Happy Fri-yay My Teacher Peeps,
Have you ever done a gallery walk in the classroom? Have you ever wished you had just a little more structure to follow?
Gallery walks are where you have posted/taped information around the room, and students are given questions to answer from that information. I have heard them called other things, this is just what I have always called this.
Recently, I have discovered a way to make these a little more guided, and done with ease and order. As a person whose first career was the military, this is really important to the foundation of my classroom structure.
First:
The first way to give this a little more order, is to number the readings that you have on the wall, and correlated with that number are the questions.
Second:
The second is to number the students off in the number of readings there are. For instance, if there are four readings, I count students off by four. Then I send ones to the first reading, twos to the second, and so on. They can go where they wish from there, but this breaks up how many people are reading at a given station at a time. Also, it divides up buddies, so that they are answering these themselves, versus copying off someone else’s work.
Last:
The next way that I organize gallery walks is by walking around asking students guiding questions, and answering questions as they arise. I try really hard not to reveal the answers, but to guide them with questions to the answers they need.
You can also set up a station where they can check that their answers are correct. This allows for you to continue to help students around the room, and for early finishers to have something to work on, while they wait for their classmates to get done.
I recently posted a Gallery Walk about the Olmec and Zapotec civilizations, if you need it for your teacher toolbox! 🙂 It is always my hope that the lessons and support that I share helps you in the classroom!
Well friends, those are my suggestions, please let me know if you have any questions or suggestions that you have done in your classes!
Thank you,
Misty
