One Little Word -- Inspired by Our Classroom Routine

We change desks every two weeks in Room 226. Students' morning work on moving day is to move all their belongings out of their desk (or box) to a stack on their chair (or stool or nearby their spot at a standing table). Then we clean and disinfect (hooray for Clorox and Lysol wipes!) our old abode so the new tenant will have a fresh start. (Embedded life skill: clean the apartment so you get your deposit back!) With all of the students seated in the meeting area, I pull sticks to "assign" seats. First stick pulled chooses a spot at the first table, next stick sits at the stool table, then the clock table, the red chairs table, and the blue chairs table, and back around again until all the sticks are pulled and everyone has a new spot. (Pairs of students volunteer for the two standing tables.) So, every two weeks, students get a new table group and a new view in the classroom. I am not in charge of creating a seating chart and therefore, I am not in charge of behavior--they are. In reality, the spot they are assigned is mostly just a predictable place to put their belongings. Seating is flexible during most every work time--they are also in charge of their learning zone.

We've added a new spin to this bi-weekly routine. I wrote about it a few weeks ago, and it was #12 in last year's 31 Teaching Truths. We choose a new word to BE for the next two weeks. The person who chooses the word gets to determine the style of the lettering and decorate the poster. So far this year, we've been positive, fierce, focused, persevering, love (not be loving, but actually be love), courageous, flexible, and confident.

In 2019, instead of choosing One Little Word for the year, I am going to spend more time with each of the words we choose for our gallery of what we will BE.

A few weeks ago in a conversation about our words (not during the actual choosing ceremony), I tossed out the word WIERD in honor of our ongoing celebration of diversity, but was gently redirected by one of my students. He suggested that UNIQUE would be a more positive expression, one without the negative connotations. (So...maybe our quick little practice of lining up shades of meaning in synonyms is starting to stick?) Let the record stand, though, the words that are chosen are theirs, not mine. And yes, kids are starting to hoard words, hoping to be the next one chosen.

Lo and behold, the word that was chosen for this round was, indeed, UNIQUE. Perfect word, actually. It was the theme of the talk they heard on Monday from author Jason Tharp! So for the next two weeks, we'll celebrate all that makes us one-of-a-kind.