It hasn't been all elves and ugly Christmas sweaters that light up (gotta love it!) at Cleveland Elementary over the past two weeks, as fun as that has been!
All of my lessons are in full swing as I cover the character traits of Respect and Compassion with kindergarten, second, and fourth grade students, many of which incorporate centers for student activities. I talked about using centers last year for a Compassion lesson in this post and emphasized Compassion in accepting differences, particularly disabilities. Many of you really liked the idea!
Centers are one of my favorite lesson strategies, and I shared how I use them during my presentation at the 2014 NCSCA Conference. I was surprised by how many people seemed interested in creating centers for their own lessons and was asked by numerous people if I had any to share on my TPT Life on the Fly Store. It reminded me of this video I recently saw in a blog post by George Couros, an innovative administrator in Canada.
Can you relate? The brilliance of bloggers I follow and my school counselor colleagues continues to astound me, while I am still somewhat surprised when someone emails me about a "great idea" they were able to use from my blog. And that's what makes collaboration so great! What might seem like a "no brainer" to you could make all the difference to someone else.So, I wanted to share my top tips for using centers in your classroom guidance lessons.
1. Use a timer or give students clear voice/hand signal prompts to make center rotations calm and efficient. Classroom management is really the key to successfully incorporating centers into your lessons! I give a 30 second warning and then say "Give me 5" to indicate we are about to transition. As soon as my hand goes up, the students' hands go up, and they know mouths are silent. Then, I count down 5-4-3-2-1 as they walk to the next center. I prefer this method to timers because it gives me flexibility in case there is a group that needs an extra minute on one rotation. However, I have used both methods. Also, don't be afraid to use short time increments for your centers. In my ability awareness centers, students were only at each of the six centers for about 4 minutes before I had them rotate.
2. Use a center worksheet to maintain student accountability. No matter what type of centers I am using, there is a finished product that holds students accountable. Sometimes there is individual accountability like in my ability awareness center sheet. Other times, teams are coming up with a skit or writing answers on a whiteboard that will have to be shared in front of the class.
3. Have more activities available than time will allow. I never want students to be bored or have idle time in my centers. If they are brainstorming, I tell them to brainstorm "as many ideas as they can" so I will get at least a handful of quality ideas. In my ability awareness centers, there are at least two activities for each center. If they don't get to every single sentence or question it is okay, as long as they learned enough to complete their work product. This strategy helps me keep even the quickest of workers actively engaged during my lesson.
4. Assign your center teams carefully. This tip is a no brainer but extremely important. If you know you have students that don't handle unstructured activities well, you may need to put them in a smaller group and choose partners for that student that have above-average behavior.
5. Incorporate multimedia into at least one of your centers. Centers are a great time to use those 2 or 3 computers that are in every classroom. Find a great website that relates to what you are teaching, play a video from YouTube that will catch the students' attention, or give them something interactive to do on the Smartboard if you have one at your disposal. There are a million 21st century technology resources available online for free. Use them!
If you want to start with a ready-made lesson, check out my Ability Awareness center pack and accompanying Smartboard lesson on TPT by clicking the images. Or, get creative and incorporate centers into a lesson you already use. Either way, get started on some amazing centers!
Enjoy and Happy Counseling!
~ Angela
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