Circle Applications in the Classroom
To begin:
- Morning
Meeting
- Check-in:
how was your night, what’s going on in your life, go over schedules for
the day
- To
create classroom beliefs, rule, expectations
- Getting
to know each other, name games, sharing, something no one knows about you
Anytime:
- To
teach character values: perseverance, respect courage, honesty,
accountability, responsibility, compassion, excellence, reverence,
authenticity, and random acts of kindness.
- Behavior
issues: teasing, stealing, fighting, threats, problems on the playground
- Sharing:
show and tell, a birthday present, an item from home
- Brainstorming
ideas: ideas for creative writing, how to spend class money, where to go
on field trips, class projects, research paper topic, planning music
program
- Discussion:
news article, current events, books poems
- Fun,
cooperative activity: lap sit, untangle the knot, telling jokes, Mrs.
Mulumby
- Story
telling: ghost stories
- Reviewing:
unit, quiz test, term/quarter, for fun
- Evaluation:
field trips, assemblies, books, units, projects, effort, job performance
- Goal
setting: for project, subject, unit, test behavior
- Classmate
is an outcast, how can we help/get to know him/her better
- To
find out why ¾ of us bombed the test
- To
debrief what did and didn’t go well in their cooperative group
- Student
led circles: in class, with younger students, in the evening to teach
parents
- Student
chosen discussion topics
- Conferences with parents and students
- Team
meetings with colleagues
- Staff
meetings
- Own
Family
In Closure
- To share
something good that happened to them that day
- Recognition
at the end of the quarter/term: sharing something they are proud of they
did that quarter/celebration of improvements
- Thank
you circle: thank someone who helped you or did something nice for you
that day
- To
debrief the day
- End of
the school year: highlights, what would you do different