Room Transformations (Wild Card Style)

So, upon my principal's recommendation, I recently read Hope and Wade King's book, The Wild Card.  The King's are a married couple who teach at the Ron Clark Academy in Atlanta Georgia.  When I visited RCA in March of 2017 I got to see both of them teach in person, which was nothing short of amazing.  They both are very gifted teachers and they share their passion for teaching in their book.  There are so many take aways I gained from this book, but I decided to try one new idea since it was so close to the end of the school year.  I did my own room transformations with the themes of Disney and Star Wars.

Disney

My classroom main theme is Harry Potter, so the challenge for the room transformation was to cover up all my Harry Potter decor as much as possible.  I bought plastic tablecloths from the dollar store to  go over my Harry Potter wall decals.  I also brought some of my boys' Mickey Mouse stuffed animals and our family pictures from Disney World.

One wall of my Disney Room Transformation including Disney quotes and Family pictures from Disney World.

I also had plastic table cloths covering the desks which I had formed into groups as well as baskets at each table for different planned group activities.

Seeing the look on the kids' faces when they first saw the room transformation was priceless.  It was what made all the extra work worth it.  They seemed excited to be in my room that entire week and wanted to know what "Disney" activity we were going to do each day.  Usually, this type of enthusiasm doesn't happen in late April and early May, so I was impressed.

I had a Disney themed plan for four days.  This could've been extended to five days, but we had to finish up standardized testing on that Monday.  Since I have 45 minute class periods, that worked out well.  On Tuesday, we did a close read on a short Bio of Walt Disney.  They also watched Steam Boat Willie and did a close read on a Steam Boat Willie article I found from the Library of Congress.  I declared that the following day, Wednesday was Disney Princess Day and the core of my lesson was Snow White.  Since Snow White was the first full length animated Disney movie, we did a close read of the original (Brother's Grimm) version of Snow White.  That lesson could've easily been extended to a few days with how much we could've done...we could've researched the different cultural versions of Snow White and even read other original versions of Disney inspired movies.  Even though most of my students are 12, they loved this lesson...boys included.  Thursday's lesson involved planning a trip to Disney World using online resources.   This lesson could've easily been extended to two days since no one was anywhere close to completion by the end of class.  My final lesson was having the students watch the Disney short film, Feast, analyze the plot of the film, and then tell the story from "Winston's" point of view.

My Disney Princess corner.  I couldn't cover up all my Harry Potter decor, but that's alright. 

Star Wars

The following week, I transformed my room to a Star Wars theme.  The transformation process was very similar to the Disney theme the week before.  I used tabled cloths, pictures I printed online as well family pictures from the Star Wars part of Disney World.  One difference is that one of my students had a ton of Star Wars merchandise that he shared that week with me.  He also stayed after school to help me decorate my room.  I was thrilled that I was able to involve him in this way because he was able to take ownership in what he learned that week.  

May the 4th Be With You!

This theme lasted longer than I expected.  The first day, I had the students read an article over the Star Wars film history.  This lesson worked out well because students didn't have to watch the films to understand the activity.  In another lesson, I broke the students into ability groups and gave each group a character bio.  Again, even if the students hadn't seen the movies, they could easily understand and participate with the activity.  They read the bio and identified character traits with their particular character.  The next activity was a lot of fun, but I should've allowed a few more days, but there just wasn't time.  I brought in my boys' Star Wars figures and old calendars.  I put the students in groups again and had them do photo shoots of the figures.  They used the old calendar pictures for the background.  After they finished the pictures, they used https://bookcreator.com to write a story to go with the pictures.  The kids loved this activity.  I gave them two class periods to work, but most didn't finish.  

I purposely planned my Star Wars theme week to fall into the week of May the 4th.  For that day, I dressed as Princess Leia and encouraged other students to dress up as a Star Wars character of their choice.  Some of the Star Wars fans got into it.  On that day, I had the students analyze Star Wars websites using the 5 W's to determine if the information was legit.  The students learned that the Star Wars franchise may very well outlive us all.  

The following week, I allowed a few more class periods to show episode IV which was the first Star Wars movie ever made.  I was able to connect several standards with he movie such as making inferences, plot structure, and character traits.  I also had the students write up a movie review after they watched the movie.  I was able to convert several of my students into Star Wars fans! 

The Challenges

It was difficult to keep the table cloths on the walls the entire week.  My room is quite humid, so in the warmer months of the year, it's nearly impossible to get anything to stay on the walls without my glue gun.  Every morning, I would have to restick things to the wall, and after so much of that, it kind of lost it's magic.  Also, the students destroyed the table cloths on the desks, so I decided I wasn't going to use them again for that kind of room transformation. They seemed to be more of a distraction anyway.   I will be looking for ideas for next time to help me keep things from falling from the walls.  I got some ideas from other teachers to use Command Strip hooks to hang fabric or table cloths from the walls.  I plan on trying that next time.  

The Pros

This really helped get my students back into learning mode since most of them had mentally checked out after spring break.  They were excited to come to my class every day during my transformations and all of them were engaged in the activities...even my students who were the hardest to motivate.  This is not something I can do all the time because it does takes a lot of time and effort to get my room "transformed."  Plus, doing something like this often would not be as magical.  It is definitely worth the time and effort, but looking forward, it is something I will probably save for the end of a term when students need a little extra motivation.  

I totally recomend reading the book, The Wild Card.  Teachers will definitely get some much-needed inspiration for their own classrooms.  The Kings are definitely teachers to look up to. 

Wild Card