Systems and Routines

Learning our Systems and Routines

Predictability and routine helps to promote responsibility and helps children feel safe and secure.  If they know things that are coming up they can feel more comfortable and confident and can focus on their learning, rather than worrying about what may happen next.  In Autahi we try to encourage the predictability with a few routines that are consistent throughout the week.  

1. Morning Jobs

Every morning there is a note written on the whiteboard as you come in the front door. Each morning the note gives some prompts for the jobs that need doing and may also suggest something to work on before the bell goes.  Getting into the habit of reading over the jobs with your child/ren each morning helps set a good routine.  Encouraging them to do their own jobs also helps to foster responsibility and ownership.  The 3 main jobs include unpacking your book bag, picking a snack and hanging up your bag, but there are other jobs that come up throughout the week as well. One of the other jobs is setting up our outdoor space and making it safe.  Letting the kids be the ones to do this helps them to recognise and internalise the boundaries as well as feeling a sense of responsibility and accomplishment. In this situation the kids problem-solved and worked together to move the heavy cones.

2. Buddy Reading

 Every day straight after Morning Tea children come back inside, find a buddy, pick a few books and look through the books together.  This encourages literacy, gives us a chance to wind down after play time and allows us to work with and chat with different people in the class.

3. Resting/Mindfulness/Meditation

Every day straight after lunch, the children come inside to soft music, find one spot, lay down and have a rest.  Sometimes we follow short guided children's meditations, other times we just focus on breathing and letting our bodies and minds rest in our otherwise busy days and sometimes we look out the skylight and watch the clouds go by.  The idea is that resting time is a quiet, on our own time to get in tune with how we are feeling and do a little bit of reflection on ourselves and our day. 

One of our systems: Our folders

Each child has their own folder where they are encouraged to put work that they are not finished.  The idea is that children can choose to go back and finish off something they started a few days before and we have a place to house our things.  Every few weeks we will do a folder sort where we look through, see if there is anything that needs finishing off and then things will come home. Systems like this one allow for children to take ownership over their own work and to maintain order in what is a very busy space with lots of things being made.

There are many more little routines and systems that we will be working on and learning, but that was just a snapshot.  Now that you know some of our routines you can encourage them at home and when you get to school.