Blah, blah, blah to rigor and instructional time! All children deserve a little fun and play at the end of the week. Here’s the “Friday Dance” and a few suggestions to give your students something to look forward to this week.
The Friday Dance (Tune: “Coming Round the Mountain”)
Come on everybody, take a chance. (Step back and clap your hands.)
It’s time to do the Friday dance.
Get up on your feet.
Clap and get beat!
Let’s all do the Friday dance.
It’s Friday! It’s Friday! It’s Friday! Yeah! (Hands in the air and
dance around.)
Friday Free Time
The last 15 minutes on Friday let the kids take off their shoes and do whatever they want!
Sit Where You Want
Friday afternoon let children switch places and sit wherever they want Friday afternoon.
Chew and Write
To encourage writing about what they learned during the week give each student sugar free gum to chew. They can chew the gum as long as they are writing.
Jamboree
Get together with another class or all the children on your grade level and sing! A different class could be in charge of this event every week.
Game Day
Let children bring board games (NOT video games) from home on Friday and play with their friends the last 30 minutes of the day.
*Invite parent volunteers or an older class to help with the games.
*Set up 4 or 5 different games, divide students into groups, and then let them rotate every 15 minutes to a different game.
Dress Up
We always looked forward to dress up days. Pajama parties, beach day (Yes, in January!), what I want to be when I grow up, hat day, sports day, and silly sock day are just a few ideas.
*You can always tie these into standards by having children dress up like a favorite book character or a hero.