Community Building: Morning Meeting

One way that I like to continue building classroom community all throughout the school year is my daily Morning Meeting.  Morning Meeting is one of my students’ favorite parts of the day.  

Greeting

Each day, we form a circle on the rug and students take turns choosing someone to say “Good Morning” to.  We use a variety of greetings throughout the year.  Some are very simple such as “Happy Friday” or “Happy Half Day” and some are more complex such as greeting each other in number order, reverse number order, or another language.

Share

Each day, my students have the opportunity to share if they have any exciting news they would like to tell their classmates.  Every Monday, we do a “Weekend Update” and students get to share a weekend highlight.  If a student participates in sports outside of school, sometimes parents will send me pictures or videos to share with the class.  I have also had students bring in sketchbooks to share if they are really interested in drawing or have demonstrated hobbies that they like to do such as knee hockey or ballet.  Students really enjoy being able to make connections with their classmates who have similar interests to them.

Activity

My students’ favorite part of Morning Meeting is when we play a game or do an activity to wrap up our Morning Meeting.  These activities or games are designed to take about 10 minutes.

At the beginning of the year, one of my favorite activities is creating a Bitmoji class picture.  I use the website Pixton to design the class photo.  I give each of my students a username generated by the website and then, they are able to create their own Bitmoji character.  After they are finished creating, all of the Bitmojis are compiled into a class photo.  This is one of my favorite activities that I do with my students all year and I give them the framed photo as a gift on the last day of school. I also use it as my Google Classroom banner.

Games

Some of my students favorite games are:

-Seven Up - This is a classic game where seven students stand at the front of the room and everyone else puts their head down and thumb up.  The seven students each put down someone’s thumb and then, students have to guess who picked them.

-Four Corners - Each corner of our classroom is labeled with a sign that says North, East, West, or South.  One student stands in the middle of the room with their eyes closed while other students move around the room.  Students have about one minute to move around the room and when the time is up, if the person in the middle says "North" for example, everyone in the North corner has to sit down.  The object of the game is to be the last person standing.

-21 - Students stand in a circle and go around the circle counting to 21.  Students can either say one, two, or three numbers when it is their turn.  If you say the number 21, you have to sit down. My students are very strategic during this game.

-Coseeki - Students sit in a circle.  One person sits in the middle of the circle with their eyes closed.  One student is chosen to be the “motion person” and everyone else copies this person’s motions.  When the student in the middle opens their eyes, they have to guess who the “motion person” is.

-Hot and Cold - One student stands in the hall and another student hides an object somewhere in the classroom.  I like to use Squishmallows for this game.  Once the object is hidden, the student in the hall comes back into the classroom and the class says “hot or cold” depending on how close they are getting to the object. Once the object is found, another round begins.

-Heads or Tails - Students stand in a circle.  I have a coin and they have to choose heads or tails.  If they choose heads, they put their hands on their head and if they choose tails, they put their hands on their hips.  When I flip the coin, if "heads" is called for example, everyone that said "tails" has to sit down.  The goal is to be the last person standing.

Please visit “We are Teachers: Morning Meeting Activities” to read about some more ways to make your Morning Meeting fun and engaging for students. Which of these activities would you like to try with your students next year?