Both Ralph Askins School (RAS) and Fayetteville Middle School (FMS) have started a fairly new event at their schools to help engage their students in the mornings and teaches them communication skills. Both RAS and FMS have turned their normal morning announcements into a fun morning show with the help of their students.
The RAS Morning Show was started last year by Dr. Claudia Styles when she was the principal of RAS. Styles started the Google Meet live announcements in 2020, and would do the show from her office with a special student and staff guests. In October 2020, the students took over being the hosts of the RAS Morning Show. At RAS, each morning show has two fourth grade students that are co-hosts. Occasionally, there may be two additional fourth grade students that lead a joke, riddle, or skit. Sometimes there may also be adult guests ranging from system employees to community guests. At RAS, the morning show is voluntary. According to Mann, “I ask students if they’d like to be a part of the show, and they either shy away or jump on the chance. If they say no, there’s no pressure. If they are on the fence and unsure, I tell them to try it one time. If they don’t like it, I tell them I won’t bother them again. Usually after one time, they realize it’s not as scary as they thought. One reward from doing this show is seeing students become confident with public speaking.”
The RAS Morning Show is live-streamed by Google Meet. According to RAS fourth grade teacher Briana Mann, “A Google Meet link is sent out. Other classes watch when we go live at 8 a.m. We also record the show and send out the link. Ms. Sandy Williams also posts the recording on Facebook and the school website. Students practice when they arrive to class at about 7:45 and do the live show at 8.” Mann also states that the RAS students enjoy the morning show. Mann states that they give awards on the show for character traits, recognize birthdays, and other accomplishments of the RAS students. The parents and teachers also enjoy the RAS Morning Show. The teachers make their students feel proud by bragging on their job well down, and the parents get to see the great things about RAS. The RAS Morning Show also allows the parents to keep up with events at the school.
According to Mann, “The RAS Morning Show has so much great potential, and we hope to keep adding different segments to it to make it more appealing, engaging, and worthwhile. Students are able to see that skills they learn in school are important in real life. Being part of the RAS Morning Show shows them that reading fluently with inflection is so important. They see that they will read and act differently depending on their audience and purpose. The purpose of the show is to communicate, so the goal is to read clearly and slowly, not as fast as they can like they do on fluency assessments. They also learn public speaking cues and skills like sitting still, making eye contact with the ‘camera’ audience, taking pauses, and using their hands when speaking.”
The FMS Morning Show was just started in late August this year. According to Katelyn Barnes from FMS, “The show lets the students know about the latest events and happening in our school, including birthdays and lunch, sports events, and school-wide events. The show also periodically has special segments that engage the students. During this time, the students on the show either host, direct, or deal with the technical sides of the show.” At FMS, every student in the building watches the show, but only about 10 students who volunteer work on the show each day. Barnes also states, “I think the students really enjoy it, and they never know what is going to be on it, so it gives them something to look forward to. They especially love the special segments featuring other students or staff members. Before, I don’t think the students necessarily looked forward to the announcements, so the morning show has really taken a monotonous, simple activity and made it a fun thing for students to look forward to every day.” The teachers and parents of FMS also love the FMS Morning Show. The FMS Morning Show keeps everyone up to date on the happenings at FMS, and allows the parents to see their children featured on the show.
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