Start Fresh 2003
For a hand-out ready format of this information, please download the Start Fresh 2003 Word Document.
**most of these activities came from handouts given to me by my district's staff develolper. They did not have information about where the activities orignally came from.
- Proverbs
- Thanks for the Compliments
- Space Creations
- Indian Feather
- Playback Theater
- Quilt-making
- Skin the Snake
- Hula Hoop Body Pass
- Stand-Up
- Collecting Coins
- Collaborative Drawing
- A Brainstorming Project
- The Moral of the Story
- Human Scavenger Hunt
- Wanted Poster
- Commonalities
- M & M Activity
- Colors and Numbers
- Group Resume
- Roving Reporters
- Similarity Grouping
- Corners
Proverbs
Take some standard 3"x5" index cards and write on them a number of famous quotes or proverbs that reflect the core values of your class or demonstrate some thing that you want your students to think about with regard to working as a team. Make two cards for every quote, and be sure that the quotes are appropriate for the age and reading level of your kids.
Bring the cards to class, and distribute them face down to the kids, either by passing them out at random or by letting them select from a box. Have everyone read the cards silently to themselves. Now tell them that everyone in the room has someone with the same quote; ask them to find that person and talk about what the quote means. (If you have an odd number of children in the group, use a card yourself.)
Let the kids mingle and talk to each other, sharing the quotes until they find their partner. Make sure they understand that it's not a race. Once all the students have found their counterparts, have them return to their seats. You can stop now or continue discussing it as a group. Try asking questions like, "What strategy did you use to find the other person?" or "What does your quote mean to you in your personal life?" Try this activity using other things written on the cards, such as characters or quotes from books you read during the year.
Some proverbs to get you started:
- A bad penny always turns up.
- A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.
- A chain is no stronger than its weakest link.
- A fool and his money are soon parted.
- A friend in need is a friend indeed.
- A man is known by his friends.
- A man is known by the company he keeps.
- A stitch in time saves nine.
- Actions speak louder than words.
- After a storm comes a calm.
- All good things must come to an end.
- All that glitters is not gold.
- Appearances are deceptive.
- As you make your bed, so must you lie in it.
- As you sow, so shall you reap.
- Bad news travels fast.
- Beauty is only skin-deep.
- Beggars can't be choosers.
- Better late than never.
- Better be safe than sorry.
- Birds of a feather flock together.
- Business before pleasure.
- Crime does not pay.
- Diligence is the mother of good fortune.
- Discretion is the better part of valor.
- Do not wear out your welcome.
- Do unto others as you would have them to do unto you.
- Don't cut off your nose to spite your face.
- Don't put all your eggs in one basket.
- Early to bed and early to rise, make a man healthy, wealthy and wise.
- Every bird loves to hear himself sing.
- Every dog has his day.
- Every man has his faults.
- Every man is his own worst enemy.
- Every picture tells a story.
- Faith will move mountains.
- First things first.
- First think, and then speak.
- Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.
- Give credit where credit is due.
- Great minds think alike.
- He who hesitates is lost.
- Honesty is the best policy.
- If a job's worth doing, it's worth doing well.
- Ignorance is bliss.
- It is best to be on the safe side.
- It is no use crying over spilt milk.
- It takes two to tango.
- Keep your mouth shut and your ears open.
- Laughter is the best medicine.
- Let bygones be bygones.
- Life is a bowl of cherries.
- Live and learn.
- Live and let live.
- Look before you leap.
- Look on the bright side.
- Make hay while the sun shines.
- Many hands make light work.
- Mind your own business.
- Never judge from appearances.
- Never look a gift horse in the mouth.
- Never say die.
- Never too late to learn.
- No man is indispensable.
- Nothing succeeds like success.
- Nothing ventured, nothing gained.
- Old habits die hard.
- One good turn deserves another.
- One man's loss is another man's gain.
- Opportunity seldom knocks twice.
- Out of sight, out of mind.
- Patience is a virtue.
- Practice makes perfect.
- Practice what you preach.
- Prevention is better than cure.
- Scratch my back and I'll scratch yours.
- Seeing is believing.
- Silence is golden.
- Something is better than nothing.
- Strike while the iron is hot.
- The early bird catches the worm.
- The first step is the hardest.
- The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence.
- The proof of the pudding is in the eating.
- There are two sides to every question.
- There is a time and a place for everything.
- There is more than one way to skin a cat.
- There is safety in numbers.
- Things are not always what they seem.
- Those who live in glass houses should not throw stones.
- Time cures all things.
- Time flies.
- Time is money.
- To err is human.
- Tomorrow is another day.
- Too many cooks spoil the broth.
- Turn the other cheek.
- Two heads are better than one.
- Two wrongs do not make a right.
- United we stand, divided we fall.
- Variety is the spice of life.
- When the cat's away, the mice will play.
- Where there's a will there's a way.
- You can't please everyone.
- You can't tell a book by its cover.
- You can't win them all.
- You cannot have it both ways.
- You cannot have your cake and eat it.
- You don't get something for nothing.
- You win some, you lose
some.
Thanks for the Compliments
*This activity works best after having gone through some other community building activities.
Materials: Paper, markers, tape
Description: Everyone gets a piece of paper taped to their back. (Make sure their name is at the top of the paper.) Each person is given a marker. Each person in the group must walk around the room and write a compliment or positive remark about that person on their back. There will be lots of giggling...but NO PEEKING!
When everyone has written something positive on each others back, everyone returns to their seat. Everyone exchanges papers without looking at their own. Each participant gets a turn at reading off the person's list to that person out loud. What a great self-esteem booster. By the way, it doesn't matter if the group knows each other well because you can say things like.."She seems friendly" etc.
You’ll need a large area to complete this activity.
Divide class into small groups—5-6 students in each group.
You can instruct the groups to form various shapes and have them evaluate how well they’ve managed to form the shape. Or you can have groups create a variety of shapes using their imaginations and their bodies. Ideas include round, oblong, flat, open, jagged, closed, parallels, intersections, semicircles, and diamonds. In this version, you might want to have other groups guess what the shape is. Based on the guesses, the group making the shape would need to alter their design until the rest of the class comes up with the correct shape.
Larger groups might try stars, rectangles, cubes, hearts, octagons, and so forth.
Another variation is to create emotions instead of shapes, such as fear or intelligence.
Materials: Several large feathers, several empty coffee cans, a pair of scissors.
Divide students into groups of 5-10 people, sitting in a circle. Arrange the groups into a ring. In the center of all the groups is a leader with a pair of scissors. In the center of each team circle is a can with a feather sticking out of it. Each player must remove the feather, using only their mouth while standing on one leg. (teammates can assist each other). When the player has taken the feather out of the container with their mouth, they must go to the common center of the ring and cut off the portion of the feather that was touched by the mouth. Each time the feather gets shorter and shorter, making it more difficult to retrieve from the container. Because the feather will be cut, students will want to be careful about how much of the feather they get into their mouths. The first group to have everyone get the feather out would be victorious.
Playback Theatre
Students are divided into small groups. One member of the group will tell a true story. The story can be about them, but it doesn’t have to be. As long as the story is true, and appropriate for school (for older students), it’s OK. For older students, this can be a more involved story.
The other members of the group are charged with acting out the story as it has been told to them. They may need to take notes during the telling of the story so that they’re sure they are able to accurately “playback” to the story-teller. After the playback, the story-teller will evaluate how well the actors did in retelling the story.
This can be something that is performed for the entire class.
Quilt Making
Materials: A blank sheet of paper for each student—can use colored paper or construction paper; markers, crayons, colored pencils; hole punch; yard to “sew” the quilt squares together.
Quilts have been used throughout history as visual and sensory documents and nostalgic memoirs. Quilting performed in groups allows the opportunity to socialize while accomplishing a collaborative task.
For this activity, each student will be given a sheet of paper to turn into a square in the quilt. On their square, they will need to draw something that represents who they are. For instance, if they like sports, they may want to draw sports paraphernalia on their square. If students do not draw well, they can make a collage-like square, using pictures from magazines. Each student will need to “sign” their square.
When the squares are completed, they will need to be hole-punched on each side so that they can be “sewn” together. Yarn will be threaded through the holes.
*this is a great project to complete for display at open house.
You’ll need a large space to complete this activity.
Students line up one behind another. Starting in the middle of the line, person A reaches between their legs with their left hand and grabs the right hand of the person behind them. Whoever is in front of person A, reaches back to grab person A’s right hand with their left hand. Once the chain is formed, they are ready to begin. The last person in line lies down on his back. The person in front of him backs up, straddling his body and lies down behind him. Continue until the whole group waddles back. Discuss how you had to work together to all finish.
Standing in a large circle, holding hands, one person starts a hula hoop going around. Every student must pass his or her entire body through the hula hoop without breaking hands. One person will time how long it takes to get the hoop around. Challenge the class to beat their time. Take a minute to discuss how they had to help each other to get the hoop around.
Have your group get in pairs. The pairs will sit on the floor, back pressed to back. They must stand up without using their hands. After a pair stands up, have them find another pair and all 4 of them must sit down and stand up. Go on as such until the entire group is together and have everyone try to stand up. This is a good game to promote friendliness and it is a huge blast when you have an exceptionally large group.
Materials: 1 chair, At least 20 coins.
Divide the class into small groups. Place one person in a chair positioned at the end of a room which faces forward towards the rest of the room. You then scatter coins on the floor in front of the person in the chair. The coins should be widely spread out. Let the person in the chair take a look at where the coins are scattered. The person in the chair is then blind folded. The rest of the players in the game sit a few feet away from the coins scatted around the feet of the person in the chair.
The task of the person who is blind-folded is to gather the coins on the ground. Allow the blind-folded student to attempt to gather the coins without assistance from the group members. Group members can then take turns giving the blind-folded student directions intended to help him/her collect more coins.
At the end of this exercise, the teacher should lead a discussion about what made for effective directions.
Collaborative Drawings
Materials: Different colored pencils, pens, or markers; blank sheets of paper.
Each person uses different colored pen and creates a squiggly line or scribble (the only rule is no intersecting lines). Each person should have an idea of what they want the drawing to eventually be. He or she passes it to the person on the right who adds to the drawing. The drawing keeps making its way around the group until it is back to the person who started it. When a squiggle is received it can be rotated in any direction to get an idea what to make out of it. When the drawing gets back to its originator, he or she should try to complete the drawing as they had originally intended.
At the end, students should talk about how they decided to add to the drawing as it came to them.
A Brainstorming Project
(*from Making Learning Happen: Strategies for an Interactive Classroom by Jeffrey Golub)
Place students in small groups and give them the following instructions:
Design a new eating implement that has as important a function as the knife, fork, and spoon. This invention belongs on every table.
Have students complete the following tasks:
1. Design the invention and be prepared to explain to the class how it works. Students should feel free to draw a picture.
2. Give the invention a name.
3. In an oral presentation, convince the rest of the class that your invention is (a) necessary (b) practical, and (c) desirable.
4. Design a magazine ad for your invention.
Each group in turn presents its design for a new eating implement to the class, describing how the invention works and persuading the class that the implement is necessary, practical, and desirable.
The Moral of the Story
(from Making Learning Happen: Strategies for an Interactive Classroom by Jeffrey N. Golub)
*You can substitute any story with a moral for this activity. Aesop’s fables might work well for younger students.
Read the following story to the class:
Long ago in Japan, the students in a certain school used to study meditation. Four of them who were close friends promised one another to observe seven days of s silence.
On the first day all were silent. Their meditation had begun auspiciously, but when night came and the oil lamps were growing dim, one of the students could not help but exclaiming to a servant: “Fix those lamps!”
The second student was surprised to hear the first one talk: “We’re not supposed to say a word,” he remarked.
“You two are stupid. Why did you talk?” asked the third.
“I am the only one who has not talked,” concluded the fourth student.
Give the following directions to the students:
Take a moment now and write down a moral—a lesson to be learned—for this story. Do not converse with your classmates first; just create a moral, write it down, and be done with it.
After giving students a few minutes to create and write down their morals, give the next instructions:
In just a moment, you are going to get together with a classmate, and the two of you are going to create a moral together. You can do this in four ways:
1. You read each other’s morals and decide that person A has written a really good moral, and you agree that’s the one you’re going to use for this exercise.
2. Or you decide that person B has created an excellent moral that doesn’t need any changes or improvements.
3. You might decide to combine and rearrange parts of your two morals to create a new one.
4. Or perhaps after reading each other’s morals, you decide that neither one is very good so you draft a whole new moral together.
The moral that students create in their pairs, as well as their reasons for selecting that moral, will be read to the class.
(*from Making Learning Happen: Strategies for an Interactive Classroom by Jeffrey Golub)
In this activity, students get out of their seats and have an opportunity to get to know each other.
Materials: Scavenger Hunt sheet for each student.
Each student can only sign another’s scavenger hunt sheet twice so that student have to interact with every one. The teacher should participate in this as well. At the end when every one has had their sheet signed, feel free to go over some of the items on the list, encouraging students to share answers.
For a copy of the Human Scavenger Hunt sheet, please download the Start Fresh 2003 handout.
(*from Making Learning Happen: Strategies for an Interactive Classroom by Jeffrey Golub)
You can complete this activity in class or you can have students work on it outside of class and then bring it back to school.
Directions:
1. Each wanted poster should contain a picture or sketch of the “suspect”. The picture or sketch or snapshot should be large enough to be seen from a short distance. With digital technology, the teacher can provide photos cheaply and quickly.
2. Find an offense to be accused of and write it under your picture. This offense may be one of your bad habits. For example: Wanted for Procrastination, Wanted for Spending Too Much Time on The Computer, Wanted for Biting her Fingernails, etc.
3. Write your name and an alias (AKA=Also Known As) Make sure the Alias has something to do with the offense. For example: The Scrambler, Busy Signal, Bitten Nubs, etc.
4. Write a short paragraph describing the offense and what trouble it has caused. You may wish to use phrases such as…
• “She/He can be seen…”
• “Use extreme caution because…”
• “She/He is usually found…”
5. A second paragraph should include a physical description.
6. The reward should be something consistent with the crime. For example: A Day-Planner, Call-Waiting, A French Manicure, etc.
Commonalities:
Line up class by height
Form groups of three
Members of the group decide on four things they have in
common (not height or the fact that they’re in school)
Each group then makes a visual representation of their
commonalities and the class gets to guess what the
commonalities are.
M & M Activity:
RED Describe something about the way you look that you
like
ORANGE Describe a part of your personality that you like
YELLOW Tell about an accomplishment that you feel proud
about
BLUE Describe something about you that would make you a nice person to have for a friend.
GREEN What one complimentary word would your good friend use to describe you?
Instructions:
1. Give each participant a small bag of M & M’s or have them in a dish on each table. Participants are to select two M & M’s.
2. Show the above directions on the overhead and share as indicated.
3. Following activity, instruct participants to eat M & Ms.
Colors and Numbers:
In advance, prepare cards. For thirty students, you’ll need six different colors of construction paper, five pieces about 4”X6” of each color, numbered 1 through 5. Each card should have one number and all together there are thirty separate cards.
Each student will be asked to select a piece of colored construction paper with a number on it. They will move into different groups based on the facilitator’s directions.
Directions:
- Ask everyone who has the same number card to find each other and sit together.
- Using the WHIP strategy, ask: If you were a food, what food would you be and why?
- Allow about three minutes for groups to share.
- Ask groups to form with everyone having the same colored card.
- Question: A time traveling machine is at your disposal; what historical event or era would you visit?
- Allow three to four minutes for sharing.
- Alternative Question:
- Jim Croce wrote a song “Time in a Bottle.” What time from your life would you want to bottle so that you could preserve it?
- Who is a person in your life that you are proud of and why are you proud of him or her?
Group Resume:
Procedure:
1. Divide participants into subgroups of 3-6 members.
2. Tell the group members that they represent an incredible array of talent and experiences.
3. Suggest that one way to identify and brag about the group’s resources is to compose a group resume.
4. Give the subgroups newsprint or butcher paper and markers to use in creating their resume. The resumes should include any information that promotes the subgroup as a whole. The groups may choose to include any of the following information:
- Educational background
- Knowledge about the class materials (who’s good in science, reading, writing, etc)
- Major accomplishments
- Hobbies, talent, travels, family
- Sports
- Musical abilities
- Boy/Girl Scouts, etc.
5. Invite each subgroup to present its resume and acknowledge the total resources within the entire group.
Variations:
1. To expedite the activity, give out a prepared resume outline that specifies the information to be gathered.
2. Instead of having participants compile a resume, ask them to interview one another about categories you provide.
Roving Reporters:
Everyone gives and gets a scoop in a room full of roving reporters.
Materials: Paper and pencil for each player.
1. Pass out pencils and paper to everyone and explain that they’re all roving reporters who will be interviewing each other.
2. Then ask every one to make up two interview questions to ask at least four people who will be interviewing each other. For example, you might interview four people by asking, “How many brothers and sisters do you have?” and “What’s a movie you really liked?” Other suggestions might be questions about:
Their families
Pets
Special interests
Accomplishments
Favorite foods
Favorite places
People they admire
Favorite music
Alternative: Have participants develop a group list of questions that are written on the board. Then each reporter selects the questions he or she wants to ask from the list.
3. Once students have each decided on their two questions, the group mingles and interviews one another. As reporters do their interviews, they write down the person’s name and take some notes about the answer.
4. After ten minutes or so, bring everyone back together, introduce each student and ask the roving reporters to share what they’ve learned in their interviews. For example: “This is Andrea Mitchell. Roving reporters, what’s the scoop?”
To see a copy of the Roving Reporter's Handout, please download the Start Fresh 2003 Handout.
Student characteristics: The teacher announces a dimension such as color of hair or birthday months. Everyone with the same answer forms a group. They then discuss positive and negative aspects of that characteristic. It can include paraphrasing across groups. Some dimensions: pets owned, favorite sport or hobby, favorite type of restaurant, dream vacation, etc. Similarity groupings, like line-ups and class bar graphs can be followed by frequency graphs which provide a good visual representation of the class.
Corners
Preferences: This structure is designed to allow students to know and accept themselves and others. Any individual difference can be the focus, such as favorite season, intended profession, or even the type of shoe you would like to be. Students go to the corner of the room representing their choice. So, for example, all the tennis shoe people go to one corner, the hiking boot people go to another. Students then share reasons for their choice with a partner in their corner. Finally, students play a paraphrase game in which they must listen carefully to the reason of the group (high heels, hiking boots, loafers, etc) in order to be able to correctly paraphrase them.
Typical Corners Sequence:
Step One: Announce corners, with a number in each corner and with visuals posted in each corner if possible.
Step Two: Think and Write time. Give students a bit of silent thinking time to clarify for themselves their preference. Have them write the number of their preferred corner on a slip of paper. (This way they will clarify their own values, not just go to the corner their friends prefer)
Step Three: Students group in corners. Students go to their corners and pair up to express the reasons for their preferences. They then form groups of four within the corner, and students in the group paraphrase their partner from the paired listening. The teacher calls on students from one corner to announce to the class.
Step Four: Students paraphrase. Students in pairs in the corners paraphrase the reasons. This last sharing and paraphrasing is repeated for each corner.
Step Five: Team Review. When students are back in their teams, they make sure everyone can name reasons supporting their choices.
Last Updated August 4, 2007
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