You may wonder what should take place in a math classroom the first week of school. I’m sure you have visions of making everything perfect and you know how important it is to establish procedures and start the year on a good note. Since I’ve been doing this for a long time, I thought I would tell you what I usually do, so here goes!
I recommend that new teachers follow a PowerPoint the first day and make sure you give your students all the important rules and procedures. Many teachers have read Harry Wong’s First Days of School. This book has many great thoughts and tips to prepare teachers for the first weeks of school. If you are more established, then you may not want to go over the PowerPoint all in one day and instead do bits and pieces of it throughout the week.
I like to give students an “About Me” page as bell work on the first day. This gives them something to do and it give me time to make sure all is well before I start.
With the “About Me” page, I will also give the students an index card. The index card gets folded in half long ways and students write their name on it. They set the name plate on their desk so that I can start learning names. I use these name plates throughout the year for various reasons.
The other thing I like to do during the first days in my math class are activities from YouCubed. The items I focus on are in the Week of Inspirational Math(s). I’ll give more specifics in my weekly plan.
I am on a block schedule and I see my students three times a week. I have Mon/Wed/ Friday classes and Tue/Thur/Friday classes. Classes are 90 minutes except on Friday they are about 45 minutes. Here is what a sample first week would look like in my math class.
- Mon/Tue Classes – Bell Work (About Me Activity), Name Plate, First Day PowerPoint and Scavenger Hunt. The scavenger hunt helps students become familiar with the syllabus and our online platform. I use Canvas. I put the material needed on this platform and teach them how to find the syllabus, scavenger hunt and the online parent contact form. All are digital, so it’s nice not to take up any paper copies of things.
- Wed/Thu Classes – Name Plates are handed out. Wrap up anything that was not finished from the previous class. Do the 4 4’s Activity from YouCubed. If time allows, I’ll start the Collatz conjecture (Oh Hail the Elephant.)
- Friday – I like to finish the Collatz conjecture and then do one more activity or watch other videos from YouCubed. (Be sure to look through the Week of Inspirational Math(s). Another good one that I like to do is building shapes. You can see a demo in the first picture on this post where students are making shapes using string.) I remind students about the materials they need to bring to class on Monday so they can ask their parents to get them over the weekend. I also remind students to complete any paperwork over the weekend.
Take a look at my 1st Week of School for the Secondary Educator in my TpT Store.
I hope you got some good ideas from the lesson plan above. It’s nice to see what other people are doing. Ask your fellow teachers at your school what they do. Collaborate with your peers on other ideas. Most teachers do not start their curriculum until the 2nd or 3rd week of school these days.
Have a great year!
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