First day of school

The things we did:

1. Spent half the day in advisory and at an assembly. Advisory was less-than-fun, because it was (1) with ninth graders who already did the activities in eighth grade with the exact same group of people and (2) consisted of 40 people because they paired off groups. Oh well.
2. Saw each of our classes for a grand total of 15 minutes. My classes colored index cards (green, yellow, red, purple) to be used as response cards (yes/I understand, I mostly understand, no/I don’t understand, HELP!). They filled out a cheesy getting-to-know-you worksheet. We talked about the difference between ethnicity and culture. I told them to think lightly on what makes them feel safe, supported, able to take risks, respected, happy, etc. because we will spend the next few days developing class norms.