Daily agenda slides are designed to give your students a quick easy to understand overview of what they can expect in your class each day. Here are 5 reasons you should use daily agenda slides in your middle school science classroom.
One of the great things about developing agenda slides is that you get to choose how to format them and what information you display on them. In my classroom, I like to use the agenda slide to not only display the topic for the day but also the various activities we will complete throughout the class period. Depending on the day, I may also write the expected time for each activity. This not only tells my students about how long each activity will take but it also helps keep me on track through the class period.
When I first started teaching, I used written agendas and wrote the class expectations each day on the board. This was tedious and only allowed me to prepare my agenda for one day at a time. That is why I created digital agenda slides. These slides are easy to use and allow me to plan and type up by agenda for weeks or months at a time. It also makes it easy to adjust or revise if something changes that interrupts our daily agenda.
Daily agenda slides are a great way to simplify so many parts of your classroom routine, from reminders and daily objectives to warm ups, they allow students to have everything they need in one place. If you would like to try using daily agenda slides in your middle school classroom, download these free daily science agenda slides for your classroom!
Don’t forget to check out Secondary Sparks on TPT for more middle school science resources here.
1. Agenda Slides help Establish Classroom Routines
When your students walk into the classroom, they want to know what to expect. Before I started using agenda slides in my classroom, I would get the dreaded “what are we doing today?” question from at least 5 students at the beginning of the class period. This wastes your time AND your students’ time. By utilizing daily agenda slides, you are setting classroom expectations and a routine that helps students know exactly what to expect when they come into the classroom and what materials they need. At the beginning of the school year, it’s important to teach this routine and reinforce it with your students. By giving your students an agenda for the day, you are setting the tone for the class period. Students no longer wonder what they will be learning each day. This creates an environment where students have a regular routine and are ready to learn as soon as they take their seats. And because they are middle schoolers and require regular reinforcement, if you have a student who continues to ask “what are we doing today,” you can simply remind them to check the agenda.
2. make sure students know the daily agenda
One of the great things about developing agenda slides is that you get to choose how to format them and what information you display on them. In my classroom, I like to use the agenda slide to not only display the topic for the day but also the various activities we will complete throughout the class period. Depending on the day, I may also write the expected time for each activity. This not only tells my students about how long each activity will take but it also helps keep me on track through the class period.
When I first started teaching, I used written agendas and wrote the class expectations each day on the board. This was tedious and only allowed me to prepare my agenda for one day at a time. That is why I created digital agenda slides. These slides are easy to use and allow me to plan and type up by agenda for weeks or months at a time. It also makes it easy to adjust or revise if something changes that interrupts our daily agenda.
3. Display lesson objectives for students
As I create my agenda slides, I also like to include the lesson objective for the day. I use this section of my agenda to display the lesson objective in student friendly language. This allows my students to know what skill they are working toward and what they are expected to know at the end of the lesson. This is also great for observations. If administrators come in for a walk through observation or formal observation, they can easily reference the agenda slide to see what objectives students are working towards during the class period.
4. Add Reminders to your Agenda slides
I also have a section on my agenda slides to display upcoming events and reminders for my students. This is a great place to put upcoming field trips and important due dates. I also use this section to remind students about paperwork that needs to be signed or turned in. This section gives my students everything they need to fill out their planners. At the beginning of the class period, students can take out their planner or agenda, fill in upcoming events so they can reference it at home or show it to parents.5. warm ups
Daily agenda slides are the perfect place to add in daily warm ups. This helps eliminate extra paper but also helps students know what they should be doing first when they come into the classroom. Last year I tried paper warm ups. I printed weekly warm up sheets for my students and students had to keep them in their binder for the week. As you can imagine, I had students who forgot their warm up sheets or lost them. I found myself constantly reprinting warm up sheets for students who no longer had them or having students turn in their warm ups on scrap pieces of paper. By adding the daily warm up questions to my agenda slides, my students are better able to keep up with their daily warm ups. Students simply copy or answer the question of the day in their interactive notebook or on a paper to turn in during the class period. This has cut down on copies and helped my students to be able to start working immediately when they walk in.Daily agenda slides are a great way to simplify so many parts of your classroom routine, from reminders and daily objectives to warm ups, they allow students to have everything they need in one place. If you would like to try using daily agenda slides in your middle school classroom, download these free daily science agenda slides for your classroom!
Don’t forget to check out Secondary Sparks on TPT for more middle school science resources here.
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