By Andreina Ibarra
Back to class is a time of joy. It is a time to celebrate the bond between faculty, students, and their school. Every experience should be unforgettable.
Now that instructors are back in class, they should ask themselves two questions: What do I usually do during the first days in the classroom? What topics do I usually discuss with the students?
Remember that everything that happens during the first days of class is fundamental for the development of the rest of the course, because it is precisely during the first months when the activities or proposals have special interest and importance among the students.
With this in mind, a guide developed by the University of Valencia (Spain) suggests explaining to students the methodologies to be used in the classroom.
How can you support your students during back to class?
During the start of a new school year, it is common for students to feel anxiety or fear. Given that school can be an important meeting and support space, what can you do for your students to support them?
- Talk about the new challenges: Generate spaces for group and individual dialogue.
- Invite students to propose the best forms of evaluation—or explain clearly that the only purpose of your class is to nurture their knowledge.
- Have fun! Organize recreational activities that encourage the bond between students and faculty.
If as an instructor, you encourage learning and cooperative work as opposed to traditional methodology, the results you obtain will always be much more positive.
Take a moment to relax
It is very important to take care of the school environment and keep everything related to the classroom under control. However, it is also important that you take some steps to ensure that your own experience will also be positive.
Try to practice relaxation techniques before and after class. This will help improve your attention, enhance control over mental processes, increase your ability to control emotions, and provide physical relaxation.
It is also important to plan your classes ahead of time and establish priorities. Stress is often the result of an overload of work.
Get back into a routine
One of the things that happens most during vacations is that routines are completely disrupted. Although we should not lose the general structure, it is normal that some school year schedules and habits are altered over vacation.
Therefore, a couple of weeks before going back to class, it is important to restart some of our routines. Getting up earlier each day, getting used to our school-year eating schedules, and perhaps dedicating a few minutes daily to activities such as reading or studying will help us re-adapt more easily to the daily routine.
Once we’re back to class, it is important to be aware that our students are coming from a vacation period that is usually intense, so giving them a few days to readjust to the expectations of order, attention, and discipline can be useful.
Read also: Eight Ways to Relax During the Back to School Craziness
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