The Power of the Opening Minutes
With Suzy Pepper Rollins

The opening minutes hold tremendous power for learning.  Student motivation, reading comprehension, intellectual curiosity, and the value of a task all hinge on starting with something powerful! Unfortunately, these moments may have been “hijacked” along the way and turned into a “Do Now” classroom management moment.  Do this now while I take attendance, fill out some forms, rotate my tires, etc.  No More!  That’s the subject of our short podcast this week.  

But wait! Here are some amazing free resources by our fabulous authors to support make these opening minutes super strong! 

• Kristina Smekens:  Free bundle of bell-ringers for ELA!

• Angela Stockman:  Free Firestarters for writing!

• Laurel Schmidt:  It say’s “Banish Writer’s Block” but this is a cool technique for other subjects – Students draw their heads for a brain dump & then sequence ideas.

• Suzy Pepper Rollins:  Alpha brainstorming is for all subjects! From A -Z, everything you know about fractions, taxes, Africa, prices, etc.