Secret Scraps

Student Contributor: S. Burton
This tool helps to get the room clean quickly at the end of the day. It is a fun way for students to become motivated about the way their classroom looks.

This is a tool to help clean the room at the end of the day as well as help students build responsibility for their own classroom. The students will have practiced this task until they understand the expectations of keeping the volume low and being cautious while searching for scraps. The teacher chooses two scraps and waits for students to be ready at their desk. When ready the teacher allows them to begin searching. The person who found the chosen scrap gets a reward. When using this tool, I found it helped build community in the classroom. The students wanted their room to look nice instead of being upset with winner, they congratulated and praised the winner. As the teacher choosing it was easy to rotate who won as the secret scrap is only known by you. As a result, you can wait for that student and say what they picked up.

I put this in the supportive phase as it helps students learn why having a clean room is important. It helps teach them responsibility, community, and gain a sense of pride. This is a tool that is student centered yet collaborative as the teacher is the main director, but the students are the one doing all the work. It relates to the other two phases as being able to work as a community to clean up the room helps to prevent arguments between students and prevents accidents that may arise in a messy room. It relates to the corrective phase as because it limits the reasons a correction would need to be made. With a clean room the students are able to engage more and feel pride while being in the classroom.

More Information –
Tool Source: Mrs. Sandra Olsen