Student Contributor: Deidra Churchill
Get to Know Dice are used for an icebreaker at the beginning of the school year. Students create their own dice with questions on each side related to what they want to learn about their classmates. It is a helpful way to begin creating a community of students that know and care about one another.
There are cube template worksheets that you will need available for the class. The students are divided into groups of 3-5 to think of what they would be interested in learning about their classmates. They will write the questions on the worksheet before cutting out the dice and folding it up. You will then use different grouping strategies to move students around the room, so that they are able to ask new students questions from different dice. This is a good activity to do while introducing grouping strategies. I have done this in many of my classes while in school and I always enjoyed that is gave me the opportunity to ask questions I may not have thought of on my own, and talk with students I haven’t had the chance to get to know. For younger ages you may want to have pre-made dice ready, however for older ages creating the questions together is a good team build activity.
I placed the Get to Know Dice in the Preventative category because that is where it fits best. The dice are an activity that is most useful at the beginning of the year while still developing a sense of community. The dice would not be used in the supportive phase because it take place before the learning begins, but it gives students an opportunity to practice grouping strategies that are helpful in that phase. This activity does not connect to the corrective phase but may be a time to use group interference in order to help strengthen expectations during group work. As a group activity the get to know dice would best fit in with the Student Directed and Collaborative theories. I believe this to be true because the purpose of using this tool is complimented with the desire to build a community based around students having caring relationships with one another and encouraging teamwork while learning.
More Information –
Tool Source: This is an activity I have done throughout school years, most recently in Dr. Torres’s class.
https://www.firstpalette.com/tool_box/printables/cube.html
