With Spring in full force and the number of days to the end of the school year dwindling down, we thought it might be helpful to share some ideas for finishing your school year successfully. While it may be tempting to ease up on academic activities, we encourage you to help your students stay engaged in learning. How do you actively engage students as the school year ends?
Here are some suggestions to keep students focused on learning:
Skip the public end of the school year countdown.
We know it is common for teachers to have a countdown to the last day of school prominently displayed. We get it. You are tired. Your students are tired. You are looking forward to summer.
Keep in mind that anxiously counting down the days sends a message that you can’t wait to get out of school. You want to stop the learning. You want to be away from school and from your students.
Believe it or not, many students are happier in school that out of school. School is safe. They participate in meal programs and extracurricular activities. They are supervised. Adults pay attention to them. Many students feel untethered during school breaks, left alone to entertain themselves and care for themselves. Be aware that to some students, summer is not necessarily something to celebrate.
Find ways to celebrate the learning that students have accomplished this year.
If your district uses portfolios, you have a built- in system for celebration. Give students time to analyze their work, choose the work that represents their best learning, and reflect on the skills they have learned. Be sure to share their portfolios with peers and with parents.
Create a project for the last couple of weeks that allows students to create and demonstrate their learning from the year. This might be a great time to have them create a video, a “Ted Talk” type of speech, a Power Point or another form of presentation.
Put on a puppet show! Students can create puppets and write scripts about something they have learned over the school year. This is a great way to review concepts.
Have students use the writing process and write a letter to parents sharing the key things they have learned this year.
Have students write letters to next year’s students sharing their favorite activities and events, keys to success, and the most important things they learned in your class this year. Collect the letters into a class book.
Let students nominate themselves and submit their best work for your class “awards.” These can be all kinds of made up awards such as “Best Use of Experimental Procedure” or “Most Original Composition.” Use your standards and curriculum to come up with many awards, both serious and just for fun.
Give students opportunities to publicly share their learning from the year.
Present your class play, your student’s poetry, or your students musical talents at a nursing home.
Let students select their best pieces of writing and collect them into books to display at local businesses.
Display student art work in local businesses.
Have older students teach younger students a skill they have learned this year.
Give students suggestions for summer activities.
This doesn’t have to be summer homework, though some schools do assign summer reading or other work.
Give students a list of your top ten favorite books, which they might want to read over the summer. Do book talks and make the books sound so good students will want to read them!
Give students the schedules for summer library programs or local day camps. Share information about local events, museum exhibits or activities that they might want to participate in over the summer months.
Tap into your students’ expertise as well. Have them make lists of their favorite books, movies, and summer activities.
Ask students to make a plan for learning over the summer.
Maybe they will love trying out the experiments found in books of science activities for students. Maybe they would love math puzzles. Maybe they would love to write and illustrate their own book of poems. Maybe they would love to watch 20 classic award- winning films. Perhaps they can read and watch videos to improve at a sport or hobby.
If students have access to technology over the summer, challenge them to make a video or other project. They might love to write plays based on fairy tales, act them out and make videos with their friends! Or, they may become the next You Tube sensation by explaining historical people or events to other high school students. An interest in history worked out well for Lin- Manuel Miranda!
These are just a few ideas to get you thinking about how you might keep students engaged in learning at the end of the school year and over the summer.
We would love to hear your end of school activities in the comments below!
Our best,
[…] Actively Engage Students As the School Year Ends […]