Emily
Hey, there thanks for joining us today for teacher approved tips, a special series from the teacher approved podcast. Every Thursday, we bring you a weekly bonus episode highlighting new and favorite teacher approved tips from us and other amazing educators.
Emily
Our first tip is create a secret handshake for your class.
Heidi
As we mentioned in Monday's episode, it's important to proactively build your classroom community at the beginning of the year.
Emily
One way that I've done that in the past is by creating a secret handshake with my class. I'm actually not sure where I got this idea. In the morning meeting book from Responsive Classroom, it shares an idea for having students make up handshakes with each other as a greeting one day, but I like to have my class create one special handshake that we all knew and could do with each other.
Emily
So we would do this during one of our morning meetings early in the school year. The students would suggest different actions to add to the handshake like doing a fist bump or wiggling their fingers until we narrowed it down to a specific handshake. You don't want it to get too long, I think three to four actions is a good length.
Emily
After we narrowed down we'd practice it a few times and pass it around the circle. Going forward, we would use the secret handshake as one of our greeting styles during morning meeting, or sometimes we do it at our Friday circle. At the end of the day, every day, I like to stand at the door and say goodbye to students by letting them choose a hug a handshake or a high five with me on the way out.
Emily
So they could do a regular handshake or our secret class handshake. There are a lot of other variations you could add to that hug, handshake, high five thing too if you want to incorporate that into your day.
Heidi
I love having a personal moment with each student as the day comes to a close. And I know online I've seen some teachers do individual handshakes with each student, which is obviously an amazing way to build connection with each of your students.
Heidi
But I'm going to be honest that I don't think I could keep those individual handshake. So a class handshake would be the way to go for me.
Emily
Plus, I like how if you have a special secret handshake for your whole class, it's like you're in this special club together and only the people in your class know it. It's a great way to unify your whole class together.
Heidi
It's the little things that make your class feel like a family. We would love to hear your thoughts on classroom handshakes over in the teacher approved Facebook group.
Emily
Our second teacher approved tip today comes from Megan from The Literacy Dive. Let's give it a listen.
Megan
Hi, everyone. I am thrilled to be here with you on the Teacher Approved Podcast. My name is Megan Polk and I am the host of The Literacy Dive Podcast and the content creator of The Literacy Dive.
Megan
I cannot wait to share one of my teacher approved tips that you can get up and running in no time. I want to stress how important it is to embed writing into your schedule every single day. Even if it's only for a few minutes, I noticed a few things year after year.
Megan
What I noticed is that I saw growth in students who were reluctant to write but I also saw creativity soar in those who loved it. So both types of students benefited immensely and I want to share some ideas that can help you easily implement and make priority of writing this year.
Megan
Now I might be dating myself here. But when I was in school, we had something called DEAR time d-e-a-r. And it was an initiative to help all students across the whole entire school value reading. We were able to pick up any type of text, we were able to explore any genre we wanted, for a very, very short amount of time. But that's what we could do with drop everything and read.
Megan
So this got me thinking about a practice that I knew I wanted to do when I became a teacher. I definitely implemented DEAR time because I know how impactful that was for me. But I also implemented drop everything and write.
Megan
So very similarly this is a spontaneous activity. It's going to allow writing to enter your classroom in a very stress free but fun and exciting way. Students get free choice and when you give them free choice, you already automatically get their buy in because it's not forced.
Megan
And this time is self selected. So they're able to do free writing, they can finish a past writing, they could also use inspiration pulled from your writing center, maybe writing a recipe, making a card, writing a letter, all of those genres that we typically don't have coming through our classrooms every single day, but they're definitely still important to explore.
Megan
So I saw this connection between drop everything and read and drop everything and write, and together, this just made for a really exciting time in my classroom. So with drop everything and write, you could also allow for partners with this. So maybe a pair of students are working on a piece of writing together, this is a great time to allow for collaboration in the middle of your day, at a very spontaneous time. And your students are going to love being able to drop whatever they have, and go and write.
Megan
This time could also be used to incorporate writing activities, which are more specific, but it's just enough time for students to get some interaction with paper and pencil or a device if that's what you use, and be able to practice various writing skills.
Megan
This bite sized writing has so many benefits, and you can focus on a variety of writing skills or genres without students even knowing it. I like to call that disguising it. It's truly the best because your students will get the practice they need and it will not feel like writer's workshop or your writing block. Your students will be begging for the drop everything and write time.
Megan
Now I know you're probably thinking, Whoa, whoa, like what is this going to look like? How is this going to be managed? If I just say drop everything and write in the students are running everywhere and going everywhere and grabbing all the materials and this and that. I know that concern, I've heard that concern, I've experienced that concern.
Megan
So on the flip side to free write and just having students write about whatever they want, I do find that sometimes having a structure, but still plenty of time for student creativity is actually the perfect combo. Essentially, you would have an activity that's already prepared, ready to go for your drop everything and write time.
Megan
This could be building words, this could be picture this where they're writing about a picture, this can be a quick write, this can be writing an acrostic poem, whatever that skill or genre you want it to be that's connected to those activities. So at this time, when you call drop everything and write your students are going to know to get a pencil and to be ready to see what their creative writing activity is.
Megan
So to help with that, I have six free writing activities that are pulled out of different collections from the daily writing disguise. And I put them into a small sampler pack. Each main collection offers four different writing activities and 20 opportunities to make this a daily habit.
Megan
But I want you just to start small. I made these because time is of the essence. And all of these can be done within 10 minutes or even less. You can download this freebie at theliteracydive.com/sampler.
Megan
I want to encourage you to get in on the fun with your students. You will be surprised at how much of an impact that action of you writing too will truly make on your students. So if you're not a lover of writing, or if you lack confidence with teaching it, drop everything and write in some of these writing activities are actually going to help you as well. This practice truly makes writing more comfortable for you and for your students.
Megan
I know questions may come. So if you have any specific questions about this process, drop everything and write I would be more than happy to answer those for you. And the best way to get into contact with me is over on Instagram at @theliteracydive where I am very, very active.
Megan
Don't forget your free download at theliteracydive.com/sampler. And I hope that this can be a staple when you're doing drop everything and write. Heidi and Emily, thank you so much for having me on. I love the way you are supporting teachers through these teacher approved tips.
Emily
Thank you Megan, for sharing that tip with us. I'm kind of obsessed with this idea. I absolutely did drop everything and read when I was a student and my students always had reading time in my classroom as a teacher. I don't know why it never occurred to me to do drop everything and write
Heidi
Megan's point that you can have a really big impact by doing at least a little bit of writing every day really resonates with me because we already know that to be true with a lot of other instructional routines that we use and love.
Heidi
It makes perfect sense that making writing a priority with even just a few minutes of time every day will really move the needle on your students writing skills and help them build a love of writing.
Emily
And I love how you can do this as a completely open free write time, or give them a little guidance with a daily creative writing task. Be sure to check out Megan's generous free sampler of activities at the link in the show notes and you can connect with me Megan on Instagram at @theliteracydive and tune into her episodes on The Literacy Dive Podcast.
Heidi
That's it for today's episode. Try making a secret class handshake. And remember Megan's teacher approved tip to include drop everything and write time in your daily schedule.