CREating a successful classroom environment
This year, I am introducing classroom meetings in our 5th grade classroom. We will be having them once a week (usually Fridays). The class is fully aware that classroom meetings are taken seriously, and they are not a time to joke around. It is a time for us to gather as a classroom community to promote each other's social, emotional, and academic growth in a respectful and thoughtful manner.
WHAT ARE CLASSROOM MEETINGS?
Classroom meetings are a way for students to work together in order to solve problems and raise awareness about classroom issues as well as celebrate academic and social successes. They promote a classroom climate that is built on trust and respect among the students and teacher while establishing a sense of communal belonging and fostering tolerance, self-discipline, responsibility, and compassion within students.
In addition, they provide students with the opportunity to embrace multiple viewpoints while trying to understand the diverse thinking that occurs throughout the classroom. During classroom meetings, teachers act as the facilitators while students decide the course of the agenda and take ownership of their own learning through speaking, listening, and leadership skills. It is a time of the week where many students have shown the most excitement because they have the opportunity to share their viewpoints and work together to achieve a common goal based on what they value and deem most important in OUR classroom community.
WHAT ARE THE BENEFITS?
WHAT DOES THE AGENDA FOR A MEETING LOOK LIKE?
WHAT ARE CLASSROOM MEETINGS?
Classroom meetings are a way for students to work together in order to solve problems and raise awareness about classroom issues as well as celebrate academic and social successes. They promote a classroom climate that is built on trust and respect among the students and teacher while establishing a sense of communal belonging and fostering tolerance, self-discipline, responsibility, and compassion within students.
In addition, they provide students with the opportunity to embrace multiple viewpoints while trying to understand the diverse thinking that occurs throughout the classroom. During classroom meetings, teachers act as the facilitators while students decide the course of the agenda and take ownership of their own learning through speaking, listening, and leadership skills. It is a time of the week where many students have shown the most excitement because they have the opportunity to share their viewpoints and work together to achieve a common goal based on what they value and deem most important in OUR classroom community.
WHAT ARE THE BENEFITS?
- Students and teachers alike will feel a sense of community
- Students will feel supported in becoming independent problem-solvers and that their voices are being heard and respected
- Fewer discipline problems and improved positive motivation
WHAT DOES THE AGENDA FOR A MEETING LOOK LIKE?
- Greeting
- Compliments (social and academic successes are praised)
- Follow up on previous meeting
- Problem solve
- Wrap Up