managing centers

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Archive : 2003 : February : 25

managing centers
By Sandy

I have been using centers in my classroom for several years now to keep the other students "out of my hair" while I conduct my small literacy groups. Some things that I had to learn the hard way are:

Have several activities
in each center. (one that is mandatory and several that are optiona)
Hold them accountable by providing some way for them to document what they have done.(pencil and Paper work)
You don't have to change every center out every week. You can rotate to make planning easier.
I have one center for each day of the week and the students rotate through them. I group my students so that

I have no more than four students at a center at a time to keep noise down. While I have 1/3 of my class in a small group the other 2/3 are at centers. I rotate them through so that I can provide small group instruction with them all. I am always looking for great ideas to use so please send them my way.