Not 5 minutes after I finished writing my blog post for chapter 3 of Learn Like a Pirate, a fabulous idea for introducing our student-led classroom to my students popped into my head and I started writing a new blog post (and as an added bonus, I got to put off doing the dishes for a little while longer).
The Activity:
One of my favorite team-building activities to do on the first day is a cup-stacking challenge - you can read more about it HERE and HERE. Collaborating like this is a great way to get your students working together to solve problems and helps set up great whole group discussions about how to work together to meet goals and learn from your mistakes. Right away, I knew how I could use this group activity to introduce the ideas behind the student-led classroom. You need 6 stacking cups (I use solo cups), one elastic, and enough string for one piece per person in the group (I usually do groups of 4). Students need to move the cups from one formation to another using only the elastic and string - at no time can their hands (or any body parts, for that matter) touch the cups. Teachers should give no hints or instruction about how to move the cups - groups need to figure out what strategies work for them as part of their team-building.
How I Will Change the Activity:
The first thing is to change the way the cups were stacked at the beginning. Instead of having 2 rows of 3, the cups will first be stacked in a pyramid. I wrote a "T" on the top cup.
They will have to break down the pyramid, starting from the top, before they can rebuild the stack (which will be the six cups fitting together in one stack with the T cup on the bottom).
If the stack falls while they are making it, they will have to work together to get it standing again. All of this will happen without any teacher instruction or input outside of showing them what the final stack should look like and instructing them at the beginning that at no time can their hands touch the cups - they have to figure out how to move the cups using only string and elastics.
They will have to break down the pyramid, starting from the top, before they can rebuild the stack (which will be the six cups fitting together in one stack with the T cup on the bottom).
Explaining the Student-Led Classroom:
We can also talk (notice I didn't say "I'll tell them" - I'm working on these changes already) about challenges - sometimes the stack fell, just like we will sometimes encounter problems with this new way of doing things, but by working together, we can build it back up again. We can end with a student-created anchor chart about our learning and insights from this activity.
I am SO excited about this. It ties in the ideals of growth mindset AND introduces the methods of the student-led classroom. I think it's going to be a GREAT year!
