You may notice a new title here. We have officially chosen our class name: The Rainbow Ice Creams! See below for more on this process.

How We Became the Rainbow Ice Creams

Our process started as it typically does at Barrow: brainstorming a list of possible candidates. But we adjusted our approach slightly this year. Rather than doing this as a group exercise, we invited each child to submit one name privately. Something I’ve observed in general about this age and in particular about this crew is the power of groupthink. Overall, this phenomenon is a positive sign of their social development and the strength of their bond. But for this particular activity, we wanted to work towards consensus rather than default to kids falling in line with whatever ideas were simply offered first. A few kids opted not to suggest a name so we ended up with 16 contenders.

As you can see, a few themes emerged: rainbows and sweets! And because these suggestions were made privately, we knew they were more authentic to the group rather than merely a prisoner of the moment. We invited each child to circle any/every name they felt excited by. We’d use this to narrow our selections down, advancing any name that had support from more than 50% of the group. This eliminated two names that had minimal support: Super Fast Falcons and Harry Potter.

Our next two rounds had the children select their top three and then top two names from remaining candidates. Before each round, we invited them to share their thoughts and feelings on each name, reminding them importance of communicating kindly and respectfully (i.e., “That name is note for me” instead of “That name is bad.”). To help them understand the concept of having a limited number of votes, they used manipulatives to communicate their preferences. After each round, we advanced those with the most support. This eventually took us down to our final two contenders and our final vote. We gave them a night to fully consider their choice… and, of course, to engage in behind-the-scenes politicking. No election would be complete without campaigning!

Each child circled their choice and submitted their vote privately. We counted the results together and by a margin of 13 to 6 decided that, together, we are the Rainbow Ice Creams.

Work is already underway on collaboratively designing a logo/symbol for the group. More on that to come!

Questions to Ask Your Orange Room-er

1.) What is your class name? What name did you vote for? How do you feel about it?

2.) Which half group are you in? (Lavender Lions or Turquoise Tigers)

3.) What does intuition mean when you’re sharing your math ideas?

4.) What new materials did you add to the art area? (Answer: Tape and scissors)

5.) What familiar material did you bring to a new space? (Answer: DUPLOs on the roof)