How to Build Positive Relationships with Your Students at Back-to-School [episode 148]

Emily  0:37

Hey there, thanks for joining us today. In today’s episode, we’ve got some simple ways to affirm students at the start of the year, and a teacher approved tip for making it easy to connect with your students.

Heidi  0:49

We start our episodes with a morning message just like we used to do it morning meeting in our classrooms. This week’s morning message is you and your grade level team just started a band. What are you calling yourself? Emily, what is your new band name?

Emily  1:05

Well, I think our band name could be the Paper Jams.

Heidi  1:10

I lik that. It works on two levels so funny.

Emily  1:13

What would yours be, Heidi?

Heidi  1:17

Maybe the Common Assessments.

Emily  1:20

Our teacher approved Facebook group had a lot of fun with this one. Arlene’s team would be the Data Divers.

Heidi 1:27

Can I be an honorary member since I used to be on Arlene’s team.

Emily  1:31

You’ll have to ask Arlene. She one leader. Tammy says her team has already called the Dream Team and I think I might be jealous. That’s a good name.

Heidi  1:40

Yeah, that is good one.

Emily  1:41

Tracy says the Fidelity Felons. I’m not sure if that’s because they’re sick of fidelity are so good at it, it should be a felony. Colleen said her team had a second grade rocks theme one year and all the teachers got rock star names. Her teammate was Vance Halen, and she was Barn Jovi. Tim says that with the increase of scripted curricula, he’s going with Talking Heads.

Heidi  2:11

Tim’s got some strong feelings. I can’t blame him.

Emily  2:14

Yeah, but I think that one’s already taken, unfortunately. Too bad Tim. We’d love to have you join the conversation over in our teacher approved Facebook group.

Emily  2:23

As you’re starting your plans for the first few weeks of school, keep in mind your ATTABOY goals.

Heidi  2:31

ATTABOY stands for affirming, training, teaching and assessing at the beginning of the year.

Emily  2:36

Now if you’re new here, welcome. Hi, we’re so glad you’ve joined us. But if you’ve listened to this podcast before, you might guess that our favorite ATTABOY goal is training. We can’t get enough of procedures and expectations and routines, and systems. All that beautiful fun stuff.

Heidi  2:39

Well, you know, at least we think it’s fun.

Emily  2:58

But actually our favorite ATTABOY goal, the one we would say is the most important at back to school is affirming.

Heidi  3:06

We define affirming as all of the work that we do to create a space that is safe and welcoming and nurtures a feeling of community.

Emily  3:15

One of the reasons we love procedures the way we do is because of how much they support our goals of affirming. A classroom that is safe and welcoming is also a classroom that’s predictable and structured. Procedures and routines create the foundation of a nurturing classroom.

Heidi  3:32

Back in episode 87, we shared the four main ways to affirm students. They are first recognizing students as individuals. Next, building a positive class identity. Third is making connections among class members. And last is to extend your class community beyond your classroom.

Emily  3:52

Those are very broad categories, and there are many different ways to incorporate them into your first week of school plans. We shared some suggestions in Episode 87. But today we’ve got a whole new list of practical takeaways.

Heidi  4:05

Because practical takeaways are the best. I need to work on my air horn.

Emily  4:14

Oh, nice try though. Let’s kick things off with suggestions of ways to recognize your students as individuals. Heidi, what do you got?

Heidi  4:23

One way you can recognize your students as individuals before school even starts is to make sure that anything you choose to display reflects your students identities.

Emily  4:32

In a 2019 study, researchers discovered that adjusting images and examples in classroom displays to mirror student’s own culture boosted grades by nine percentage points.

Heidi  4:45

Everyone wants to see themselves reflected in their space. So keep that in mind as you set up your classroom.

Emily  4:51

Another way to make sure your class decor is inclusive is to let your students help make your displays. We all love a Pinterest perfect bulletin board. But displays are more meaningful to your students if they participate in making them.

Heidi  5:05

Joanne at head over heels for teaching has a tradition that I love. She has her students choose a motivational quote to illustrate. And here’s what she has to say.

Heidi  5:16

This has been one of my favorite activities for 26 years. I realized I was spending way too much money on pre made posters from the teacher’s store, and I wanted our classroom to be ours. This gives students a sense of ownership and it really brightens our room with their creativity.

Emily  5:33

I love this because not only does having students create classroom decor, ensure that the decor is inclusive, but as Joanne said, it gives students a sense of ownership in their classroom. When students feel that they belong in the class, they’re more willing to meet your expectations and engage in learning. So it is a win for everyone. I feel like Joanne does this really well. So for sure, check her out on Instagram.

Heidi  5:57

Yes, she is above and beyond with the ways that she creates class community.

Emily  6:01

Absolutely.

Heidi  6:04

Another way to recognize students as individuals is to do shout outs. Edutopia has a little video about this. And I do say little because it’s literally one minute long. We’ll link to it in the show notes if you want to watch it. Just make sure you pop the popcorn ahead of time, because you want to time during the video.

Heidi  6:21

Basically, all you do is have a prompt, like a little tiny ring or something else. And then you ask each group to give a shout out to someone who they noticed was doing something well, or was brave enough to try something difficult.

Emily  6:34

I love how simple this is. And you could do this any time of day, even multiple times a day if you want.

Heidi  6:41

Obviously, you’re going to have to teach your students your expectations. It will take some modeling and reflection for them to understand what kinds of things should be shouted out.

Emily  6:51

Yeah for sure. I bet you’ll get a lot of off topic suggestions at first and that’s okay. Roll with it and redirect them. Yes, Camden does have cool shoes. But did you notice how he was doing his work.

Heidi  7:05

It’s so powerful for kids to be validated by their peers. As teachers you know, we can welcome and recognize our students all day long. But it means so much more when that cheering comes from their classmates.

Emily  7:19

Another simple tip comes from our teacher approved Facebook community. Tabitha says we made our own playlist. I let my kids write down their top three songs. And after I check them out, I make a Spotify playlist with their songs. They love when I let them listen to that playlist. It’s also neat to see the diversity of what my kids listened to. I have everything from classic rock to current pop.

Emily  7:41

They beg me to play the class playlist. Every so often I let them add new songs. They just turn them in on a sticky note and I vet them and then decide if they can be added or not. I told them right out the gate that not all songs would make it and they may not be appropriate and they were okay with that.

Heidi  7:56

Talk about you’re getting a lot of bang for your buck. Without too much work. Tabitha is able to celebrate her kids as individuals, and use their contributions to help build the class identity.

Emily  8:07

How convenient then that building a positive class identity is the second way to affirm students.

Heidi  8:14

Wow, it’s almost like we planned it.

Emily  8:17

Crazy. When it comes to building a positive class identity, build is the key word. As the teacher you lay the foundation, but building the rest of it requires a team effort.

Heidi  8:29

One way we can build that identity is by giving students responsibility in the class. And the easiest way to give responsibility is to assign class jobs.

Emily  8:38

There are so many ways to manage class jobs. When you see what another teacher is doing, it’s tempting to assume that you should be doing the same thing. But the truth is you should do whatever works for you. The kids will still get the benefits of handling responsibilities no matter how you set it up.

Heidi  8:53

Of course one of the biggest ways to impact class identity is with a daily morning meeting.

Emily  8:59

We love morning meeting around here so much. It’s so good. It checks every box for building class community kids are welcomed and recognizes individuals. They practice communicating respectfully, and the whole group participates in a shared activity. The only downside to morning meeting is the time that it takes.

Heidi  9:17

Yeah, time pressure is real. Only 140 or so math lessons stand between you and end of year testing.

Emily  9:25

And this is one of the push backs we hear most often of why people can’t do morning meeting they think they just do not have the time.

Emily  9:34

But when that pressure starts to creep in, remind yourself that creating a positive class community isn’t just about the kids feeling good. It has a direct impact on learning, when students feel accepted and included in improves their academic performance.

Heidi  9:49

That’s because kids who feel valued are willing to keep trying when things get hard. They learn to see themselves as capable and are more willing to contribute to the classroom.

Emily  9:59

If you’re on the fence It’s about morning meeting tried to reframe it as a time investment instead of a time commitment. Helping students feel that they’re valued members of the class means they’re more willing to participate and put effort into their work, which leads to greater achievement.

Heidi  10:15

After recognizing students as individuals and building a positive class identity, the third way to affirm students is to make connections among class members. Tell us more about this Emily.

Emily  10:26

At the start of the year, that means get to know you activities, right, you can do this formally with activities like find someone who or would you rather.

Heidi  10:35

And both of those activities have the bonus of letting kids stand up and move, which is always welcome at the start of the year. With find someone who they can kind of mingle around the space a bit with Would You Rather you can assign different sides of the room for each option, and then have kids move to the side they prefer.

Emily  10:52

You can extend that idea into four corners. Instead of two options assigned each corner of the room a different option, you could do favorite ice cream flavors, and have a corner for chocolate, vanilla, peanut butter and strawberry, then the kids move to the corner that matches their preference.

Heidi  11:07

And just so that no one is left out, you might want to have one of the corners, or maybe the center of the room be designated as a space for I don’t like any of those options.

Emily  11:18

Because you know, there will be plenty of kids who say that.

Heidi  11:21

And you will hear about it if you don’t have a choice for them.

Emily  11:24

Go noodle has a bunch of fun are you more like videos if you want a similar move around the room activity already done for you.

Heidi  11:31

These type of games are great for making connections because they show kids how much they have in common with each other.

Emily  11:38

Besides that type of formal get to know your game, you could do a team building activity where the students are working toward a goal. But the real goal is the friends we make along the way.

Heidi  11:49

Of course it is. Just be really certain that the task you’re assigning is one that your students can successfully manage at the start of the year. Yes, we want to promote a growth mindset that says that mistakes are okay. But we don’t want anyone getting the idea that they have failed on the third day of school.

Emily  12:09

Oh for sure. The anxiety is high those first few days. Aim for an activity that is challenging, but doable for the age you teach. Then his kids work together to rescue a gummy worm or build a spaghetti noodle tower, they’re learning to relate to each other.

Heidi  12:24

If you don’t want to fool problem solving activity, just playing games together is a great way for students to get acquainted with each other and with you. You could play back to school bingo, or sing a silly song, or even learn a new math game.

Emily  12:39

There are a lot of digital options as well. Your students could create their own all about me quizzes on Kahoot, or make a school scavenger hunt on the goose chase app. How fun would it be to have groups go on a photo scavenger hunt around the school?

Heidi  12:53

Especially because we want to extend our class community beyond the classroom. So helping students get familiar with the school is a great way to do that.

Emily  13:02

You also may want to invite some of the school staff to come introduce themselves to your class and explain what they do to help the school.

Heidi  13:09

Kids have no idea how much work goes on behind the scenes to make their school day possible. Knowing what the adults in the building are doing to help them can motivate them to you know, be grateful and say thank you, and hopefully to make fewer messes.

Emily  13:25

Yeah, hopefully. A kindness challenge is also a great way to bridge the class and the community, you could set a class goal of doing 500 acts of kindness in a month. Or you could challenge each student to do an act of kindness each day.

Heidi  13:39

While kindness is its own reward, you can increase the benefit to your class by having some kind of visual way to track their progress. That way students can see how their individual acts are contributing toward a larger goal. One way to do this is by posting a big chart with empty boxes and having students write their names in a box for each act of kindness that they do.

Emily  14:03

I’ve also seen kindness chains where students add a link to the chain for each kind act they do. With the whole class working on it, I bet those chains get pretty long.

Heidi  14:12

Partnering with another class is a great way to reach out beyond your class walls. This is especially meaningful if you can partner with a class in a different grade level. My second graders had fifth grade buddies for a lot of years, mostly because my friend Angela taught fifth grade. And it was just a partner of our classes.

Heidi  14:31

But the kids really loved it. We made up for the last 20 minutes on Fridays. And when we first started, I would have the fifth graders help my second graders read. But I eventually switched to math games. And that was even better, because as it turns out, fifth graders can also use the review of second grade math skills.

Emily  14:50

There are so many fun back to school ideas you could choose to do.

Heidi  14:54

But while the options are limitless, your time is not.

Emily  14:58

So we want to make sure that what we choose to do in the first days of school is laying the foundation for a successful year. To guide your decisions round up ideas for how to meet the goal of affirming your students at the start of the year.

Heidi  15:11

Look for activities that will help you recognize students as individuals, build a positive class identity, make connections among class members, and also extend your class community beyond your classroom.

Emily  15:24

We know you’re on your way to having your best year yet.

Heidi  15:27

We would love to hear all about your favorite Back to School activities. Come join the conversation in our teacher approved Facebook group.

Emily  15:36

Now let’s talk about this week’s teacher approved tip. Each week, we leave you with a small actionable tip that you can apply in your classroom today. This week’s teacher approved tip is make it easy to have positive contact. What can you tell us about this Heidi?

Heidi  15:51

Since we are talking about ways to affirm students, one of the best ways to recognize students as individuals is to make personal connections. But you know how it goes in the hectic flow of a school day, it is really hard to have any one on one time with your students, especially any of your students who aren’t needing a lot of support from you.

Heidi  16:14

One way to make sure that that contact is happening is to send positive notes. And now if you are like me, that was often on my to do list, but was frequently the first thing I skipped. I knew it was important. But when faced with so many other tasks, it was easy to just push it to the next day. And then the next day and you know, then it’s next year.

Heidi  16:36

If this task seems valuable, we want to make it easy to do the right thing. One way to do that is to prepare ahead of time. If your goal is to send a positive note to each student each month, you could print slips of papers with the kids names already on them. Then each day you grab the top one off the stack and jot a quick note and you are ready to go.

Emily  16:56

If you really want to be on top of it, you could print the whole year at once. That way you’re not going to fall behind because you need to print more.

Heidi  17:03

Yeah, the more barriers we can eliminate ahead of time, the more likely you are to be successful. You also might want to print a few blank ones because you know there will be new students coming during the year.

Emily  17:15

Or if you don’t want to have printed notes, grab a pack of post it notes and count out a stack for each month. Then go through and write each student’s name on a post it. That might be more work up front but post its are so handy for just adding to take home folders.

Heidi  17:30

Another thing that can help is to create a bank of general nice things to say. I used to get hung up trying to find something personal to say to each student. And it is important to be able to say I noticed how you were a good friend to Easton when he got hurt on the playground today. But don’t let perfect be the enemy of good our fatal downfall around here.

Heidi  17:52

It’s better to write something generic like I’m so glad I get to be your teacher than it is to write nothing. Fostering personal connections with your students is so important. So do what you can to make the process easy to manage.

Heidi  18:07

To wrap up the show we are sharing what we’re giving extra credit to this week. Emily, what gets your extra credit?

Emily  18:12

I’m giving extra credit to the very fancy As Seen on TV product the Cup Cozy. Of course, this is a foam pillow that has little circular inserts for holding cups so that you can keep your drinks next to you on the couch without spilling.

Emily  18:29

My son likes to make what I lovingly call his nest of blankets on the couch to relax in. He always wants to keep his drink next to him when he’s in his little nest. But it stresses me out that he will spill all over the couch. And even though it is usually just water, still a big wet mess. So I grabbed this silly drink cozy pillow thing for his birthday and he absolutely loves it.

Emily  18:54

He’s like this is the best gift after he was all done with all the presents and everybody went home he was like got that one out first and was like this is going to be so great. And it is actually very well made and could be handy for anyone who wants to keep a drink or a snack or remote handy next to you on the couch. So it is the exact kind of ridiculous in my opinion.

Emily  19:16

And I actually think Target is making a knockoff of this that’s like in the dollar spot right now. But I haven’t seen it and I don’t know if it is comparable but maybe if you want something extra cheap check your dollar spot.

Heidi  19:29

Yeah, but that one really did seem sturdy, and he was very tickled with it.

Emily  19:34

That boy, he’s so cute. Okay, what are you giving extra credit to Heidi?

Heidi  19:38

Well, speaking of that silly boy and his birthday presents, my extra credit goes to smart games. If you’re not familiar, they make games that focus on problem solving and strategy. And they do have multiplayer games like the kind that you could play as a family. But the thing I really love are their single player games.

Heidi  19:56

We have used some of them for years with our preschoolers and They were very popular with the kids. One that I love that we would, of course, get out in the spring was a little wooden bunny in a box. And then the kids have picture cards. And they’re the goal is to stack the pieces to match the picture. It starts off pretty straightforward. But the challenges get increasingly complicated.

Heidi  20:19

I love that all of their pieces are really well made and fun to play with like they have one. That’s the three little piggies and it’s just the cute little piggies and a wolf. And of course, the little three houses. It’s so cute. And I shouldn’t have looked at their website because even though I’m not teaching preschool at the moment, they have this new one. So it’s like this little wooden tree with these circle cut out see clip these little colorful birds in.

Emily  20:45

So you need to adopt somebody’s preschool class.

Heidi  20:52

But I did buy a gift for the birthday boy the other day. And I got him because he’s not in preschool, a game called tower stacks, where it gives you a bunch of tower pieces that you have to arrange to build castles to match the pictures. It looks really fun. So hopefully it’ll keep him busy for a while. Once he’s done with his water holding pillow.

Emily  21:15

He can probably use both at the same time.

Heidi  21:19

These games are kind of pricey, but I think they could be so fun to add to your inside recess games bin. Because even if they are single player, I could see kids working together to try and figure out these challenges. Maybe you see if you’ve got any parents who are willing to donate if you put this on your wish list. I think it’d be a lot of fun.

Emily  21:36

Yeah.

Heidi  21:37

That’s it for today’s episode. Remember to round up some practical ideas for affirming your kids at the start of the school year. And don’t forget today’s teacher approved tip, make it easy to have positive contact.