. All that is needed is paper plates and spaghetti.  

5. Pool Noodle Races: Pool noodle races is just like the spaghetti races but with 2 pool noodles and a beach ball or balloon. Split your class into teams. The challenge is to be the first team to transport your beach ball or balloon to the other side of the room or playground without it falling off. 

6. Longest Paper Chain: The longest paper chain challenge consists of 1 sheet of construction paper, scissors, and glue. The challenge is to be the first group to build the longest paper chain out of only 1 sheet of construction paper in 30 minutes.   

7. All Aboard!:  All you need for this activity is Dollar Tree plastic table cloths for each team of 4-5 students. Cut the table cloths in half and ask each group to try to fit inside the boat.  When the group succeeds, decrease the area (by cutting or folding the table cloth) and challenge the group again.  How far can the group go?

8. Flip the Boat:  Use the same table cloths from All Aboard. Have the teams to stand on the table cloth, challenge them to turn the table cloth over without anyone touching the ground in the process.  Can add a time limit to make it more interesting!

9. 100 Cup Towers: All that is needed is 100 dixie cups for each team. Challenge the teams to be the first to build a 100 cup structure without it falling. Can add a time limit to make it more fun.

10. Trust Line: Place a foot of tape on the ground and have the kids stand on either side of the tape, leaving no gaps. To start, one person stands at one end of the tape and spins around 10 times, while everyone counts his turns. The person must then attempt to run down the length of the line as straight as they can. The kids on the side stand with their arms out ready to catch and protect the person from falling. The point is for the kids to know their friends won't let them fall.

Teamwork Videos:

                                                  

What team building activities do you do in your classroom?

Don't forget to share with your teacher friends and especially all the new teachers out there. 

Thank you for stopping by! 

Part 2: Are You Ready for the BEGINNING OF THE YEAR?

Raise your hand if you are ready to start your first week of school?  If you are not then by the time you leave this blog you will be! I plan to give you lots of great ideas to begin your first week of school that will include stories, get to know you activities, and lots of team building. 

Now that you have created a culture of openness and discussion it is time to build respect and positive relationships.  If you remember from my last post I discussed John Hattie's research on positive influences in the classroom.  Those influences help to make the most growth in your students. When looking at effect sizes you always want a 0.40 or greater to see the most growth. John Hattie's research shows that teacher-student relationships produce an effect size of 0.72. This shows me how important it is to build and encourage these relationships on the front end. Students decide within 2 weeks whether or not you are worth it. So make your impact now!

1. Friendship:

I start my friendship lesson by discussing what friendship means, looks like, feels like, sounds like by using a chart like this.

Next, I read Enemy Pie by Derek Munson and discuss the importance of friendship. After I have read this story we add more information we learned about friendship to the anchor chart.

Here is a link for an 
online version
from Storyline

Then, I head to one of my favorite websites that has great lessons and activities to work on character education, The Ned Show. This is a great website to use at the beginning of the year. They have compiled lessons, stories, and videos to help teach 8 different topics ranging from growth mindset to preventing bullying for all elementary ages.  

The Building Relationship topic has 6 lesson plans that help to encourage and engage students in building relationships. One of my favorite activities is friendship soup.  There are several different ways you can do this activity. I first have the children come up with their own ingredients they would need and the recipe for a great friendship.  Next, they create a friendship soup, salad, or pie. 

Version 1: Friendship Fruit Salad

For this version, I found the symbolic meaning of several different fruits that would represent friendship.  This version is a great way to bring in Science as well. You can begin a unit on physical science about mixtures and solutions. 

Version 2: Less messy Friendship Soup

The 2nd version I used items I had around my classroom like below. This is also a great activity to learn about mixtures in Science and what tools are needed to separate a mixture. Possible questions to ask during the activity: 
How could we separate these items? 
What categories would we place these objects in? 

Love being able to combine 2 subjects into one lesson! 

Version 3: No Mess Friendship Pie

If you are not a fan of all the mess then this is the version for you. A Year of Many Firsts has this super cute activity. All the templates are provided on her website for the craft. 

Finally, we end our day by completing a venn-diagram displaying how they are alike and different from their friends. I display the word diversity and discuss the meaning. I then relate it back to friendship and what it means to be a great friend referring back to our anchor chart from the morning. I next read Spaghetti in a Hot Dog Bun by Maria Dismondy. 

Here is a link for an 
online version
from youtube.

Third Grade Thinkers has a great venn-diagram activity that I use to close this lesson. I love how she uses candy to match up the classmates. Read the link above to get all the directions and the link to this activity. I have done this on paper like below or I have stapled paper plates together to make a venn-diagram and then die cut out circles using skin color construction paper. The students then create their own faces and hair and glue to the top of the paper plates. 

                      

         

2. More Stories on Friendship

Here is a link for an
online version
from Storyline

Your students will love these stories about amazing friendships in the animal world. 

                             

Here is a link for an
online version on youtube.

Here is a link for an
online version on youtube.

To end your day on friendship establish a final list of what makes a great friend. Post it in your room to remind your students how important it is to have great friends.  

How do you promote friendship in your classroom? 

Please share in the comments section so we can create a platform to inspire each other.

Don't forget to hit follow!
 I will be posting through out the year how I teach Tennessee State Standards through engaging activities.