Genius Hour Introduction

After months of researching and planning over the summer, I was finally able to introduce Genius Hour to my class. My best source for information was this LiveBinder by Joy Kirr. The problem was, with all of the information out there, and all of the different ways other teachers have introduced it, I still wasn't sure how I was going to do it. Finally, days before THE BIG DAY, I put it all together. First, I crafted my parent letter so that they would be aware of the plan. I posted that on my website. Then I introduced the idea with my video from PowToon:

Then I chose explained that students would be coming up with different ideas and that they would be working in class on the project. This video does a great job in just introducing that:

After that, I told my class that they would be presenting their final project to the class in a TED-like way. I showed this short video of high school students presenting their projects. I realize that this is above my students' level, but it is still a great example.

By this time, the class was really getting fired up. They starting asking me questions, so I went over the basic rules that I had created. I was happy to say, the answer was "Yes" to almost every question!

This haiku deck that I created is what REALLY got them excited.

Here's the link for it.

This gave my students A LOT to think about over the weekend. So now, my plan for this week is to begin collecting ideas and looking at the possibilities for my class. The new adventure begins!