Prizes and Seats

Ah, the first day of a new quarter... always a full day.

First, we changed the seating chart. I did pretty good this time; only one person was dissatisfied with her seat. In preparation for the (potentially) many complaints about who has to sit by who, I made some 'Seat Switch' coupons they could earn by reading more books (BINGO prizes) or writing more words (NaNo prizes). They were huge hits. Since I was in coupon making mode this weekend, I made a bunch of other ones: Miss H types for one round, chew gum in class one morning, pick a redo round for Daily 5.

We only had time to pass out BINGO prizes today, so not many coupons were taken. NaNo prizes are on the agenda for tomorrow and I'm sure many coupons will be picked then. There was quite the class discussion about the use of the coupons, most resulting in a class vote. How many can people take at a time? The result from voting: up to three. Can people switch seats with people who don't want to switch? Yes, but if that person has a coupon, they could switch back. Can the seating swap coupons be used for lunch seats?

Yes, my class has not forgotten that lunch seats are assigned. Their choice, not mine. That was the second thing we did this morning. I had totally forgotten about it until someone said, "Yes! We get to change lunch seats today!" So we drew sticks right away since I knew they wouldn't be able to concentrate if we didn't get it out of the way. It mostly went the way people wanted it to, although two people are very disappointed with their seats. They were the ones who asked if coupons could be used for lunch seats. Surprisingly, the class voted that yes, they can be used. Personally, it doesn't matter to me, so if they want to use their coupon at lunch, by all means. Only four seat swap coupons were made, and they can't be reused until someone redeems one.

On a totally different note, some of the games for our Family Write Night came today. Super fast! I only ordered them Saturday. I wonder if my kids will notice them on my desk and ask to play them early. Perhaps. Or maybe they'll be too focused on NaNo to want to play games. Some kids are way ahead and some are way behind. It's a good thing Miss M is coming tomorrow; she can help type for kids too. I already have a meeting scheduled with one of the 5th graders who doesn't know what to write next in her story.

The prizes are a huge motivator. Two students told me they're going to write so they get over 1000 words so they can get a 'big' prize tomorrow (aka- a class coupon). We'll see! I still need to write my words tonight, but my energy is flagging. Running errands all over town will do that! The rest of the nights this week won't be much better, energy-wise. Tomorrow there's a PTL meeting, Thursday I have errands in Mankato, and then Friday I have nothing. So maybe I can take it easy Friday. Good thing it's a short week!