How do we add ‘zing’ to Circle Time in a very small school?
Q: I lead a very small, rural primary school, where we all know one another very well and use our whole-school Circle Time to explore many issues. I try to be innovative and stimulating, but would be grateful for your advice on new resources - the ones that 'add zing and excitement'. I'm sure the P7 children are fed-up with 'only me' after all those years!
Jenny: For a start, I don’t believe the pupils are fed up with “only you”…to have stability from a teacher who cares is a really sound experience that enables pupils to find their own creativity. Creativity and innovation flourish when there is emotional safety within a school. If people judge too quickly or react too strongly to mistakes then others can’t take risks…and risk-taking leads to excellence.
Basically once you have set up and displayed the ground rules of circle time – for example, ‘we value each others ideas, we don’t use ‘put downs’, ‘we don’t mention anyone’s name in a negative way’ and ‘we think of good things to say about each other’ – then the pupils are ready to move on to a stronger vision of highly developed social skills, creativity, empathy, valuing and supported self discipline. The resources that help inject more fun and free up the flame of innovation are all very different. We find parachutes games generation from our book ‘Making Waves’ is a great treat towards the end of circle time. We have families of animals and ‘people puppets’ that have a range of interesting lives and concerns that they need support from the children with. We have two books ‘101 Games for Social Skills’ and ‘101 Games for Self Esteem’ which really help extend children’s emotional literacy. We have a kit bag that includes lesson plans that help teachers use props and costumes – such as cloaks, rain sticks, blindfolds, treasure chests and others. There are a range of new books with structured programmes of circle time lesson plans. We have new books coming out on how to use drama through circle time.
I do strongly believe that you need a range of ideas and props beside you to be exciting. We use the concept that children could invite other people to circle time. So we invited parents, grandparents and older people from the local community…social workers, probation officers! etc. This ‘opening up’ certainly jazzed up circle time. It made it more exciting to hear other peoples concerns and issues and to apply our collective mind to other people’s needs and problems. So, I hope these ideas have helped, do go onto my website which lists all the ideas www.circle-time.co.uk. We have an on-line shop with lots of publications for teachers.
Related Tags »
Tell a friend
Enter yours and a friends name to send them this page.
