Team Building AND Writing Combined

Today is "Team Building Tuesday" in my classroom for morning meeting. The activity they completed today involved the following:

I split the students into small groups of about 3-4 students. There has to be an even number of groups. After the students got into their small groups I told them their instructions. Each group was going to be assigned ANOTHER group in the room. They were to create a story using the group members from their assigned team as their characters. Example: Group A consisted of Student 1, 2, 3, and 4 Group B consisted of Student 5, 6, 7, and 8. Group A writes about students 5, 6, 7, and 8 and Group B writes about Student 1, 2, 3, and 4. They had the first 5-10 minutes to brainstorm character traits and strengths about the classmates they had been assigned as their characters. After that time they had about 15 minutes to create their stories.

Afterwards, we came together and the students voted to read each of the group's writings. They were HILARIOUS and very positive! The students gave a lot of positive feedback and even asked me to do it again in the future weeks.

Great way to incorporate writing into a team building activity!

Excerpts from their writing:
"Once upon a time there were three friends named Jacob, Emma, and Maegan. Jacob was funny, goofy, and creative. Maegan is intelligent, a great artist, and caring. Emma is a great softball player, she's smart and creative. One day they all met up at the jungle by their pet monkey named Mr. What'cha'ma'call it. When they got to the jungle Maegan said "Do you want to paint a picture of monkeys and bananas?" They hung the picture when they were done in a tree and started playing softball when WHACK! Emma hit the ball through the picture. Jacob quickly said "Uh oh girlfriend."

Their first instinct was the repaint the picture but they realized they were out of paint. Then Jacob started climbing the tree to Mr. What'cha'ma'call it and he was dining on bananas so he grabbed him and smaced him on the canvas. The next day when they went back to school they gave the picture to Ms. B and she said it looked like an elephant."

Create a Country

We did this activity as a team building activity over the course of about three days (Morning Meeting time only). The students were to create a country with their teammates. They had to come up with the following BEFORE creating the actual visual:

Country's Name

License Plate

National Bird

National Flower

The Flag

After they completed their activity they presented their visuals and went over the items they were required to produce. They were also asked the following follow up questions:

1. How were decisions made in your group?

2. Is everyone happy with what was decided? Why or why not?

3. What things are important to remember when making group decisions?

4. How can you tell if a group has been successful?

5. Why is it important to be able to make decisions as a member of a group?

These were the final products-

They LOVED this project and really got a lot out of working together. The answers to the follow up questions were really insightful. Next time I would ask them to answer them on a small sheet of paper as a reflection rather than discussion to see if their answers would've changed.

Name Team Building

Every morning I lead a morning meeting with my fifth graders. Every day of the week is a specific theme-

Mondays are "My Recap Mondays"

Tuesdays are "Team Building Tuesdays"

Wednesdays are "What's Up Wednesdays" [Current Events]

Thursdays are "Thoughtful Thursdays"

Fridays are "Friendship Fridays" [Book Buddies with the kindergarten students.]

Today, is Tuesday- "Team Building Tuesday" to be exact and that is exactly what we did. For our activity today the students were shown a white piece of paper with my (last) name spelled across it.

             B  A  N   K   E   N   B   U  S  H

After reviewing ACROSTIC poems from the previous week I told the students their goal was to work as a team to include EVERY student's name on the BANKENBUSH sign. Every student had to somehow be connected back to my last name.

They had a time limit to complete this task with very little direction outside of what I stated above. After the first go around we discussed what the positives were as well as what the deltas (things they could've done differently) were. Here is what they came up with:

+

Didn't argue with each other.

Chose a team leader.

Had a place for everyone to go when they were finished writing their name.

Deltas

Not everyone sat where they should've when they were done.

Everyone wanted to share their ideas with the team leader even though they weren't in charge.

People were talking out of turn.

Too much confusion.

Too much going on.

After discussing control and the deltas that they shared we came up with possible solutions.

Solutions

Team leader discusses with the class their strategies BEFORE starting.

Team leader calls on who to come up.

Separate the students into groups- 5 letters or below on one side and 6+ letters in your name on the other.

When you're finished sit back in your seats instead of on the floor to help organize.

Remember to include all students- even those who are missing.

The second time around went by MUCH better. Few results we had:

1. The team leader ended up forgetting her own name because she was so worried about everyone else.

2. Once they were told one minute warning a few students starting calling out suggestions in a panic that they wouldn't be done on time- again, going back to control.

It turned out really insightful for all the students and for myself.