How to Plan a Classroom Theme
Developing classroom themes serves as a good means to teach students different skills. Classroom themes also give an opportunity to integrate school curriculum around the theme topic, which provides far better understanding of the curriculum subject. A well-planned theme helps to build knowledge and life experience of students and can develop an attitude of inquiry in them. A classroom theme plan should also allow for fun and enthusiastic involvement of students in the learning process.
Other People Are Reading
Instructions
-
-
1
Discuss your idea of planning a classroom theme with fellow teachers. This way you will be able to share different ideas and benefit from others' expertise. If a similar effort was made in the school earlier, you could derive information from that teacher on how it was done.
-
2
Think about the different themes that can work for your class. Teachers usually select themes into which they can integrate curriculum topics. For example, if you are looking to develop a theme based on social studies, you could use some themes such as Native American history or the Roman emperors. If it is a science topic, you could use something like space exploration or natural disasters.
-
-
3
Involve students in developing theme ideas. Students can come up with innovative ideas. This type of collaboration in which teacher and students participate on an equal level increases student involvement and improves teacher-student relationships.
-
4
Decide on a theme that you think is worthwhile. The theme you select should increase knowledge of the students, add to their skills and develop a positive attitude. Also take into account the funds you would require to implement the theme. If you have a pre-determined budget, analyze beforehand how you will acquire funds in case of extra expenses. For example, will you be collecting it from the students or will the school provide any help.
-
5
Define the objective of the classroom theme. Plan activities based on the theme, determine resources and provide evaluation strategies. For example, if your theme is English words, your objective could be "Improving student vocabulary" and you could plan activities such as finding "27 better words" for a given word, according to K-3TeacherResources.com website. The resources for this activity can include online and print dictionaries. Evaluate activity based on the number of words generated. The successful student would be one that has completed all 27 words.
-
1
