May Morning Meeting Ideas for Virtual, In-Person, and Hybrid Teaching (2021)
The end of the school year is approaching (can you believe it?), so of course, I’m back with another Morning Meeting blog post, and today I’m sharing my May Morning Meeting ideas for virtual, in-person, and hybrid teaching.
In today’s blog post…
We’ll be looking at (1) May Morning Meeting Slides and (2) 2021 May Holiday Morning Meeting Ideas! You can check out my slides for the entire month of May here.
As always, this blog post is going to follow the Responsive Classroom Morning Meeting Structure, which consists of a Greeting, Share, Activity, and Message. Responsive Classroom is an amazing resource for a student-centered, SEL approach to teaching.
Morning Meeting Slides
If you are new to my blog, I’ll let you in on a secret that I’ve been sharing with readers for a few months now…
To my loyal readers, you already know what I’m going to say 🙂
My top tip for Morning Meeting is to create a very clear structure for students.
Morning Meeting works best when teachers create routine for students. In doing so, teachers can set the tone for the remainder of the day.
The best way, in my opinion, that we can create a structure or schedule for students to follow is by using a slides presentation to frame the meeting (more on that in the next section!).
If you are teaching in-person, you can project the slides on your board for students in the classroom to see. If you are teaching on Zoom / Google Meet / Microsoft Teams, you can easily screenshare the slides for students at home to see.
Greeting
Once your students have entered your classroom (either virtual or in-person), you can begin by saying something like, “Good morning students! Today is a wonderful Wednesday! It is Wednesday May 19, 2021. Samara is our morning leader. Samara, how will we greet the class today?”
At this point in the school year, I tend to recommend that teachers spend less time on the Morning Greeting, and instead, dedicate most of their time to the Share and Activity.
At the end of the day, that choice is up to you! You know your students and your class better than I do.
Share
I go back and forth on whether Share or Activity is my favorite part of Morning Meeting…
This month, I’m really loving Morning Shares because they are a great way to support social emotional learning. They can also be fun this time of year because you can learn something new about your students – even in May!
Last month, I shared Thoughtful Thursday as an idea for Morning Meeting Shares, and this month, I want to share some more reflective Shares (that’s a lot of “Shares” in one sentence, but you know what I mean!).
I like the following two prompts because they allow students to reflect on their school environment, as well as practice some self-reflection on the school year thus far.
This first prompt says, “What can our school do to show more gratitude?” And the second prompt says, “What have you learned about yourself this year?”
Activity
I still love the Activity part of Morning Meeting – and of course, students love it too. In the video below, I share tons of different Morning Meeting Activity ideas. Check it out for some ideas that work year round. I shared this video as part of my Vlogmas video series, but like I said, the games work great for any time of year, especially in May when you’re needing some extra inspiration.
This month, I’d recommend considering incorporating more body movement during Morning Meeting. Your activities can consist of things like jumping jacks, yoga, breathing exercises, or even a dance party. Sometimes I like to get creative and have students act out different scenarios, like the one you see below!
This activity says, “Pretend you are a painter, creating a masterpiece.” It’s simple. It’s quick. But you’ll love how imaginative students can be!
Morning Message
Morning Message works best when it is unique to your class. I’m not in your classroom. I don’t know your students. And so ultimately, you are the expert when it comes to the Morning Message!
I do have some ideas to help you get started. You can:
- Outline the schedule for the rest of the morning / day
- Have students think about a goal they have for the day
- Revisit a topic from yesterday (or last week)
- Set expectations or agreements for the day
2021 May Holiday Morning Meetings
Celebrating different holidays during Morning Meeting can be so much fun! During May, there are several holidays you might want to incorporate into your Morning Meetings:
- Star Wars Day
- Cinco de Mayo
- Space Day
- Endangered Species Day
- Scavenger Hunt Day
- Memorial Day
On Cinco de Mayo, you might have a conversation with students about the history behind this holiday, and even ask them to respond to the share prompt: “What can our class do to learn more about Cinco de Mayo and Mexican culture?”
On Endangered Species Day, you might ask students, “What can kids do to spread awareness about endangered species?” Or, you might have them draw posters to spread awareness about endangered species.
Do you like these slides?
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I created an ENTIRE MONTH’S worth of pre-made, ready-to-go (but still editable!) Morning Meeting Slides to use with your students in May. If you like these slides and activity ideas, you can check out my product here.
Thank you!
If you’re new here, hi! I’m Maddie. I’m an edtech coach and a K-5 STEM teacher, but Morning Meeting has quickly become my thing online. I’ve shared videos with tips and tricks and I’ve created a bunch of products too. Check it out and let me know what you think!
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