My Kinesthetic Technology Classroom

Last year, three amazing first grade teachers in my building remodeled their classrooms to increase movement in their rooms. I had the pleasure of teaching in their rooms for several months and was really impressed with how the change increased engagement of students. You can read more about their work and the research behind it on their website. As we get ready to come back to school this year, I have been looking for ways to incorporate their ideas into my new technology lab. While I can't incorporate all of the ideas due to the technology in my room, I can incorporate many of the ideas.

First, I raised the height of two tables in my room and bought several sets of hedgehogs for students to stand on.

I really wanted to increase movement when students are sitting at the tables with their Chromebooks. I ordered a set of Bouncy Bands and asked a couple of students to come try them out. They fit easily on my chairs and students LOVE them. I just ordered a whole class set to put them on every chair.

My tables are all on wheels so it is really easy to move them around for students to face forward to see the screen when I'm modeling and to work with partners when they are collaborating during work time. The tables easily push out of the way when we are working on our coding skills with Dash and Dot. And I now have a Teaming Table with a large monitor for small group collaboration and small group instruction.