Introductory Week

Day 3
Week one: Plan #3 of 3
Plan type: Summary
Context:
Grade level: 8th
Length of lesson: 90 min.
This lesson will be taught on the third day of class, during the introduction
week with a classroom full of new students.
The goal of Day 3 is: Establishing Norms and Safe Learning Space.
Critical Learning Objectives:
SWBAT:
Cognitive (know/understand):
1. Students will know ways that their peers operate in the classroom
including daily classroom routines and expectations, and behavioral
norms.
Affective (feel/value) and/or Non-Cognitive:
1. Students will understand that we can find common ground in spite of
our differences.
2. Students will understand the importance of working collaboratively and
efficiently with peers.
3. Students will understand that they are part of a team in the classroom
and that their actions and words have an impact on those around
them.
Performance (do):
1. Students will perform skits to illustrate their knowledge of classroom
values of community, norms, and procedures through a summative
assessment.
SOLs:
7.1 The student will participate in and contribute to conversations,
group discussions, and oral presentations.
CCSs:
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.8.1
Engage effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in
groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grade 8 topics, texts, and
issues, building on others' ideas and expressing their own clearly.

Methods of Assessment:
Diagnostic: N/A
Formative:
On the first day, students played Train Wreck to learn about each other
individually, but today they will begin seeing things they have in
common. During the Common Threads game, students will again
share individual facts, but before they share, they will have to connect
it to something the previous peer shared. This requires students to
think of ways they are connected to their peers while using the web as
a visual representation. The teacher will observe the students as they
play Common Threads, assessing the frequency and depth of student
connections of similarities. [Informal Formative Assessment, K1]

The Home Court activity will emphasize the importance of

collaboration and trust in the classroom. Students will work together
and self-reflect on ways to make this happen. The teacher will observe
and participate in conversations, informally assessing for students
understanding of collaboration, teamwork, and how their words and
actions impact the class. The teacher will collect writing prompts and
review students self-reflection. [Informal & Formal Formative
Assessment, A1-3]

Summative:
On the third day, students will write and perform skits about classroom
procedures for Quiet-Attentive-Listening, Silent-Patient-Waiting, Home
Court, and Daily Classroom Routines. Students will be split into four
groups and assigned one of the previously listed procedures. Their task
will be to write and perform a 2-3 minute skit about their assigned
classroom procedure. The students will choose to make the content of
their skit an example or non-example of the assigned procedure. The
students will be asked to be dramatic, emphasizing the example or
non-example in a fun, memorable way. The teacher will take notes
during each skit and assess how well each group understands the
classroom procedure they perform. To assess individual students
understanding of ALL classroom procedures, the teacher will have
students fill out a graphic organizer consisting of four boxes. Each box
will be assigned one of the four assigned classroom procedures (QuietAttentive-Listening, Silent-Patient-Waiting, Home Court, and Daily
Classroom Routines). Students will fill out 3 of the 4 boxes while they
watch other groups perform. At the end of the skits, students will
individually fill in the box corresponding to the procedure their skit was
based on. Students will be responsible for using the box to record both

the main idea(s) of each classroom procedure and evidence for how to
exemplify or not exemplify that procedure (based on the student skits).
Students will also draw a symbol or picture representing the main idea
identified in each skit. This will allow the teacher to assess the
students on each of these critical classroom norm activities, helping
ensure all students understand how the classroom will function
throughout the year. [D1]
Materials Needed:
Ball of twine or string
Notecards for each student
Scrap Paper
Students Composition Notebooks
The Silent-Patient-Waiting chart (displayed)
Summative Assessment Rubrics
Procedures/Instructional Strategies
Beginning Room Arrangement: The room is currently arranged in a circle.
[Changes in this arrangement that become necessary later will be noted in
the plan]
Welcome:
Step 1: Welcome
The teacher will greet students at the door and remind them to check the
board for their Do-Now. Students will take a notecard from the bin by the
door. Before the start of class, the teacher will write these two questions on
the board with the instructions for students to write on their notecard.
What is something you remember about your partner (any of
them so far) from 2 Truths and Lie?
Your favorite part of your Owners Manual and why you love it so
much.
Think-pair-share their entrance cards. (5 mins.)
Main Lesson:
Step 2: Home Court (40-45 mins.)
This activity is multifaceted, but a critical part of developing classroom
norms. Each step will serve as a subheading under this step of the overall
lesson.
A. Introduction The teacher will refer to the previous days
Owners Manual activity referenced in the entrance card. In this
activity, students looked really hard at themselves and how they work,
and this activity has them bring those qualities into a team mindset.

The teacher will start by introducing the overall activity, home court.
The teacher begins by telling students that statistically teams win
more games at home than when they are away. This fact is consistent
across sports and also between amateur and professional players. To
celebrate different students interests, the teacher will remind students
that there are many ways of thinking about a team that arent just
about sports--like dance teams, debate teams, and families. (2-3
minutes)
B. Partner Brainstorm The teacher will ask students to turn to a
partner and brainstorm on scrap paper. They will answer the question:
Why do you think teams perform better when they play at home? The
teacher will emphasize that brainstorming means quantity over quality;
they should write everything down. (5 minutes)
C. Partner Prioritize After a couple of minutes, students will work
with the same partner to prioritize the list according to how much they
believe each reason actually affects a team; number one makes the
most difference, and so on. This time, they will write their prioritized
lists in the next clean page of their composition notebooks. (2-3
minutes)
D. Share Out/Norms The teacher will remind students to reference
the Quiet-Attentive-Listening chart during share out. Then, pairs take
turns reading an idea to the class following these instructions: When it
is your turn, read your number one idea. If that has already been
mentioned, read your number two, etc. If all of yours have been taken,
go back to your number one and read that. As you listen, check off the
ones that are mentioned and add the new ones to your own list in your
composition notebook. Students will typically choose fan support and
comfort with their playing field as the top two reasons. After sharing
out, the teacher will open up class discussion to briefly talk about why
these things improve performance playing at home. (10 mins.)
E. Writing Prompt Students will independently respond to the
prompt: How do fan support and a comfortable playing field relate to
the academic success of the people in this room? How can we create a
home court advantage here? The teacher will remind students to
reference the Silent-Patient-Waiting list as they finish up their writing,
but she will encourage them to write as much as they can in the time
they have. (5-10 minutes)
F. Partner Share Students will turn to a different partner to share
what they wrote during the writing prompt. The teacher will observe
and join these conversations. (5 mins.)
G. Whole class reflection- To really connect this activity with
Objective A, the teacher will ask students, How do you think this
activity was important? Why? She will then facilitate this discussion
about how important common ground, collaboration, and teamwork are
in our classroom, identifying and clarifying any misconceptions (5
mins.)

Step 3: Common Threads

The teacher will need a ball of twine or string for this game. The teacher will
start with the string. She will share one small fact about her life or a personal
interest. Students will think of a way to connect to what the teacher shares.
Students will raise their hand when they have thought of a connection. The
teacher will choose a student and toss the string while holding on to the end
of the string. Then, the student with the string will share a small fact or
personal interest. Other students will think of a way to connect and raise
their hands. The student will choose another student, preference given to
students who have not had the string yet, and pass the ball of string while
still holding on to part of it. The object is to have all students share
something, creating a web that shows we are all connected through each
other. (10-15 minutes)
Step 4: Skits as a summative assessment: (20-25 mins.)
Students will, as groups of three or four, complete skits acting out the daily
routine under the guidance of the teacher, asking questions to the groups.
The teacher will take notes on a rubric for each group (see Assessments:
Summative Section above for details).
Closure:
Step 6: Wrap Up and Q&A
The teacher will allow time for students to ask questions and reflect as a
large group about the work done this week to build community and safe
learning space. (5 minutes)