A follow-up to our community building
So, I decided to do a few things differently than I had expected for today's Teambuilding class. I ended up creating these cute little "Say Something Nice" cards and started the class by giving each student one of these cards filled out by me saying nice things about each of them. These, of course, we're well received. We then sat in a community circle and discussed the things we disliked about the class. Answers ranged from the chairs in the room to bullying, which sparked a great round table discussion. We then went on to discuss the things we liked in the class with answers ranging from nothing (I hate school), to them liking the new teaching strategies they have seen in this class (their words). Again this sparked a great discussion about what great things we want to continue to do in this class. After all of this information was out in the open and the students had been very open to sharing, we moved on to the "Say something nice" portion of the day. Here, each of us in the circle said something nice about the person to our right, then about the person to our left and then about the person across from us. I wasn't sure what to expect during this portion, but the compliments amazed me! The students were then asked to take one or more of the cards (see the template) and write something nice about one of the adults, of their choice, in the school. There were a number of amazing cards created and the smiles on the teachers' faces was nice to see. At the end of class, I asked the students on their exit cards if they liked sharing and saying nice things to each other and every student responded with a "yes"! It was a good feel-good kind of day and so needed by all of us in these dark days of November. Now, on to December!