Educators seeking to establish or enhance classroom routines can access a variety of free digital resources designed for morning meetings. These materials, often referred to as "freebies," typically include editable slide templates, ready-to-use slide decks, and activity prompts. The available resources focus on streamlining preparation for teachers while fostering social-emotional learning, community building, and skill review among students. Most offerings are compatible with digital platforms such as Google Slides and PowerPoint, making them suitable for both in-person instruction and distance learning environments.
Types of Available Freebies
Several educators and content creators provide complimentary digital materials to support morning meeting structures. These resources generally fall into two categories: fully prepared slide decks and customizable templates.
- Ready-to-Use Slides: Some sources offer pre-made slide sets that require minimal preparation. For example, one resource provides a "whole FREE week of our interactive Morning Meeting slides for upper elementary," consisting of 25 ready-to-go slides. These slides cover the standard morning meeting components: a greeting prompt, share prompt, activity, and morning message slide for each day. Another source offers a "1 Week of Ready-to-Use Morning Meeting Slides."
- Editable Templates: Other resources focus on providing templates that allow teachers to customize content. These include "1 Week of Customizable Ready-to-Use Morning Meeting Slides," "1 Week of Editable Morning Meeting Slides," and "Morning Meeting Slides Templates." One specific offering includes editable slides for the months of September through June, featuring templates for greeting, sharing, group activity, and morning message sections. These templates are designed to keep morning meetings fresh and fun through theming.
The format of these resources is typically digital. Common file types mentioned include Zip files and Google Apps formats. One source explicitly notes that its resource is "completely paperless" and available via Google Slides.
Core Components of Morning Meetings
The available materials emphasize a structured approach to morning meetings, typically consisting of four distinct parts. Understanding these components helps educators utilize the freebies effectively.
- The Greeting: This initial component is designed to welcome each student into the classroom community. It provides an opportunity for students to hear their names in a positive context. One source offers free "Greetings prompt cards" to assist with this segment.
- The Share: During the share portion, students have the opportunity to discuss significant events or information from their lives. Teachers can structure this segment strictly or allow for open floor discussion. Free resources often include "share prompts" or "Morning Meeting Questions" to facilitate conversation. One source provides a free sample of "12 Free Conversation Starters" that can be used for morning meetings, writing prompts, or character-building lessons.
- The Activity: This segment serves as a body break and encourages movement and collaboration. Activities can range from getting-to-know-you exercises at the start of the year to academic-based tasks later on. One source highlights that the activity should remain lighthearted and fun.
- The Message: The morning message concludes the meeting. It is used to outline the day's focus, inform students about specials, or communicate schedule changes. Some free slide templates include specific slides for this purpose.
Benefits of Implementing Morning Meetings
According to educational resources, implementing daily morning meetings offers several benefits for the classroom environment and student development.
- Consistency and Routine: Morning meetings help students ease into their day by providing a predictable routine. This consistency can offer a sense of safety and comfort, particularly for students who may have experienced a chaotic morning at home.
- Community Building: The practice is cited as a way to build community and connect students and teachers. It sets a positive tone for the rest of the day.
- Social-Emotional Learning (SEL): Many free resources specifically target social-emotional learning topics. One source describes a "back to school themed resource" that focuses on these topics. The structure of the meeting allows for emotion check-ins and discussions about empathy (e.g., sending "extra care and compassion" to a student having a rough day).
- Skill Review: Morning meetings can be utilized to review various academic skills. Educators can spiral review math facts, phonics patterns, or other standards-covered material.
- Preparation Efficiency: For teachers, these free digital resources aim to reduce the prep time associated with planning morning meetings. One source notes that the provided pack "takes all of the prep out of morning meeting," allowing teachers to focus on other tasks.
Accessibility and Usage
The freebies are generally designed for a broad range of grade levels, with one source specifying an audience of "PreK - 3rd" grade. Another source mentions suitability for "upper elementary."
In terms of accessibility, many resources require users to sign up for a newsletter to receive the free slides. One source explicitly states that downloading the free morning meeting slides will sign the user up for a newsletter, with the option to unsubscribe at any time.
For virtual learning environments, the digital nature of these slides is a key advantage. They can be used in virtual classrooms or via interactive whiteboards like SMARTBoard in person. One source details that slides can be assigned in Google Classroom by making a copy for each student. Additionally, some creators provide video content, such as a YouTube video, to demonstrate how to use the virtual morning meeting slides effectively.
Conclusion
The provided source material details a range of free digital resources available to educators for conducting morning meetings. These resources, primarily in the form of Google Slides or PowerPoint templates, offer both ready-to-use and customizable options. They are structured around the four standard components of morning meetings: greeting, sharing, activity, and message. The use of these freebies is presented as a method to build classroom community, support social-emotional learning, review academic skills, and establish consistent routines, all while minimizing teacher preparation time.