Transitions/Quieting Techniques & A Chance to Win

Happy Monday to you all. I sure hope you are having a great day.

I know it has been quite a while since I posted something for my classroom management series. I feel so bad. It has been a crazy couple of weeks, but I am back with one of my favorite management strategies.

As always, if you want to check out my other posts in my series you can just click on the picture below.

I did a guest post over at Learning is Something to Treasure on last Sunday which included the first part of this post. If you missed it, you are going to want to hop over there and read it. I talked about some of the methods of transitioning and quieting the students in your classroom.

How many of you hate when you are in the middle of giving directions of the next activity and kids start to do/go to the activity before you are even finished explaining what they are to do. This drives me absolutely CA-RA-ZEEEEE!!!!! How many of you dislike how long it takes to get all your little peaches quiet? If you are with me on this, then you will definitely want to hop over and read it.

I will even wait for you to hop over and read it.............

Ok....your back....Now that last one I was talking about

MY LAST AND FAVORITE ONE OF ALL IS:

4. Word of the Day:  This technique is such a great one that I stumbled upon and boy am I glad I did.  Stephanie, at Third Grade Thoughts, posted a while back about using the Word of the Day as a transition technique. You can read her post here.  She also posted a video that I have shared below.





I absolutely love this technique. Not only is it a great classroom management strategy, but it also can expand children's vocabulary. Stephanie talks about how she uses different words from the lessons for the week to be the word of the day. The ideas are endless for this technique.

You will need to make sure that you talk about what the word of the day is so that students know that when you say the word they are to make the transition. This should be done first thing in the morning because transitioning starts first thing. The best time would be during morning meeting time, where you can introduce the word and then talk about it and use it in different ways. Then whenever you want students to transition, you begin the directions by saying "When I say the Word of the Day..." then they will transition after the word of the day has been said.

I decided that since we are always looking for ways to sneak in the sight words that my word of the day would be one of the students sight words. I will also mix in different vocabulary terms that we can discuss. They will not only be working on their sight words, but also be expanding their vocabularies.

In order to display this in my classroom I have created some Word of the Day cards that are included in my Sight Word of the Day Pack. I will display the Word of the Day card on the front board and then pick a word for the day and hang it off of the card with binder clips. This can be done in whatever way you wish to do so. This is what I have found will work best for my class.

Whenever you implement any kind of technique or procedure that you want your students to make routine remember that you have to practice these techniques in order for them to become routine for students. If they don't know what each of these techniques mean then they will not be effective. You cannot only practice it once or twice either. You have to do it numerous times in the first weeks of school and at various other times as well. It never hurts to practice it every once in a while. Practicing these techniques helps to make following them routine.

Now for the fun part. I have created a Sight Word of the Day Pack to go along with my Pirate Theme as well as a bright colors pack.

Included in this pack:
-41 1st Grade sight word cards
-41 1st Grade sight word practice sheets
-4 Word of the Day Cards

One lucky winner will walk away with this pack. All you have to do is be a follower of my blog and leave me a message with your email and an answer to the following question: Do you use the Dolch sight word list or the Fry Sight Word List and which do you prefer?

I will choose a winner from the comments on Wednesday morning. Feel free to share and pin this product with your friends. I won't mind :) Good luck to those who enter.

If you can't wait, you can grab this from my TPT store by clicking HERE FOR THE PIRATE THEME or HERE FOR THE BRIGHT COLORS THEME.