Classroom transition time tips

Looking for creative ways to make the most of every moment in the school day? Transition times can sometimes be chaotic. DreamBox Learning teachers put their collective experiences together to share these engaging activities to help keep students focused during classroom transition times.

Transition: Lining up

Activity: Counting Through the Line

Before moving a line of students out the door have them skip count down the line. The first person starts with a number, then each child adds on to the previous number until they reach the back of the line. Once everyone has had a turn, the line is ready to move. Counting Through the Line keeps students engaged and quiet since they need to hear the count. It also reinforces counting patterns. If the line is short or you have more time, count through the line more than once.

Transition: Clean up

Activity: Classified Clean Up

Getting the classroom straightened up at the end of day is always a little challenging. To make clean up go more smoothly, ask partners or a small group of students to clean up an area using classification, such as putting away things by specific shape names, colors, sizes, etc. This helps children identify object attributes and classify objects according to their attributes.

Transition: Leaving or entering the classroom

Activity: Double Up

Greet students when they come in the door with a deck of cards (without face cards). Show each student a card as they enter and ask them to double it. As a variation, give students 2 cards and ask them to identify which is more (or less) or whether they’re equal. Once you’ve done this several times with the class, have your students take turns leading the activity.

Activity: Making Ten

As students are lined up to leave or enter the classroom, say a number from 1-20 to each student. Have the student tell you how many more are needed to get to ten, or how many should be removed to get to ten. For older students, say a number from 0-100 and have the student tell you how many they have to add to get to the next higher multiple of ten.

Any transition

Activity: Beat the Clock

For a week, have students take turns timing how long it takes to do various transitions (lining up, cleaning up, walking to a specialist class), and keep track of the time.

Want more suggestions? You can download a printable with these and more transition time activities for teachers!

Did you know?

More than 75,000 students have had fun learning math with DreamBox, in all 50 states and Canadian provinces! Read firsthand what educators are saying about their experiences using DreamBox in the classroom. Click here.

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