Quality World... Everyone has a Story

As I was reflecting on what to do my next blog on, I came across an awesome blog from one of my mentors, Coach Durst. His blog was about a beginning of the year activity in his classroom where the students reflect on their type of learning and create a Superhero. Reading his blog post allowed me to reflect on what I have done at the beginning of the year with the students in my classroom and that brought me to an activity that I have thoroughly enjoyed in my first 2 years.

Now before I get to much into this activity, I must give credit to one of my college professors, Jerry Worley, for this activity. Even us college "cherubs" as he called us, got to enjoy this activity and it allowed for some deep reflection. The point of this activity is really to try and get to know your students at a deep level and what is really behind their "story". We all know that every student has a story and the more we get to know about what makes that student tick, the more success we can have when working with them throughout the year.

This activity, the Quality World, seems very simple but what really draws me to it, is the individuality and freedom that this activity allows. The objective of this activity is to have the students create their own Quality World. Their Quality World can include pictures, words, phrases, quotes, motto's they live by, things they value, anything they deem important in their life. Like I said one of the very unique things with this activity is the direction it can be taken. Students can create a world where what's inside the circle is what they value and the outside can be things that try to bring them down. They can use illustrations, words, dividers, whatever they want to really tell their own story. Below are some pictures of some of the Quality World's that were created in my classroom this year along with my personal one that I show them every year.

As you can see through these various examples this simple activity provides students to really share what is important to them and allows them to use their own creativity to tell their story.

So as I reflect back on the first month of the school year and the goal of this blog, I looked back at wanting to share the positives that go in the classroom everyday. This is a very unique opportunity to allow students at their own level to create something that they value and is important to them and it is now my job to spread the innovative thoughts and ideas from these amazing students!