Spicing Up Morning Message

I love using Morning Message with my kiddos. The only problem is, if you do something consistently on a daily basis-it can get stale and they can become less interested. I wanted to give you some ideas of things you could do to spice things up a little bit and add a little bit of rigor as well.

1) Compare 2 things in a Venn diagram. This can actually be fun, especially if you take suggestions from the kids. Let's compare a turtle to a dinosaur, etc. We use thinking maps and do more double bubbles, however, they do still see Venn diagrams on their testing or work from our reading program-so I want them to still be familiar with that format.

2) Analogies-if you use thinking maps this is a great place to model Bridge maps-if not, it can just be a straight up analogy. What I really stress with them is to be able to verbalize the relationship between the words. I always leave the last one completely blank, so they have to come up with both parts.

3) Use a photograph instead of words. I do mine on the Smartboard, so it's pretty easy just to insert one in. I like to use photos of me when I was little or my dog. They love to learn more about you! I ask them to create a title for the pic or to ask unanswered questions about the information they don't have. This is what I have for them tomorrow:

(I think I was 6-broken arm doing a back walkover in gymnastics).

4. Use famous quotes. The kids can discuss them or you can help give them real-world examples where it fits in.

5. Book review: I truly believe kids need to discuss books with each other more-what fun is reading a great book and then keeping it all to yourself. I have a sign-up sheet where a student can volunteer to share a quick summary and opinion of a story.

6. Bucket Fillers: we use this in class, however I also like to model for them what it is supposed to look like. Sometimes they aren't very specific. So this is an opportunity for me to share some about the kiddos and then they can quickly share some if they want to.

How do you spice up your morning message?