How often do we get engrossed in an afternoon lesson only to glance at the clock and realise that the children need to be outside to meet their parents in a couple of minutes? The mad scramble to put resources away, the inevitable scrum in the cloakroom and the realisation when you return to the classroom that there were letters to go home today don’t help to provide a calm transition at the end of the day.
What effect does this have on you? What effect does this have on the other members of your classroom community? The transition back to parents and carers needs to be handled as carefully as receiving the children into school in the morning. No parent wants to receive an anxious and rushed child at the end of the day.
We’ve all been there, these things happen. But if you find that you’re always the last class to appear outside it may help to look at your end of day routines. What could you put in place to provide a calm transition for each child from the school community back into their individual home communities?
Use the ideas in ‘Responsibilities in the Classroom‘ to assign tasks to different groups of children to enable the end of a lesson, the collection or resources and sharing out items to go home to be carried out in a calm manner. Remember to share your expectations using positive language (see here).
In this post, I considered how morning routines help to make a positive start to the day. The areas here need to be considered travelling in the reverse direction. Having a tray with outgoing resources by the door can help you to remember to send them home as can giving a pupil the responsibility to remind you! Consider the steps needed to leave the classroom; collection of personal belongings and leaving the classroom ready for the cleaning staff to do their magic. Think about how these could be broken down into an easy routine that the majority of pupils are able to participate in.
Think about those children who find transitions difficult, how could you ease their participation? Could they complete their tasks slightly ahead of everyone else or with the support of a peer?
A couple of weeks ago on my Facebook page I shared the idea of a ‘smile jar’ to help to focus on the positives from your day. Before leaving the classroom share a positive moment from your day or ask another member of your classroom community to share something and then tell them something about the next school day to give them something to look forward to or prepare themselves for.
Once you’ve read this post, think about how many of these activities you want to use. Then think about how long they will realistically take – remember how many children of different abilities are being expected to do them and think about the environment and space in which you can carry them out. You will need to take time to ‘train’ them and you may need to use pictorial cues to support them. The time taken will vary according to the stage of the school year, especially after returning from a holiday, and new arrivals to your class.
Keeps Them Out Of Mischief 
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