“I dedicate our learning today to my dad. He grew up working class in Baltimore, and when he was your age, his mother was dying of cancer. Every day after school he would have to come home to bathe her and clean her sores. Later, he became the first person in his family to attend medical school, and today he is a leading cancer doctor. He is one of the most humble, hard-working people I know.”
The five sentences above about my father are an example of what I call a daily dedication, a 30- to a 60-second presentation delivered each day by a student or teacher. It usually occurs right after the initial do-now or warmup but before we introduce the day’s objective and agenda. It takes less than five minutes to total each week, but it’s a prized moment in the day, one that refocuses us, fosters community, and reignites our motivation.
I can’t recommend this simple ritual enough, whether for the classroom or for larger school assemblies. And if you are heading deeper into winter, tired of remote learning, worried about dwindling student motivation, I encourage you to give the daily dedication a try, to make it a new year’s resolution for your virtual classroom.
The daily dedication takes inspiration in part from the work of Kelly Gallagher, who invites one student each day to share a brief “reading minute,” by reading a few lines from a poem or something personal that has meaning for them. It also reminds me of parochial schools that ask a student to choose a daily prayer to read at the start of class.
HONORING OUR TIME TOGETHER
It’s a simple, brief ritual, but one that recenters us. It reminds us explicitly and implicitly that the classroom is a sacred space, that the opportunity to come together and learn alongside one another—even virtually—is something special and should not be taken for granted. It hopefully emphasizes that our time together is precious, that we should honor it by using it purposefully.
As Matthew Kay has written, rituals like this absorb a tiny fraction of the lesson while fostering “an environment of humility and genuine interest in each other’s lives and passion.” And it is culturally sustaining and student-centered in that students get to take the lead in honoring and celebrating their own diverse identities.
Setting up this ritual is simple. I often model the daily dedication on the first or second day of school by sharing something about my father like the paragraph above. I put up a photo of him, and students love identifying our similarities (and pointing out his better looks!). I then explain how the dedications work and the rationale for them, that they can choose anyone living or dead, real or fictional, who provides inspiration. I ask for a few volunteers for the next few days and then usually go alphabetically from there. There are usually a few students who at least feign reluctance, but my students are so brave, their dedications quickly get more vulnerable and powerful than mine. Students are sucked in and buy-in quickly.
Students snap for each other at the end. I put in a quick, easy participation grade to recognize their preparation and earnestness. I throw in a bonus point if they email me or bring in an image to go with the dedication, but the grading is probably unnecessary. Students love this ritual.
Often a student tracks the order for me, updates a corner of our whiteboard with who is on deck, and reminds us about this during daily class announcements.
