In all of our combined years of teaching the three of us can agree that morning meeting is our all time favorite!
The magic of this daily routine worked for all of us, every single year, with every single class we had. That’s what makes it so magical.
Why Morning Meeting is Important
There are several reasons why we think morning meeting is the best routine that any teacher can implement in their classroom.
- Creates opportunities for building relationships as a whole class.
- Creates and encourages a positive classroom community.
- Teaches students effective routines and procedures.
- Engages students first thing in the morning!
- Teaches students to be accountable, when you let them lead morning meetings!
- Sets the tone for effective classroom management every morning
It is basically the unicorn of teaching activities!
The 5 components of a Morning Meeting Lesson Plan
A morning meeting lesson plan consists of 5 components: message, greeting, reading, sharing, and an activity. Preferably, morning meeting should be scheduled right after your students arrive for the day and typically lasts approximately 20-30 minutes. Scheduling the morning meeting at the first of the day is a way to help students transition from home to school.
Buy the bundle: Morning Greeting Sharing Cards
Teachers should engage in Morning Meeting
The whole class sits in a circle, which includes the teacher, for the entire meeting. The teacher’s presence is crucial to ensure structure, build a climate of trust, make students feel significant, encourage collaboration, create empathy, and to support social and emotional learning.
1. The Morning Meeting Message
First, comes the message component, the teachers writes a message in the same spot every day. The message should include the date and help students think about the day ahead, reflect on the previous day, or focus on an academic skill.
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2. Morning Meeting Greetings
Morning Meeting Greeting Cards
Second, is the greeting, the teacher should pick a way for students to greet each other. Students feel like, “it matters that I came” when they are greeted by name in a friendly and cheerful way. The greeting is exchanged with two students at a time. All other students should be sitting quietly and watching the exchange of greetings. When the greeting card says to say “good morning,” students should make eye contact and include the other student’s name. We use printable/projectable greeting cards as a fun way to choose different greetings each day.
3. Morning Meeting Reading
Next, comes the reading component. For the reading, the teacher builds classroom climate by reading a poem, book, quote, or passage together. This is a great time for teachers to share a reading that is related to current classroom issues. Books can be about topics such as tattling, bullying, teamwork, friendship, or inclusion, etc. This time can also be used to focus on personal character development topics that teachers don’t usually have enough time to discuss throughout the day. Ideas for discussion include; showing empathy, embracing cultural diversity, giving thanks, acts of service, saving the earth, etc.
4. Sharing During Morning Meeting
Then, is the reading, students should be given the opportunity to share and reflect on the reading. Teachers continue to build classroom climate by allowing students to share their reflections and communicate their thoughts. We recommend creating a Sharing-sentence starter anchor chart as a class so students can effectively talk about their thoughts to the class. This is a time when the class can work together to solve current classroom issues or discuss ways to improve their personal character development. Morning Meeting Sharing Cards
5. Morning Meeting Activity
Last, is the activity portion. It is the final component in the morning meeting. This is a time to focus on team building skills. Students will succeed and fail together during the activity and they will work together to problem solve and have fun. Children do not necessarily come to school knowing how to work at a team, play safely, or how to lose with grace. It’s important to teach good sportsmanship to students. The activity component allows a time to teach that the point of playing games is to cooperate and have fun, not just to win.
Teaching students these lessons is crucial because it helps build a classroom climate of trust and collaboration. We strongly recommend that the teacher joins the game. This is a great time for teachers to be playful with their class. Students LOVE it when their teacher participates in the activity. Teachers should end the morning meeting by debriefing the activity; discussing what was successful and challenging during the activity. The teacher should connect growth mindset to the debrief and relate to classwork when possible. We use printable/projectable activity cards as a fun way to choose different greetings each day.
Morning Meeting Activity Cards
Once morning meeting is established, the teacher can allow students to lead morning meeting. Students will choose 4 components of the meeting at home and come prepared to lead the meeting on a given day. Allowing students to lead morning meeting is a great way to teach responsibility and leadership skills. It also helps address important speaking and listening standards.
Therefore, we have provided everything you will need to launch an effective morning meeting along with everything you will need to allow students to be successful at leading morning meetings in your classroom with our Student Led Morning Meeting resource. You can also purchase our greeting, sharing, and activity cards to help implement a magical morning meeting in your classroom.
Click here if you would like to use this Morning Meeting Planning Page in your classroom.
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