Dear Coach Carolyn,
The demands of my school day limit my time for Morning Meeting. How can I fit it all in?

Coach Carolyn says:
Teachers feel the pressure of many demands. But remember that Morning Meeting builds a foundation for the day, connects students to school, and gets their brains primed for learning. It can also be used to introduce academic content for that day, review key information, or spark interest in new learning. The key factors for a successful Morning Meeting are community-building and consistency. Requiring only 15 or 20 minutes, Morning Meeting actually can jump-start the academic day and improve the efficiency of your use of time throughout the day.

To support a faster-paced meeting, consider the components of Morning Meeting: greeting, sharing, activity, news and announcements. All can be designed for a 15-minute time frame.

Quick greetings
You can refresh a quick, simple, well-worn greeting for added fun and can produce the same payoffs as a lengthier greeting. You'll save time because familiar greeting formats require less introduction, modeling, and practicing time. For example, you can do a basic greeting in a language other than English (instead of hello, use buon giornio, boker tov, buenos dias, guten morgen, etc.), do a skip greeting (greet the person seated a certain number of chairs away from you), or greet by last names in just a couple of minutes.

Simultaneous greetings, during which everyone in class greets a partner or two at the same time after being given a signal to start, can be completed in well under a minute. Greetings that may be done simultaneously include Floppy Fish, Butterfly, Silent, Hand Jive, and One-minute Mingle.

Quick shares
Sharing is often the component of Morning Meeting that takes the most time. By limiting the questions or comments to three in a dialogue-share format, students are able to quickly seek some information. You can encourage them to exchange further at other appropriate times in the day such as recess or lunch. Partner shares provide a way achieve 100% participation in any share topic in just a minute or two. After any partner share, you may choose to ask one or two volunteers to summarize for the whole group what the partners discussed. Otherwise, an around-the-circle share can quickly connect to curriculum topics or an upcoming mini-lesson.

Fast, fun, academic-based games
Even a quick game may bring active learning into the day (try Buzz, Coseeki, Electricity, Hands Up, Heads or Tails, or Zoom). Many longer games can be shortened by doing only one or a few rounds. Embedding academic material in the activity can spark, review, or assess students' learning. For example, a game that encourages movement and number sense (like Human Protractor or Line Ups) easily relate to content areas. You can watch to see who needs more work in a content area or skill and who has some mastery. You can also see how students are socially succeeding-all in a few fun, active minutes. Be creative! Some of the most engaging games come from teachers or students inventing a variation to a favorite game.

Teach ahead
Teach quick greetings, share formats, and activities ahead of time, when there is less time pressure. When you get a chance-any time of the day would work-teach students quick greetings, share formats, and activities. These can be "banked" for use later. Explain, model, and practice each until you're confident students could successfully do them without much review or remodeling. Students will benefit from the exposure to lively, community-building fun as they learn the new structures, and you'll be setting them up for success down the road.

Multi-tasking news and announcements
For the news and announcements chart, try using an interactive question or task that reinforces or sparks learning by connecting to something from your lesson plans for the day. Numbers, opinions, words, letters, and even reading strategies can be embedded in your meeting chart. Save time by incorporating math calendar activities, daily editing tasks, or new vocabulary words in the text of your chart. Read the chart together as a group, and revisit it during the day to recall the pleasure of the Morning Meeting and remind everyone that they are a friendly community of learners.

First thing in the morning is far and away the best time for Morning Meeting. If that doesn't work for you, figure out another regular time when you can do it every day. My daughter's third-grade class started Morning Meeting at 10:30 a.m. (after other learning activities), and it helped them develop a strong working community.

At least have a greeting
If you must begin the school day with a transition out of the room, at least allow students time to greet one another before they leave. A very quick "stand alone" greeting such as Hand Jive, Funny Voices, or Hand Stack starts the day with everyone together. You could even manage a greeting when everyone is already lined up ready to transition. At least everyone would begin the day with a welcome from their classmates.

Carolyn Rottman is a Responsive Classroom consultant and the Administrator for Elementary School Services at Origins.

This article first appeared in Origins: A Newsletter for Elementary Educators, Winter 2011