Does your school do a step up day for the student to meet their teachers for the following year? We are doing it and I am having my students to create a book using an app called Book Creator to tell the first graders what they will be learning in 2nd grade. These digital books will be shared in small groups.
We have Move Up days for 4th and 6th graders who are transitioning to new buildings. Wile my 4th graders are learning about their new grade/building, I have my students from the prior year back for the morning.
We do! Each year our incoming kindergarten students are able to sign up for a 20 minute time slot where they and their parents can come see our classroom meet me and ask me any questions they may have before the first day of school. My principal allows us time in our teacher workdays to do this or she will also pay us to do this the week before we come back from summer break. It’s a great time to calm, nervous parents and incoming kindergarten students and to show them a few key things before school starts. It also allows students to bring in their school supplies before the year begins so that those are settled and put away and it is one less thing that I have to do on the first day of school.
Our Kinders come in the spring and to Kinder Camp in the summer. Everyone has a Meet the Teacher day in which families and students come for a short presentation, drop off supplies, and see their classrooms, friends, and teachers. It’s always a success.
We do as well! They tour and have lunch. Our multidisciplinary teams meet to go over students with medical, behavior, and/or academic concerns- we meet on different days.
We don’t have this for all grades, but our fourth graders do get to visit the middle school. It’s a pretty big deal—they're welcomed by the cheer and dance teams, take a tour of the school, and meet their future teachers. It gives them something exciting to look forward to and helps calm their nerves about the transition.
That used to be a big deal in my district. It’s kind of like a prequel to Meet the Teacher, that happens a few days before the new year starts. The step up teacher would give an overview of what the new year would be like, perhaps go over rules and procedures and a list of supplies needed and perhaps a curriculum overview. It fell out of favor when parents would want their child to have a favored teacher and found out their child didn’t have that teacher.
