10 Effective Ways to Start Class in the Middle School ELA Classroom
The bell is ringing, bodies are slamming through the doorway, and books are hitting the floor. The beginning of a class period can be one of the most hectic times of the day. On the other hand, if you have a good class-opening routine, those first few minutes may be something both you and your students actually look forward to! Here are 10 effective ways to begin class in a middle-school ELA classroom:
1. "Would You Rather" Attendance Questions
This is a fun and engaging way to start class, but depending on the question, it can derail a class pretty quickly. If you have a handle on your classroom management, go for it! On the other hand, if you have a tougher class, you may want to pick another option.
2. Independent Reading
This is just the most peaceful way to begin a class. I love to spend our independent-reading time reading my own books or talking to students about theirs. We read for ten minutes at the beginning of class, and I have six class periods each day. That means I get a total of SIXTY minutes to read every day! This is SO helpful because I am able to recommend a ton of these books to my students! It can be tempting to use this time for emails or grading, but I encourage you to try reading when your students read. It sets a great example for the kids.
3. Guided Breathing Exercises
Pre-teens are going through a lot these days, and not everyone has access to the professional help they may need. While guided breathing certainly can’t replace professional counseling, it can be helpful for anxious students who need to ground themselves before getting started on their work.
4. Journaling
When I first started teaching, I began each class period with a journal prompt. Sometimes they were silly. Sometimes they were serious. I loved how much I got to know my students through reading those prompts each quarter. Eventually, I moved to a bigger school and knew that I couldn't keep up with reading or checking 165 journal entires x 5 days/week x 9 weeks/quarter, so I let it go. But I really miss the student-teacher connection those journals brought us.
5. Standards-based Attendance Questions
When we started meeting for Zoom classes in 2020, it became difficult to gauge how much my students were understanding. To keep better tabs on them, I started to use content-related attendance questions to check in with my students since I couldn't talk with them in person. Sometimes the question might be as simple as, "Why are so many people afraid of public speaking?" and sometimes they would actually assess the topic we were covering. Either way, the questions were always related to the standards we were covering in class that day. It definitely helped!
6. Handshakes
I love having my homeroom kids greet each other with handshakes in the morning. It takes a little too much time for me to do the same with my other classes, but my homeroom kids enjoy greeting each other with weird voices and creative handshakes/pinky shakes/fist bumps/elbow bumps, etc. These days we’re pretty wary of germy, physical contact, but air-high-fives are always on the table.
7. Bell Ringers
I used to give my students an assignment on the white board at the beginning of each class, and I know many other teachers do the same. I really love the concept of students getting right to work as they walk into the classroom. It’s just super important that each daily assignment is closely aligned to the standards. Otherwise, it can smell a bit like busy work.
8. Quiz or Pre-assessment
A digital pre-assessment can help you shape your lesson for the day. Google Forms and Kahoot! are just a couple of ways students can show what they know.
9. Recitation of Class Goals
Last year, my students set reading strategies to different beats, and the kids would take turns playing the drum set while we chanted our reading strategies as a class. We turned these into dance parties, and let me tell you—those kids do NOT forget their reading strategies. Class objectives and goals can also be set to beats for some hard-core focus at the beginning of the class period.
10. Stretching/Yoga
Some days my kids walk into our classroom already arguing or crying. On days like that, I have found that it's helpful to just stop and talk before starting the day. A few stretches or poses can also be helpful when kids need a break, and this can be a really thoughtful way to begin a period.
After the first 10 minutes of class, your options are wide open! You can find 144 teaching ideas for every 7th-grade ELA standard in this free pdf download.