Celebrating with Students: Finding Joy in the Moments That Matter
Celebration in the classroom serves as a fundamental element in fostering a nurturing educational environment, as I elucidate in this episode. By embracing joyous moments, we can cultivate a sense of belonging among students, thereby enhancing their motivation and engagement. I reflect on my own birthday celebration, where sharing cupcakes with students exemplifies how simple acts of acknowledgment can significantly impact classroom culture. Furthermore, I advocate for the importance of recognizing not only individual milestones and birthdays but also the everyday achievements that contribute to a positive school culture. In doing so, we reinforce the notion that education is not solely about academic rigor; it is equally about creating lasting memories and connections that resonate well beyond the confines of the classroom.
The significance of celebration within educational settings cannot be overstated, as articulated by Mr. Funky Teacher in this enlightening discourse. Central to the narrative is the celebration of personal milestones, such as birthdays, which serve as a conduit for fostering a sense of community and belonging among students. Mr. Funky Teacher emphasizes that these joyful moments are not merely ornamental but rather integral to establishing a positive classroom culture. Through anecdotes of sharing cupcakes with his students on his birthday, he illustrates how such acts of kindness can transform the classroom environment, enhance motivation, and cultivate lasting memories. The episode posits that joy in education is a vital pedagogical strategy, enhancing student engagement and retention through positive emotional experiences. In essence, the celebration is positioned not as an ancillary task but as an essential component of effective teaching, reinforcing the idea that learning should be interwoven with joy and connection.
Takeaways:
- Celebration in the classroom transcends mere enjoyment; it is a fundamental teaching strategy that fosters belonging.
- Joyful moments shared with students enhance emotional engagement and positively impact learning retention.
- Establish traditions within the classroom to transform ordinary moments into lasting memories for students.
- Recognizing small achievements, such as mastering a skill or exhibiting kindness, strengthens classroom community and motivates students.
- Teachers should also embrace personal celebrations, as this modeling of joy demonstrates emotional balance to students.
- The act of celebrating creates an environment where students feel valued, reinforcing their connection to both the classroom and their learning journey.
Links referenced in this episode:
Companies mentioned in this episode:
- Be a Funky Teacher
Transcript
Yeah, he's Mr. Funky.
Speaker A:He's Mr. Funky Teacher.
Speaker A:Mr. Funky Teacher inspires greatness, makes you feel good.
Speaker A:Like your favorite playlist.
Speaker A:Keeping that fresh and funky.
Speaker A:Yes, he does.
Speaker A:He got some funky cool ideas to share for all you teachers.
Speaker A:He can empower others, students and teachers.
Speaker A:It's all about hard work and creativity.
Speaker A:He brings out the kindness in everyone.
Speaker A:He's got the passion to teach.
Speaker A:You hear it when he speaks.
Speaker A:He knows how to build strong relationships.
Speaker A:If you're seeking the best bunkiest, he is it.
Speaker A:He will empower you to improve.
Speaker A:You'll be helping others and loving it too.
Speaker A:He's Mr. Funky Teacher.
Speaker A:Yeah, he's Mr. Funky Teacher.
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker B:This is Mr. Funky Teacher with Be a Funky Teacher dot com.
Speaker B:I'm coming to you with another Be a Funky Teacher podcast.
Speaker B:Welcome back, everyone.
Speaker B:Today's episode is called Celebrating with Students.
Speaker B:Finding joy in the moments that matter.
Speaker B:That's what we are going to be focusing on.
Speaker B:But before we get into it, let's talk about three things that I'm thankful for.
Speaker B:First thing that I'm thankful for is another year of being alive.
Speaker B:Birthdays make you pause and breathe, don't they?
Speaker B:I.
Speaker B:For me, it does.
Speaker B:It's.
Speaker B:I'm just thinking about another year means more time to learn, to teach, to love, and to laugh.
Speaker B:Now, I don't take that for granted.
Speaker B:Another year of being alive.
Speaker B:Second thing I'm thankful for.
Speaker B:Delicious fruit.
Speaker B:Now, maybe it's a fresh apple or a slice of pineapple or a slice of watermelon.
Speaker B:I just love fresh fruit.
Speaker B:I love delicious fruit.
Speaker B:Last night I had some raspberries.
Speaker B:Small things like that remind me to slow down and appreciate simple goodness.
Speaker B:Third thing I'm thankful for.
Speaker B:Family love.
Speaker B:The foundation of everything I do.
Speaker B:Family love.
Speaker B:My family's support gives me the energy to pour back into my students and my community.
Speaker B:Well, let's get into the main topic, which is celebrating with students.
Speaker B:Finding joy in the moments that matter.
Speaker B:First thing that I want to get into is talking about how joy is a teaching strategy, y'.
Speaker B:All.
Speaker B:Celebrations isn't just extra.
Speaker B:When we celebrate with students, it's not extra.
Speaker B:It's essential.
Speaker B:When students see you smile, laugh, and enjoy the moment, they they associate learning with belonging.
Speaker B:Now, Reese research backs it up that positive emotions improve retention and engagement.
Speaker B:So think about energy in a room.
Speaker B:When you say, hey, we're celebrating today, even five minutes of joy can shift.
Speaker B:It can shift the whole day.
Speaker B:It makes a difference when we bring in that celebration opportunities into the classroom.
Speaker B:Now, today is My birthday.
Speaker B:And since it's my birthday today, I have brought some cupcakes.
Speaker B:I have brought some cupcakes into my classroom where sometimes I bring, I've brought different things over the years to my students.
Speaker B:Sometimes I've brought candy.
Speaker B:Sometimes I've brought.
Speaker B:There, there's this Mexican bakery where I used to teach and that had these delicious pastries that brought those before.
Speaker B:But this year I have from, from one of the local stores, I have cupcakes, chocolate cupcakes, and like vanilla cupcakes.
Speaker B:So I'm looking forward to sharing those with students.
Speaker B:Just a little thing to celebrate with students.
Speaker B:I, I think it's important to, to celebrate now.
Speaker B:Sure.
Speaker B:Will it take a little bit of time away from our academics?
Speaker B:Yeah, not much, but it's a way of, for, for me to bring in just a little bit of joy.
Speaker B:And joy we know is contagious.
Speaker B:When we model it, students can mirror it.
Speaker B:It's important to teach young people about taking time to celebrate.
Speaker B:Now this isn't just about me.
Speaker B:It's about teaching students to celebrate because life is tough.
Speaker B:Life, life can, life can be brutal sometimes, right?
Speaker B:It's, it's, and it can't just be all work and no play.
Speaker B:So that's why I think it's important for us as educators to bring back, bring in those experiences.
Speaker B:And we as educators know also that there might be some students that, that is not modeled for them outside the school.
Speaker B:And that, that is something I, I, I think that we as educators are in a unique position to help guide our students to see is important.
Speaker B:So that gets into the next big idea that celebrating is more than birthdays.
Speaker B:Also.
Speaker B:Yes, birthdays are special, but there's so much more to honor.
Speaker B:So we can celebrate growth.
Speaker B:Maybe, maybe there's a student who finally masters fractions or reads a paragraph fluently.
Speaker B:Maybe, maybe there's, maybe you have an opportunity where we can celebrate character.
Speaker B:A student who helped a classmate clean up a spill without being asked.
Speaker B:So we can use these micro celebrations throughout the week.
Speaker B:A high five or a sticky note compliment or a round of applause.
Speaker B:When we, when we recognize students, when we bring in recognition, and when we, we make it frequent and authentic.
Speaker B:Students begin, y'.
Speaker B:All.
Speaker B:Students begin to see effort as something worth celebrating because it's not just about effort does matter.
Speaker B:Let's just be real.
Speaker B:I, you know, there are some people who have different takes on that.
Speaker B:I believe effort matters.
Speaker B:And I'm not just, and I'm not just in the, in the camp of, oh, let's just Give everybody a participation trophy.
Speaker B:That, that's not what I'm talking about here.
Speaker B:I'm talking about real sincere effort also for, for celebrating.
Speaker B:So sure we, we can celebrate birthdays.
Speaker B:We can celebrate if there's opportunities for holiday other like holidays, but then celebrating students effort.
Speaker B:So when we, it goes back to once again student.
Speaker B:Students begin to see effort as something worth celebrating.
Speaker B:When it's frequent, when it's authentic, it's got to be authentic.
Speaker B:It can't be this fakeness.
Speaker B:And I want you to think, remember this.
Speaker B:I, I have a little.
Speaker B:This is a write, write this down.
Speaker B:It's going to be in a test type of, type of a quote here that I want to share with you.
Speaker B:Kids don't need perfection from us.
Speaker B:They need to see that we notice them.
Speaker B:Boy, doesn't that make a difference, y'?
Speaker B:All?
Speaker B:When we notice students, when we notice students, when we see them, when we can acknowledge their effort makes a big difference, y'.
Speaker B:All.
Speaker B:Makes a huge, huge difference difference.
Speaker B:So the third big thing here that I want to talk about is to build traditions that belong to your classroom.
Speaker B:Traditions, y' all turn ordinary moments into memories.
Speaker B:We can try things.
Speaker B:We have opportunities as teachers.
Speaker B:We, we can try things like, like a Friday shout out circle where students thank someone who helped them that week.
Speaker B:Or maybe there's a, like a quarterly win wall where students add sticky notes with something they're proud of.
Speaker B:When you develop rituals and experiences in the classroom that don't take away much time from learning, they deepen learning because students feel ownership and community in the classroom.
Speaker B:And as a teacher, you can weave celebration into routines just like you weave in standards.
Speaker B:It's just not, it's just not nice to do.
Speaker B:It is vital, y'.
Speaker B:All.
Speaker B:It is vital to the success of your classroom.
Speaker B:And over time, those traditions become the story students tell long after they leave your class.
Speaker B:So I want to.
Speaker B:Part of this is, I want to encourage you to model gratitude and balance, y'.
Speaker B:All.
Speaker B:Because when teachers take.
Speaker B:Take a moment to celebrate, we demonstrate emotional balance too.
Speaker B:So that goes back to that gratitude and balance.
Speaker B:Here students see that adults can work hard and still have fun.
Speaker B:I have this for.
Speaker B:I have this message in my classroom that I've used for, for over 20 years.
Speaker B:We work hard and we play hard.
Speaker B:We work hard and we play hard.
Speaker B:That, that is some verbiage that I use with students and I'm very big on using that, that, that wording with students.
Speaker B:That we work hard and we play hard.
Speaker B:That now I, I look for opportunities where you can share moments of joy with students too.
Speaker B:Like think about maybe share moments, maybe share a birthday.
Speaker B:I think there's some teachers that like, I'm not even going to tell my students it's, it's my birthday.
Speaker B:Why?
Speaker B:I, I, I, I, what, what, what's the big deal?
Speaker B:Oh, birthdays aren't that important.
Speaker B:Well, what are we modeling the students when we tell them birthdays aren't that important.
Speaker B:So when we can share our own joy moments, that's important.
Speaker B:Like birthdays share sports wins.
Speaker B:Maybe we've personal sports wins in our life that we could share with students.
Speaker B:Or maybe if there's something that our own children did and it's kind of exciting and a celebratory thing that it's so important to take those moments to share those maybe share about a funny classroom moment that happened in the class.
Speaker B:Maybe it's some interest that you're into and you got to do it.
Speaker B:I, I had, I was telling my students just yesterday about there's this, I was at this mountain bike park last weekend.
Speaker B:I went over this ramp for this wooden ramp for the first time.
Speaker B:Now there's a lot fancier and more difficult ramps, but I went over this one for the first time and that was hard.
Speaker B:And I, it was like a micro celebration that I was having with, with the students talking about it that I, I worked up to it and I finally did it and I felt like I was flying off of it.
Speaker B:It's one of the smaller ramps, but boy, it was exciting and powerful and so I, I, I, I want to stress about the importance of sharing those micro moments.
Speaker B:Those micro moments because they, and, and share them in a celebratory type of way in a positive light.
Speaker B:You're teaching students to pause and to appreciate the good in life.
Speaker B:Maybe, you know, if you want to talk about modeling gratitude and balance, here, keep it.
Speaker B:This is something I've done here.
Speaker B:But when I was preparing for the, the episode here today and, and written down some notes here, I, one thing that I saw that some people do is like a joy jar, like having a joy jar on, on, on their desk.
Speaker B:You know, every time something positive happens, drop a note in and then like if the class needs a boost, pull it out and read, read aloud some one or two positive things that happened as a boost to the class in a joy jar.
Speaker B:So, so that's something, right?
Speaker B:And, and that goes back to modeling gratitude and balance in the classroom.
Speaker B:And then the last big idea is celebrate yourself too.
Speaker B:See, teachers often forget that we deserve celebration too it goes back to once again that some teachers don't even tell their kids it's their.
Speaker B:Their students, it's their birthday.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:And I don't get that.
Speaker B:Reflecting.
Speaker B:Reflect on your own growth goes back to me teaching them or telling my class yesterday about when I did my.
Speaker B:Over the mountain biking ramp that I did.
Speaker B:That was a new skill.
Speaker B:That, that or pushing myself out of my comfort zone.
Speaker B:And I celebrated and I did a micro celebration with my students.
Speaker B:So we're always looking as well as educators.
Speaker B:Reflect on our growth.
Speaker B:We should be reflecting our growth, looking at new skills, new connections, new impact.
Speaker B:And then treat yourself with the same grace you offer students, y'.
Speaker B:All.
Speaker B:Maybe it's, you know, outside of school, maybe it's.
Speaker B:It's quiet time with coffee.
Speaker B:I'm not a coffee drinker, but maybe you are.
Speaker B:I.
Speaker B:It's like, Nicholas, you're not a coffee drinker.
Speaker B:I'm not a coffee drinker.
Speaker B:I like flavored water.
Speaker B:I. I enjoy flavor art.
Speaker B:And they're like, well, how do you.
Speaker B:How do you get caffeine?
Speaker B:Well, I. I have.
Speaker B:I have a couple different caffeinated drinks that I'll sometimes have.
Speaker B:Try to be careful with that though.
Speaker B:But.
Speaker B:But nonetheless, celebrate yourself.
Speaker B:You know, maybe coffee or some other, you know, maybe it's a, you know, they have those, those tea drinks, right?
Speaker B:Those ice or like the.
Speaker B:I think they're tea bombs.
Speaker B:You know, those are kind of.
Speaker B:Kind of big.
Speaker B:Seem big right now, but maybe it's.
Speaker B:Maybe get one of those and you just have some quiet time at.
Speaker B:At a.
Speaker B:At a coffee shop or.
Speaker B:Or just at a.
Speaker B:At a place.
Speaker B:You could just sit down and just kind of have some quiet time, kind of celebrate.
Speaker B:Personally celebrating even.
Speaker B:It doesn't have to be some big old blowout celebration type of a thing.
Speaker B:It can just be some of those quiet moments.
Speaker B:Can be a way to celebrate.
Speaker B:And see when you refill your own joy tank you then you may I. I believe you have more time to share with others, y' all too.
Speaker B:And so as we, as I wrap up this episode here, a reflective takeaways here that celebrations y'.
Speaker B:All.
Speaker B:They create connection and it reminds students that they belong and it reminds teachers why we started.
Speaker B:You don't need balloons or some sort of crazy budget.
Speaker B:You just need attention and appreciation, y'.
Speaker B:All.
Speaker B:Teaching isn't only about curriculum.
Speaker B:It's about creating moments that stick in the heart long after the lesson fades.
Speaker B:Find reasons, y' all.
Speaker B:Find reasons to celebrate this week and watch how the energy in your classroom changes.
Speaker B:Well, I hope you found value in this episode.
Speaker B:As we come to a close, I I ask if you found value in this episode.
Speaker B:Jump on over to Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your podcast and hit me up with a five star review and let me know what you think, y'.
Speaker B:All.
Speaker B:And most importantly, I want you to remember to inspire greatness in young people.
Speaker B:And don't forget to be a funky teacher.
Speaker B:Bye, now.
Speaker A:He's Mr. Funky Teacher, yeah he's Mr. Funky Teacher, yeah, yeah, yeah.
