A new school year is almost here and you’re looking for a fresh way to start a new class. Why not try back-to-school stations? In this post, I’ll share some ideas and tips I learned trying this approach during the first couple of days of the school year. 

(Looking for more ideas to start your school year off strong? Check out my five engaging back-to-school activities!)

You can also skip the prep work and just grab my Back-to-School Stations for ELA here!

Why Back-to-School Stations?

Historically, the first couple of days of school have been spent reading the syllabus, going over class rules, and maybe learning about the teacher. 

There’s absolutely nothing wrong with this! These things need to be done.

But when your high school students have eight classes just like this, your presentation isn’t going to stand out. In fact, your students still won’t name your name after you spend an exhausting hour talking nervously to a bunch of teens you just met. 

Stations, however, are way more engaging than a sit-and-get. They set the stage for the rest of your class by telling students, “Hey, here you’re going to move, work, and have fun!”

The movement around the room will also help wake up those sleepy teens and introduce them to their new learning environment.

Lastly, stations are less energy for you. 

They DO require more prep than the standard syllabus-reading day. However, during your actual instruction time, you’ll be facilitating rather than speaking the whole time. 

This gives you time to wander, actually converse with your new students, and takes you off center stage. Personally, as a teacher with social anxiety, this made those nerve-wracking first couple of days of school much easier for me. 

How Many Stations Do You Need?

This will largely depend on how long your classes are. 

For shorter classes (forty-five minutes or so), three stations with simple tasks and easy directions will probably be enough. 

For longer classes (ninety minutes), you could do six short stations or fewer stations with longer tasks. 

However, if you really want students to do six stations but you have short classes, you could extend your back-to-school stations to two days too. 

The more stations, the more prep work you’ll need to do. However, once you create the materials for your stations, these can usually be reused over and over. 

Back-to-School Stations Ideas

So what kind of stations can you set up in your room? I encourage you to think about the work students will be doing throughout your class and try to have your stations reflect those activities. 

You will want at least one station where students can get to know you and another station where you can get to know them and they can get to know each other.

In my Back-to-School Stations Resource, I have students read a letter from me and write a response at one station. This is great for two reasons: they learn about me AND I get a writing sample from them.

At a different station in my Back-to-School Stations Resource, students fill out an “All About Me” worksheet and hang it up in the room. Then, they can check out their classmates’ as they move around from station to station and learn about each other. 

We were a one-to-one school, so I used another station to force students to find their device and use it to complete a reading survey. This gave me information about their reading habits while setting up technology for the rest of the class.

If you provide any kind of organizational system for students in your class, consider using a station to introduce students to it. One station in my Back-to-School Stations Resource has students labeling and decorating the folders they’ll keep in the classroom. 

You’ll probably want students to create goals early on. Why not use a station to do it?

If you have a classroom library, put it to work! In my Back-to-School Stations Resource, students start a To Be Read sheet. This forces them to–gasp!–actually start touching books and thinking about what they’ll want to read.

More Ideas

When coming up with your stations, prioritize the routines you’ll be using year-round and the systems you want to set up early.

Here are some other station ideas to consider:

• Create a “word of the year”
• Create a vision board for the year
• Write a letter to your future self
• Create a reading/studying/homework calendar
• Annotate/read a syllabus
• A quiz about the teacher
• Watch book trailers
• Student survey
• Create a name plate/tag
• Create a bookmark

Back-to-School Stations Prep Work

Once you know how many stations you’ll be using and what tasks you want students to accomplish, it’s time to start the prep work!

First, you’ll want student-friendly directions at each station. 

Depending on what you want students to do, you might also need to create some supplemental resources for each station. For example, if you want students to read a letter from you, you’ll first have to write that letter. 

Hot tip! Leave multiple copies of the directions and your supplemental resources at each station. Then, also have a few backup copies hidden on your desk. I don’t know how, but students will make these disappear during their rotations somehow. 

I finally started putting my station directions in some dollar store picture frames to make sure they were easy to find and didn’t end up in student folders. 

Lastly, you’ll need to make sure you have enough materials for each station. Maybe you need highlighters at one station. Or perhaps your providing folders to decorate at another station. 

Make a list of everything you need to prep, gather, or buy. Then create and get those materials!

How to Run Your Back-to-School Stations

On my first day of class, I liked to have students do a classroom scavenger hunt. Then, we did back-to-school stations on the second day. 

If all of your stations will take approximately the same amount of time, you can run your stations in very structured rotations. 

Have students each sit at a station or count them off and assign them to a specific station. Then, put a timer on the board. At the end of the time, students will all get up and rotate to the next station. 

This is orderly and will probably lead to less goofing off and more productivity. However, if you have some short tasks and some long tasks, students might not be able to always complete their station. 

You can also let students self-pace through the stations–as long as they complete them all. If you choose this route, you may also want to provide students with a checklist of the stations. That way, they know exactly what they’ve completed, what they haven’t, and what the expectations are. 

During the actual day, you can choose to wander around the class checking in or posting up at a particular station. 

I always liked to hang out by the classroom library station making reading suggestions for students. However, if a student needed help elsewhere, I was still free to float and assist. 

Conclusion

One beautiful thing about back-to-school stations is that you can customize them to suit your class. 

If, however, they sound like a ton of prep work, then I suggest checking out my done-for-you Back-to-School Stations. All of the directions are editable, so you can still customize tasks for your classroom.

But you’ll also get templates and worksheets to cut the prep work down significantly. Learn more and grab the stations here!