In our classroom Mrs. Kiernan and I are encouraging the children to make good choices and to be more responsible for their actions and behavior. To promote a positive atmosphere here at school, we are watching and listening to the children, hoping to catch them "doing the right thing." Besides verbally acknowledging positive behavior, the students are asked to take marble out of the "Marbles to Earn" jar and place it in a second jar which is labeled "Do the Right Thing." This is a great honor and the children eagerly add new marbles to the jar. These compliments can be earned as whole class, as a small group, or by individuals.
The teachers are looking for good manners, kindness to classmates, cooperation with peers and teachers, positive attitudes, being good role models, etc. Only grown-ups can pass out marbles.
Each Friday we will be counting the marbles our class has earned, incorporating math into the activity. I dumped out all our earned marbles into a pile and starting pointing to each marble as I counted. Many children thought I was doing a good counting job until one student suggested a better strategy. Sophia thought that if I moved each marble as I counted, I would be sure to have the correct count. We talked about using this counting strategy instead of simply pointing to the objects to be counted. Later in the school year, we will learn other counting strategies.
For the first seven days of school, our class earned a total of 53 marbles. What a great job, class! We are off to to a terrific start.
