"Not so routine" Routines

Wow - life got in the way the past few weeks and blogging became low priority. But I'm back and hopefully will get blogging into my routine. And speaking of routine . . .


I like routines - they keep you on track and provide some stability in the day to day craziness of the classroom. BUT, I don't like boring! So I've developed some routines that are favorites of my second graders and will share them over the next few days. 


First up . . . Bowling! 
Every Thursday I go bowling during our literacy block and try to knock down as many bowling pins second graders as I can. Each student stands with a white erase board/marker/eraser in hand. I post the 3 or 6 "academic vocabulary" words we are currently working with. Each student chooses a word and writes it on their white board. I randomly choose a bowling card on which I've written the meaning of one of the vocabulary words. I say the meaning of the word - class says what word the meaning matches - all students that wrote that word are "knocked down" and no longer stand. We repeat this for a total of 6 turns. My goal is to try to get all the pins students down. Those that are knocked down still choose and write a word and keep a tally count of how many times their chosen word is picked. The goals of this routine are to practice the vocabulary words and their meanings and to have a little movement (and fun)   involved. The kids ask to do this practically every day - it's definitely one of their faves!


Here are the cards I use (they're very basic). I've laminated mine and then just use dry erase or overhead markers to write on the back.


vocabbowling