Do you have a routine for your mornings? Do your students come into the classroom crazy? I have found that creating a morning routine has really helped to get our day off to a great start. There are a few tips that I have for you to create a perfect morning routine for your students and classroom.
The first thing that I do every day is have calm music playing. I love using classical music that the students don’t know and recognize. It is important that the music you choose is not songs that the students recognize. When the students recognize the songs that are playing, they are more likely to come into the classroom wild and a little too excited. There are plenty of other opportunities throughout the day that allow you to play music that the students know. But at the start of the day, you want to set the stage for a calm day. I like to start the music before the students walk into the classroom. This helps to set the mood for the day from the minute they walk into the room.
Next on the list is to have a place for the students to see exactly what they need to do when they walk in. I like to use a procedure slide for the start of the day. I type on the slide everything that the children need to do from the minute they step into the classroom. I include everything from putting things away, to getting things out for the day, to getting started on an assignment. Having a place for the students to see what they need to do takes the morning responsibilities off of you as the teacher and puts it on the students. When a student comes up to you and asks what they're supposed to do, you are able to tell them to look at the morning procedures on the board. This also allows you to get the things done that need to get done in the morning, like attendance, and reading any notes from parents.
The next thing I do to help with our morning routine is to have some type of assignment. This gives the students something to do after they have unpacked and put all their things away. Some different ideas for assignments could be a writing page or journal entry or some type of math or language arts review. I love to have my students work on a review page that reviews skills from the weeks before. When students are done with the assignment, they get to use a STEM Bin to build different objects. STEM bins are a great idea from Brooke Brown. You can find these resources on teachers pay teachers or even at Lakeshore or Amazon. STEM bins are small boxes with different building toys like legos, blocks, or magnetic tiles for students to build with. You can create these boxes yourself or you can use resources available through Brooke. STEM bins were my students' favorite activities, and it made them work diligently to get their work done because they were so excited to use the bins.
The last thing that I do every day to have a smooth morning routine is a morning meeting. This is a time that my students always look forward to. At the start of the year, I lead the meeting so my students can learn the routine. Then after the first couple weeks of school, I hand the meeting over to my students. It becomes one of our classroom jobs to be the morning meeting leader. Each week, the leader plans out the meeting. They choose what question they want to ask and what greeting they want for the meeting. We use our morning meeting slide to help us with the flow of the meeting. This helps the students stay on track.
Having a morning routine really helps you create a wonderful environment for your students. Morning routines will help your students come into the classroom and know exactly what is expected of them. I love to see my students come in and know what they need to do. They get started as soon as they walk into the classroom. The morning routine helps to create a calm, smooth morning for your students. What part of the morning routine are you going to try first?
