We have enjoyed getting to know each other during the first several days of school. What a great group of kids!

PNA implements Responsive Classroom in order to create a safe, joyful learning environment for our students.  One of the goals of Responsive Classroom during the first few weeks of school is building a classroom community. When students are a part of a strong classroom community, they feel more comfortable tackling challenges, take more ownership in their learning, and have a higher self-esteem. Setting aside time to build relationships at the beginning of the year creates a strong foundation for the rest of the year.

As we began learning routines in different subject areas, we learned a lot about each other along the way.    ​

We learned about our learning styles by creating, sorting, and graphing our people glyphs in math.

In writing, students shared their journal entries about memorable experiences.

We begin every day with a morning meeting, which includes sharing something about ourselves and playing a game together. Morning meetings start the day on a positive note.

As a way to explore how to use Google Docs on their laptops for the first time, students learned about each other by writing acrostic poems that described themselves.

Every strong community has a set of agreements.  We explored questions like “What makes us have a great day at school?” and “What are our hopes and dreams?” to guide us in creating our own classroom agreements. Together, they decided that these should be our agreements:

1. Be safe.
2. Have fun and dream big!
3. Be respectful to each other.
4. Be responsible with the materials.
5. Be kind.

What a great year we have ahead of us! ​