At this time of the school year, we all can feel it happening in our classrooms: our students are doing sloppy work, having decreased participation, showing minimal effort, avoiding assignments, and many more unfortunate behaviors. With the temperatures rising and summer just beyond their reach, student’s lack of attention is at an all-time high. So, to combat these behaviors, we’re sharing 10 teacher-approved tips for increasing end-of-year student motivation.

For all the resources mentioned in this episode, head to the show notes:

https://www.secondstorywindow.net/podcast/end-of-year-student-motivation

Resources:

• Destination Imagination
• Looking Back Bulletin Board
• Label Scraper Tool
• Heat Gun
• Just For the Summer by Abby Jimenez
• Connect with us on Instagram @2ndstorywindow
• Shop our teacher-approved resources
• Join our Facebook group, Teacher Approved
• Leave your review on Apple Podcasts!

Emily 0:36

Hey there, thanks for joining us today. In today's episode, we've got 10 teacher approved suggestions for keeping those kids motivated all the way to the end of the school year, and sharing a tip for how to get a little ahead for back to school.

Heidi 0:52

We start our episodes with a morning message just like we used to do at morning meeting in our classrooms. This week's morning message is who is your favorite Abbott Elementary character? Emily, who is your favorite? I know it's hard to pick.

Emily 1:05

It is hard to pick it really is because like it depends on the episode like every episode, I'm like, in love with somebody new because they are all so well written. But I just love Barbara. She's good. She says the most hilarious things and her delivery is impeccable. My favorite character quirk of hers is her tendency to mix up white and black celebrities like saying Carrie Underwood when she means Kerry Washington, like, Ah, I get such a kick out of it.

Heidi 1:36

So clever. So funny.

Emily 1:38

Who's your favorite Heidi?

Heidi 1:39

Well, this is a toughy I feel like I identify with Jeanine the most. I mean, really cut from the same cloth on that one. And I love that she's a second grade teacher too. So she's very familiar territory, of feeling like you're the only one that can save the whole world and kids at every moment of the day.

Heidi 2:00

But I think my favorite character and this is kind of a new love this season is Mr. Johnson. Oh my God really just counting around on him. I feel it's because listening to the Office Ladies podcast, and doing a rewatch with that and appreciating Creed on a whole new level.

Emily 2:15

Like he's like Abbott Elementary's Creed for sure.

Heidi 2:19

I miss so much. I'm trying to really pay better attention to him. He has the best like hilarious gems that you just dropped and like moves on. And if you're not paying attention, you miss them. They're so funny. And then the scene where he's like arguing with the roofer.

Emily 2:33

That killed me that killed me that was so funny. You're not watching Abbott Elementary, you're seriously missing out.

Heidi 2:41

Yeah, you're totally missing out on you got summer now to catch up on it.

Emily 2:45

Lori says that she likes to root for Gregory he feels like an underdog but Ava keeps me laughing at her ridiculous Yes. And Melissa is also an Ava fan. She says Ava is the best she's so over the top however her character has grown as a person. As the seasons go by. She's shown she has heart under her bravado.

Heidi 3:04

I think the writers have done a really good job making her insufferable but in like an endearing way.

Emily 3:11

It's kind of like with Michael Scott, were at the beginning of the series. You don't root for him because he's just so obnoxious. But as the series goes on, you come to root for him because I didn't like Ava at first because not just oh she was the worst but now I get a real kick out of her.

Emily 3:28

We'd love to know who you root for on Abbott Elementary so come join the conversation over in our teacher approved Facebook group.

Emily 3:36

Well the end of the year comes with so many unique challenges. We've talked about some of them recently, you can go back to episode 124 if you want some tips for managing spring fever and all the fun that comes with that.

Heidi 3:51

But today we are talking about a another end of year malady called officially no motivation itis or something like that. Symptoms include negative attitude, sloppy work, decreased participation, low energy levels, aimless wandering, diminished effort, avoiding assignments, procrastinating increased confrontational behaviors, and honestly that list could go on.

Emily 4:17

Clearly, we need a remedy for this highly contagious syndrome stat. Typically, when a class is overrun with behavior problems, the solution is to increase either novelty or structure. But at the end of the school year, the solution isn't that straightforward.

Heidi 4:33

Unfortunately, right? Usually when novelty is high, like you know before winter break or before a field trip, we can increase our classroom structure to rebalance the energy in the room. But when we reach the end of the school year, novelty is at peak levels as kids anticipate summer break. But if we increase our class structure in our typical ways, like practicing procedures, narrowing choices and upholding consequences, we are actually fueling the no motivation itis outbreak.

Emily 5:05

The kids have had 170 days of that already. They are craving novelty. But if we just toss in some novelty, like letting kids take their shoes off for an afternoon that sounds smelly, I don't think if we do that, and we're not also increasing the structure, we turn the kids from bored and burned out to wild and out of control.

Heidi 5:26

Which is definitely not an improvement. The solution to this is to increase novelty and structure at the same time. And don't let that sounds overwhelming. We have got 10 easy ways to Increase your students motivation, without it turning into a free for all.

Emily 5:43

Our first suggestion is to offer a challenge. If you are done with your testing, a challenge is a great way for students to solve problems with their academic learning. STEM challengers are a natural fit for this type of activity. Students could create foil boats that can hold pennies without sinking or design marble mazes. There are so many fun ideas for STEM challenges.

Heidi 6:07

In researching this episode, I actually came across a great free resource from Destination Imagination, which I think is a fun name. And it has some really fun challenge suggestions.

Heidi 6:18

For example, having your students have to tell a story using only actions and seven words. I think about that can be really fun. We'll put a link to this PDF in the show notes. And obviously, these sorts of challenges will be easier for older students. But looking over them I think was some adapting and teacher support, most of them could work for first and second graders too.

Emily 6:41

Projects that involve group work can be extra motivating for students. At this time of year, students typically are hungry for more action and talking and cooperative learning challenges can help satisfy both of those cravings.

Heidi 6:56

Now moving on to our second suggestion, this time of year try involving students in a project. So a project may sound similar to a challenge, but they actually have different goals. A challenge typically involves creative problem solving, and it may have an open ended solution. A project on the other hand requires working over a period of time toward a specific goal.

Emily 7:20

Either as individuals or in groups, you could have your students all working on the same project. For example, students could rewrite the ending of a favorite fable or fairy tale, or students could all contribute a part of a larger project like making shapes around our school PowerPoint.

Heidi 7:37

Or if you've really got the time and energy you could have students choose their own project to work on. With a program like Genius Hour, teachers set aside an hour a week for students to research and prepare a project on their chosen topic. But at the end of the year, an hour a week is not going to get you too far. Instead, it might be more beneficial to set aside like 30 minutes a day for students to work.

Emily 8:02

And if you can take that on at the end of the year, I am sending you 1 million high fives. I'm tired just thinking about it. I think I do better with some end of your art projects or readers theatres performances I have done that at the end of the year. That's a little bit easier than managing individual students projects. But if you're already familiar with a program like Genius Hour, maybe it would be much more doable than starting from scratch in May.

Heidi 8:26

On the other hand, the end of the school year does lend itself to trying something new. And trying something new also happens to be our third suggestion for motivating kids at the end of the year.

Heidi 8:38

If you've seen something online or from another teacher that you've considered implementing, maybe something like a routine like Genius Hour or book clubs or digital math games, you can give it a test right now so you'll know if you want to commit to it next year. Not only will trying something new motivate your students, it can help you find the motivation to keep going too. As our grandma used to say a change is as good as a rest. Although she would say with a Scottish accent and I can't do that.

Emily 9:06

Neither one of us inherited a Scottish accent, sadly. Auditioning a new program now is giving your back to school self a little gift to when it comes time to launch the new year. You've already worked out some of the kinks. And you're stressed out September self will be so grateful.

Heidi 9:24

And talking about next year. Our fourth tip for motivating students is to preview next year's content. This is one of my favorite ways to increase novelty and structure at the same time. To make this work take a peek at the curriculum for the grade above you and choose a topic your students will be excited to learn about. This might be something like writing in cursive or learning two digit multiplication.

Emily 9:49

For this to work. You want to make a big deal about how your classes learned so much during the year that you think they're ready for this next step even though it's technically something they won't get to you until the next grade, then spend a few days teaching your students this new topic.

This motivates kids because you are raising the level of concern. When kids realize this is something that they are going to be responsible to know when they, they are more motivated to engage with what's going on.

If you don't want to focus on a single topic, you could offer a larger overview of the major topics that will be taught next year. Have students share what they already know about those areas, and what they're excited to learn about.

Just a couple of guidelines, if you do decide to add in some of next year's content. First, we don't want this to increase anyone's anxiety. That's why it's important to start by reminding students how much they already know. And assure them that they are ready to take this next step.

Yeah, and then make sure that you're not stepping on other teachers toes by introducing the topic and wrong. I'd suggest that you limit your instruction to the hands on introductory level.

I actually had something like this happened to me when I was a student. My second grade teacher taught us multiplication at the end of the year. And I don't remember exactly what she taught us. But I remember when my third grade teacher was introducing multiplication, I was doing whatever my second grade teacher had taught.

And my third grade teacher was like, What is going on? And so I was like, Look, this is what Mrs. Green did. And my third grade teacher did not think this is the right thing to be doing. I can't remember what I did wrong. But I have a very clear memory of my teacher, Mrs. Harder. That's a rough name for a teacher.

I can picture her before you said the name, I knew who your third grade teacher was.

Had this memory of her being frustrated. And I can tell she wasn't frustrated with me. But she was frustrated with kind of having to deal with this problem from all these kids from Mrs. Green's class.

We don't want to make our co workers jobs harder. Let's aim for lessons at the most basic level of introduction, and maybe throw in a few games to keep things interesting.

Okay, now let's go on to our fifth tip, which is to celebrate growth. Recognizing progress is one of the best means of motivation. If you can see how far you've come, it makes it easier to keep on going.

I loved how easy it was to do this with our morning work. Because I had my students pages bound into a boat for the whole year, it made it really easy to look backwards.

And on the first day of school kind of started this little tradition as the kids would flip through the pages. As they would get toward the back of the book and they would start to get a little concerned by how hard the pages seemed. But I promised them that when we got to the end of the year, they would think it was so easy, they wouldn't even give it a second thought.

And then on one of the last weeks of school in the morning, after we hit corrected our morning work, I would ask the kids how they could do such a good job with all of those hard questions. And you know how kids are they'd kind of scoff and be like that was it hard. That was so easy for me. And then I would remind them of the conversation we had on the first day, which of course they don't remember, but that's okay. I would point out that at the beginning of the year, those pages seemed impossible. And now look how easy it was it didn't even give it a second thought.

I love that your allergies are making it seem like you're really choked up about work. I mean, we do. We are very passionate about morning work and the transformation that your students will see.

Another idea for celebrating growth is making a class book. You can have each student contribute a page highlighting their greatest accomplishment from the year. Or you could do something similar in a slideshow if a book isn't your thing.

Having students make time capsules is a meaningful way to bridge the ending of one year and the start of the next. Students can reflect on the highs and the lows of this year. And make goals and predictions for what they hope the next year will bring.

As important as reflection is it can feel bittersweet, so let's not forget to keep things light. Our sixth tip for keeping students motivated is to add in the fun.

There are so many fun and have your celebrations. Coming up with ideas is definitely not the problem. The problem is having to narrow down all of the options.

You know we love a theme day, that's always a great way to increase both structure and novelty in your class. Go back to Episode 125 if you want all our tips and tricks for theme days.

Planning a fun countdown to the end of the year is another way to keep students motivated. Lots of teachers love an alphabet countdown so like 26 days before the end of the school year. They do an activity starting with the letter A and they work their way through the alphabet doing a letter a day. Back

Back in episode 63. Lots of teachers shared their fun end of your activities, so make sure to check those out for some teacher approved ideas.

Which brings us to our seventh tip for motivation use technology. For older students this would be a great time to create a digital yearbook or time capsule. Students can contribute reflections, photos and video and they can all be combined into one presentation.

If you have enough devices, you can use the goose chase app to create digital scavenger hunts around the school. Even younger students can be successful with this if they can manage the devices on their own.

You can combine a project with technology. Try assigning groups of students to make a presentation teaching your next year students all the ins and outs of understanding one of the concepts that they will be learning in their new grade.

And using technology might be another way for you to try something new before next year. If there's an app or website, you're considering incorporating into your future class, test it out now. It's a low stakes way to try it out before you go to the work of planning your schedule around it next year.

Another way to use technology is for our eighth motivation tip, make connections with other students.

Flipgrid has a pen pal program called Grid Pals, where classes all over the world can connect and Go Pangea has a pen pal Schools program.

And just to know, we've heard lots of recommendations from teachers that like these programs, but we have not tested out either of these ourselves. So maybe do a little bit of digging online before you sign your class up.

Virtual field trips and guest speakers are other ways your students can connect using technology. But there are plenty of analog ways for students to make connections too.

Right. Making a connection can be as simple as having students write letters to their future teacher, or maybe to the student who will be sitting at their desk next year. You could try pairing up with a class and another grade and do buddy activities.

My second graders had fifth grade buddies, they read with each other and played math games together. The older kids even taught my students how to play some fun games.

Or you could invite some students to visit your class from the next grade level up and have a little q&a. Ahead of time you could gather questions from your students about what to expect next year. And then have some students from that grade level visit your class and answer your students questions. And then they can also share what they like best about being in that new grade.

This will probably run smooth this if you provide those students with questions in advance, so they can think through their answers instead of hoping they can come up with something useful on the fly.

Yeah, just because they're the next grade level up doesn't mean they're any quicker on their feet. Yeah. And if you can get other grade levels on board, why not have students meet next year's teachers. If those teachers can get away for a few minutes, they can come introduce themselves to your class.

It might be more fun though, to have your class visit next year's classrooms. If you can get other grade levels on board, you can have each grade rotate through the classrooms they'll be in next year.

And you don't have to know each student's class assignments yet to make this work. Each class could rotate through all of the next grade levels, classrooms for an introduction and maybe a short fun activity. That way students will get to know all of the teachers that way.

Getting to see next year's classrooms is a great way to build excitement for the new school year, as well as biting off that pesky no motivation itis.

And another way to battle no motivation itis is to change locations. Checking out next year's classrooms does double duty as making connections and changing locations. But there are lots of other ways to change locations at school.

Right you could try doing your regular activities in a new place, like having a Science Review in the gym or have students bring their books and do silent reading time in a quiet hallway.

If you can get your team on board, you can rotate classes. Each teacher can plan an activity and then the rest of the grade level can rotate through. Maybe you spend a whole afternoon with kids rotating rooms, or you do one classroom each day for a week.

Not only does changing up locations keep students engaged, but it cuts back on the amount of planning you have to do. It's much easier to do one activity five times than it is to come up with five activities.

Of course the easiest way to change locations is to take kids outside. If you are allowed, definitely try doing some learning outside.

Or you can just give your kids some extra recess we promise we won't tell.

Our lips are sealed. Alright, that brings us to our tenth tip for keeping students motivated at the end of the year. And that is to revisit your class favorites. As much as introducing new activities is motivating to students so is revisiting old favorites.

Think about all the things your students have enjoyed this year. Favorite stories you've read favorite morning meeting greetings, favorite math games, favorite writing prompts, favorite indoor recess games, all the fun stuff that has shaped your class culture over the last nine months. And then all you have to do is add it to your school day.

You already know that these classic hits motivate your students so bring them back out. And now not only are your students engaged, but you engage them without adding more work to your to do list.

When and since students already know how to do these activities, they can manage them independently. That means you're free to work on some of those pesky end of year tasks that need your attention. So sounds like a winwin to me.

So if no motivation itis has crept into your classroom, do not fear, try some or all of these 10 Teacher Approved tips for motivating students at the end of the year.

One, offer students a challenge; two involve students in a project. Three, try something new. Four preview next year's concepts. Five, celebrate growth. Six, add in the fun. Seven use technology. Eight connect with other students, nine change locations, and 10 revisit class favorites. We are wishing you a class of busy engaged learners who give you lots of free time to work on your own and of year tasks.

Do you have a suggestion for keeping students motivated at the end of the year? We would love to hear about it. Come join the conversation in our Teacher Approved Facebook group.

Now let's talk about this week's teacher approved tip. Each week, we leave you with a small actionable tip that you can apply in your classroom today. This week's teacher approved tip is planning end of year reflection that gets you ahead for next year. Tell us about this, Heidi?

Well, you know, we love giving a gift to our future selves. And we have got a great one today. Celebrating growth is our fifth tip for keeping students motivated. And we've got a fun new product to help you do that. It's a bulletin board set that has students looking back and looking forward.

So to start as a class, you brainstorm memorable moments from the past year, you can just list them on the board. And then each student chooses one to draw and write about if you want them to do the writing.

Then you give each of the kids a polaroid frame to draw on. You can print these in color or on colored paper. And if you do want to use colored paper, I tried really hard to match the Astro bright color palette. So everything would look cohesive. If you wanted to use that paper.

Then the kids draw their memory on the polaroid frame and you can add the writing page if they do that. You collect these and then use them to make an end of your bulletin board.

We give you a header that says Looking Back at blank grade and you can fill it with your grade level. But here's where the gift part comes in. When it's time to start setting up your class in the fall. All you have to do is trade out back at two forward too. And now you're back to school bulletin board says looking forward to blank grade. And all you had to do is change out a couple words.

And you're not limited to using this on a bulletin board. You could put it on your door or on the wall outside your classroom. You could really put it anywhere you'll need a back to school display.

Ideally, this is something you can put up in May and leave up all summer. But we know some schools aren't cool about that they want everything off the walls because it's apparently so imperative that the school have bare walls all summer. If you're in that boat, we are sorry, but even if you can't leave it on display all summer, at least it will be easy to repost in the fall.

Put it up somewhere that it will be easy to take it down from probably like choose your door in that situation because it's easy to take it off and put it back up and just take a picture of it before you take it down. And then all you have to do is stick everything back up where you had it before.

It is so nice to have a meaningful way to fill some time at the end of the year. But my favorite part of this activity is actually what happens when school starts. When I did this with my own students. I was surprised by how touched my former students were to see that their work was still on display.

I think it helped them feel like they still had a part of my classroom. And you know as the soppy sappy, over emotional teacher at the first of the year. I loved having a way to show them that even though they are growing up and moving on. They'll always be my kids. And I am getting a little choked up even with the allergies.

If you are interested in this bulletin boards that you can find it in our store and we will put a link to it in the show notes. It includes the photo frames for students to color and different size writing sheets. Plus it has all the bulletin board pieces like the title, some cute border strips and a teacher guide that walks you through everything step by step.

Plus if you use a Cricut or silhouette cutting machine, we've also included the SVG files as well to make that as easy as possible.

It's the first time we've done that it feels so fun. I wish I had a cutter still so I can test it out. I don't even have a cutter anymore. So if you try it out, please send us a photo. We'd love to see how you adapt it for your classroom. And if you use the cutter tell us about that too.

To wrap up the show we are sharing what we're giving extra credit to this week. Emily, what gets your extra credit?

I'm giving extra credit to Just For the Summer by Abby Jimenez. I think I'll give an extra credit to all three of them. books in this series because I just love them all so much. She's probably my favorite like Modern Romance writer, and she's really good.

This is one of those series that is actually all standalone books, but if you do read them in order, you'll see some characters from other books and some fun little easter eggs too, but you really can read them in any order.

This latest one is about Justin who discovers he has a curse. Every woman he dates goes on to find their soulmate the second they break up. When his curse goes viral, thanks to a Reddit thread. A woman slides into his DMS with the same problem and they come up with a plan they'll date each other and break up and then they can find their true soulmates.

Perfect what could go wrong?

I know I just also really love the Abby's books have a lot of witty banter, but they tackle serious issues too, like trauma and anxiety. So highly recommend the latest from Abby Jiminez.

That sounds like the perfect summer read. Put it on your list. I already finished it. I'm sad.

Okay, what are you giving credit to Heidi?

Well, there's much less banter with my extra credit. I'm giving extra credit to a plastic label scraper tool. The other night I was trying to get some like gluey residue off a bottle. And this little dude came in so handy. I just put some Goo Gone on there, you know that orangey liquid stuff. Yes. And then I used a little scraper tool and it all came off lickety split.

I didn't have to use my fingernails at all, which is a win, so if you are responsible for getting sticky labels off of surfaces in your classroom at the end of the year, this could be a real lifesaver. I know I was had to do that or my custodian would get real frustrated with me. Back when I was a custodian in college, we just use a razor blade to get up sticky stuff. But a plastic scraper is probably much safer to have in a classroom. Although Emily, you have shown me up by getting a heat gun, which sounds way cooler than a scraper to get up sticky labels.

And I literally just got it like I just use it for the first time like two days ago. Of course my kids thought it was shot fire because that's what the box looks like. I heard them saying like, Oh, that that thing shoots fire. I'm like, No, it doesn't. It just it just gets hot. And if you have a hairdryer, you can use that as well. But I don't mind broke and I never replaced it. So I got a heat gun instead. And it works great.

Well also that would be nice to have, you know, probably around downstairs or in the kitchen. Yes. Where you're getting labels off as opposed to in your bathroom where the hairdryer is.

You don't have to like run upstairs and get your hairdryer. But I did think I think it would probably work even better if you also had a little scraper to use with it. So I'll have to look at your scraper tool. I think the two together will be an excellent comment. Yes,

Yes, well make sure you put a link to the heat gun in the show notes then.

I guess that's my bonus extra credit.

We love you so much for giving you a little extra today.

That's it for today's episode. Try some or all of our 10 Teacher Approved tips for motivating students at the end of the year. And don't forget our teacher approved tip to plan an end of year celebration that gets you ahead for next year.