Morning Procedures to teach in Kindergarten-The Big List of Things to Teach and Consider

Whether you are a brand new teacher or you have taught for years, back to school time is so much fun! There are so many cute activities to do, the kids are so excited, and you are just downright ready to rock the year. With all the fun comes one of the most important aspects of back to school time: morning routines and morning procedures. Establishing a consistent and purposeful routines in your classroom will not only help your students, but it will help you be more successful as well.

Have a Game Plan

Something to Keep in Mind

Keep it simple, especially in the beginning of the year. There are many kids who will come to you who have never been in a school setting. You will have to teach even the most basic procedures and expectations. It is always better to “over-teach” and explicitly tell them and practice what you expect them to do. Some students truly don’t know what to do. You may have students who have never seen a pencil. Model everything you expect them to do and then practice, practice, practice.

Having simple visuals will help students tremendously. This was a basic visual I made when I started teaching kindergarten. Just by looking at this routine card, they knew exactly what to do when they walked in the classroom.

First, they would empty their folder and put it in the pink basket by the door. Next, they would put their backpack in their assigned locker. Finally, they would grab breakfast in the cooler or heated bag on the carpet and eat it at their seat. They knew that after they were done eating, they could grab a morning tub and sit wherever they want.

I made this in PowerPoint in just a few minutes. If you want to make one for your classroom, use Google to find the pictures you want and then use this website to remove the backgrounds in the pictures.

Arrival Procedures

Back to school time is the perfect time to set up those routines. Before you go back to school, really think about how you want to structure your morning. Students, especially Pre-K and kindergarteners, need consistent, structured routines. If you are a new teacher, talk to other people on your grade level team and other teachers who teach other grades to see how they structure their morning. Everyone does different things in the morning and it can take some time to find what works best in your classroom. Here are a few things to think about as you plan.

Arrival Procedures

How will they walk in the classroom from the hallway?
What noise level should they have when they walk in the room?
What noise level should they have when they are unpacking their items?
How/Where will they put their backpacks? Do they have a labeled hook, cubby, locker, etc. to store their backpack? What are the expectations if they have to share a cubby/locker with another student?
How/where do you want them to store their lunchboxes? Will they stay in their backpack or will you have a special place for all lunch boxes?
How/where do you want them to store their snacks? *Personal preference: My students keep their snack in the backpacks. I had issues with students stealing or switching snacks and keeping them in their backpacks helped a lot.
How/where do you want them to store their water bottles? I have seen people use hanging shoe racks. I like to keep my water next to me, so I let my students keep their bottles on their table or on the floor. Some teachers like to zip tie a cup to the desk to act as a cup holder.

I worked at three different schools throughout my career. At my last school, I had hooks outside of my classroom. I ended up putting a card with their name next to their hook. Don’t worry, the “N” was also added after I took this picture 😉

I have also used lockers and hooks in the classroom. Use what system your school has and adapt to fit your needs.

Turning in Important Items

Unpack take home folders: How do you want them to turn in notes from home? Do you have a special basket if the note is for you or for the office? Check out places like Dollar Tree for cheap baskets for students to turn in notes.
Where will they place their empty take home folders? Do they need to show you they are empty so you don’t miss a note? Do they just put them in a basket and you will check later? Will they store them in their mailbox? This is the mailbox system I used and LOVED. I put my students’ papers in their slot, as well as their take home folders.
Where will they place their homework or any extra practice work? I am not someone who personally assigned homework, but I do give choice boards for extra practice. Every year, I have parents ask for extra work, so I made these choice boards and allowed students to complete a box a day if they want. Families LOVED them because the tasks were quick and effective.

Morning Procedures

Make Lunch Choice

There are so many options for students to make a lunch choice. Here are some of the options I have used throughout the years.

Google Slides digital lunch choices- Students would find their name and slide it to their choice. This was also a good way to help with attendance. I would pull it up before we lined up for lunch to help line them up by choices.

Clip chart with lunch choices- Students will use clothes pins to clip their choice on the paper.

Students tell you their lunch choice- This is what I used for years. While it does take more time, I was able to interact with my kids more in the morning and have some conversations I would miss out on if I collected lunch choices digitally. You can also have a responsible student go around and ask students their lunch choices.

Breakfast

Once your students have arrived are settled in the classroom, think about other aspects of your morning you will need to teach and practice with your students.

If your students are eating breakfast in the cafeteria:

How will the be expected to leave the classroom and enter the classroom when they are done?
How will they be expected to walk in the hallway to and from breakfast?
How will they get their breakfast? Do they go in line? Is it in a bag to pick up?
Where will they eat their breakfast? Do they sit at a certain table?
How are they supposed to clean up? Do they put their tray in a certain place? Do they have to put their food in certain places? etc.

Morning Activity

Once your students have unpacked and had breakfast, what do you want them to do while they wait for other students to arrive and get settled? All of the schools I have worked at had different breakfast situations. However, at all the schools, students would arrive in the classroom at different times and needed something to keep them busy until we started our day. Morning bins are a personal favorite. This blog post describes the benefits of using morning tubs in your classroom.

When you look for morning tubs, try to find activities that have a wide range of activities for all learners to complete. These are the morning tubs I use for Back to School time. You will also want to make sure to find some that include fine motor skills.

Here are some things to consider and procedures you will want to teach your students before they begin morning tubs:

How do they know which tub to get? Do they get a choice? Are they assigned? Do you rotate tubs by table?
Where will the tubs be located? Will the students be able to access them without help?
Where are the students going to sit? How will you expect them to sit during morning tub time?
When will you introduce how to do the morning activity? Will you practice the activity at the end of a teacher-led group? Will you teach the group whole glass?
Do you want the activities to be individual or partner-based? If you do assigned partners, will you have some sort of chart that shows who they will work with? Will you change partners? Do you let the students choose who they will work with each day?
How to clean up activities- model how to clean up all the pieces and check the floor for missing pieces.
Teach how to return bin to the correct spot
How will students know it is time to clean up? Will you have a bell, chimes, timer on the board, etc.?
What do you want students to do if they finish early? Will they look at books? Will they get out another center? Will they work on a different activity?

This last question is something that will be different for everyone. This will also change many, many times throughout the year. One of my favorite purposes of morning bins is because I can meet with individual students or small groups of students for remediation or enrichment. So, ask yourself…what will you do during morning tub time?

In the beginning of the year, I would focus on walking around, monitoring, and asking questions as you go from table to table. This is a great way to ensure students are doing what is expected and it is a great way to build connections with students. As the year progresses, I will use that time for testing/progress monitoring, individual and small group interventions, enrichment, etc.

Morning Meeting

Many teachers do morning meetings a little different. There are many things you can incorporate during morning meeting time. You can practice SEL strategies, discuss what will happen during the day, practice reading a morning message, etc. However you choose to structure that time, here are some procedures to teach and some things for you to think about before you begin morning meeting with students.

If you are new to morning meetings, ask other teachers how they structure their morning meeting. Plan out the components you want to use and don’t be scared to change it up.

Transition- How will students know it is time to transition to morning meeting time?
How will you structure your morning meeting time? Will the components change?
When will you prepare items you need for morning meeting?
How long will your morning meeting last? Most morning meetings range from 10-30 minutes, but look at your schedule and see what works best.
How will students walk to carpet?
How will you assign seats or will you assign seats on the carpet?
How will you expect students to sit on the carpet?
How will students notify you if they need something?
How do you expect students to participate in discussions? Will you have them talk to a neighbor first and then share out?
How will you transition them back to their seats?

Whew! I know that was a lot of information, but I hope this blog post was helpful as you plan for the new year. Just have a game plan for the start of the year and accept that it will most likely change until you find what is right for you. Don’t be scared to ask for help and observe other teachers. Even as a veteran teacher, observing other teachers helps so much. You are are going to have a great year! You’ve got this!

💜 Anna