A Soft Opening

The beginning of a school day has always been hectic for me.  There is lunch to sign up for, notes to be handed in, attendance to be taken, and so on.  But today, a day after a snow day my classroom is calm.

Over the summer, maybe even at that first Joy Write meeting, a suggestion of having a soft opening was made.  This meant that students would have choice in what they did for morning work.  Would they choose to read, write, play a math game, catch up on work or just relax and chat?

I decided to give this idea a try this year, most days at least.  Some days the class has a quick worksheet and then get to choose.  Other days they choose the whole time.  It gives me time to meet with students that I need to check in with.  It gives me time to greet everyone as only a few, if any, come up to me with questions.  It gives me a chance to breath and start the day calm as well.  Today I had 2 kids reading, 7 kids practicing math, 5 kids writing, and the rest of them are relaxing and talking to each other.

Each time we have these soft openings it amazes me how calm the class is as a whole.  Even with all the students that choose to relax and chat it is still calmer than on a day where there is “dictated” morning work.  How can something as simple as choosing what you want to work on have such a peaceful start to the day?  Why don’t I do this everyday?  Is it just my class or would this be the same in every room?  I knew from the start though, it was going to be a good day 🙂