Adding More Positive Too

Last month I shared some ways that I have been working to highlight positive actions that occur in my small groups.

 Through our school wide discussions about creating trauma sensitive classrooms, we decided that between intervention cycles, we needed to do some celebrating.

Let me back up just a bit...

After six weeks of intervention, my building wide interventions stop.  My RtI team reassesses each student in intervention to ensure that they are receiving exactly what they need.  This does mean that groups and interventions change.

What we realized is that we were not giving our students enough "closure" between the groups.  I personally felt like I needed to do a better job explaining why they were changing groups and celebrate the work they had done to improve!

Our first intervention cycle recently ended.  To celebrate, I asked each group member to tell me something positive that another student did or added to our group.  Then they wrote a note to that student with that positive thought on it.

It was a really nice way to transition groups.  Each student complimented someone else, but left with a compliment for themselves.

I am thankful that my teammates continues to push me to improve my teaching skills.  It is having a positive impact on me, as well as my students.

Em