My last post was full of ice breaker and getting to know you ideas that involved the entire class. Today I wanted to share another idea for getting to know your students, but this one is done individually, and as a homework assignment.
Because I was an English teacher, this assignment worked particularly well for my class, but it can work just as well for any other content area. The assignment was called “Dear Teacher” and was a chance for students to write a letter to me. I gave them suggestions about what they could tell me, but also left it open for them to choose the content of their letter.
Some of the suggested topics included:
- Favorite food
- Favorite subject
- Favorite music, movie, book, actor/actress, show
- Family— how many siblings, things they like to do, etc.
- Friends— who their friends are, what they like to do together, etc.
- Favorite vacations they’ve been on
- Things they did over the summer
- What they’re looking forward to about this new school year
- Goals they may have
- Their feelings about reading & writing (or whatever your content area may be)
- Anything else they felt like telling me
I also required the assignment to be hand written (this gave me a glimpse into their grammar and spelling skills since they weren’t using a computer with spell/grammar check), and required the length to be about 1- 1.5 pages long. I wanted it long enough for them to tell me about themselves, but not so long that I was reading these letters for the rest of my days!
This assignment was always so fun to get back from students. I loved learning about them! Beyond the “getting to know you” objective of the assignment, these letters also gave me insight into their writing style, grammar/spelling skills, handwriting, and personalities. Another thing I really liked about this assignment was that, because I had assured them I wasn’t going to be sharing their letters with other students, it allowed students to be completely honest and open. I had students open up and tell me about difficulties at home, friend struggles, learning struggles, and so on. It let them know right off the bat that I was a safe person who had their best interests in mind.
The “Dear Teacher” letter was always just a participation grade, which was a great way to start off the year. It was a low-stakes, no pressure assignment to ease them into graded writing that would come later.
So while this assignment was really quite simple, it accomplished much more than surface level formalities.
What kind of assignments do you give your students to start the year?