Transition Time: Word of the Day

I cannot believe I haven't blogged about this before, but even if I have, here's a fun refresher & freebie :)

I have a rowdy bunch this year, so a lot of my teaching involves movement, Brain Breaks and Whole Brain Teaching strategies.

One thing that rates at the top of my pet peeves is when kids start to transition the second I start giving the directions. It turns into a scene of me yelling over a group of moving kids who, of course, end up asking me what to do 2 minutes later.... grr!

Enter Ms. Noonan, from Teaching Channel, and her great video about managing transitions using the Word of the Day.


I love so many things about this video, don't you?!
Rewatch it, you will find something new every time :)

Every day, I end our Morning Meeting by introducing the Word of the Day. This word can come from our content units, character ed training, a new vocab word from Teacher Time, anything!

Some recent examples include:

• schooner when we started our Westward Expansion unit
• herbivore when we researched our Colorado Animals 
• profit when we began our economics unit
• compromise when our day included making decisions as a group

I will intro the word using the "I say, you say" she highlights in the video above, then write it on the board and have a child define it aloud to the group. I will add on to his/her definition and provide a few examples. The word stays written on our board all day (and sometimes it's the Word of the Day for two days in a row if it's a really fantastic one!).

Then, whenever it is time to transition and begin a new task, I begin all directions by saying, "When I say the Word of the Day..."

This has worked out so incredibly well this year and it has also increased by students' vocabularies! During Birthday Circle today, one student's compliment to the Birthday Boy was, "You are always willing to find a compromise," and I knew it was because that had been our WOTD late last week :)

Interested in my Word of the Day poster? Pick up your free copy HERE.