The beginning of your day should start off the best way possible, right? So, just what is the best way? If you ask some students, they would say the best way is to have a class that is less worthy of calling it an actual “class” and filled with work, but still have a calm and chill environment to talk and relax. Essentially, what they want is homeroom.

Currently,  we do not have homeroom every morning but, if you take a moment to imagine all the benefits it could have, you begin to see just how important it is. Although it would take up more time in the schedule, students should go to homeroom every morning because it allows for student discussions, social interaction, and distribution of school news and important documents.

Homeroom would allow everyone to have a calm morning as they either participate in a whole- class discussion or get last-minute work done. The extra time can help insure that tardy students don’t end up failing an important first-period class, provides teachers more time to prepare for class, and teachers could discuss important needed topics to be addressed in today’s world.

The discussion aspect of homeroom is really important. One way to do it is to ask students if they have any news or announcements to share and be clear that, while one person is speaking, others should listen attentively. An article on the website Shmoop provides ideas to teachers on what they could do during homeroom. including a game that could be played. This game basically states that, once a speaker has finished sharing whatever news she/he has, give others in the circle a chance to ask a question or add to the news before moving on to the next student. Small activities like these would support young people’s ability to work in small groups well. This could be done maybe once a week or once a month to help test it out.

Mark Fischetti of Scientific American, also notes that we all need new friends sometimes in our lives and who knows, the person you meet now could last forever. So having homeroom in the mornings would give students a chance to get to know more students in the school who could in return help them with something they are struggling on or just be there to be new friends. Advisories and homeroom periods provide students an opportunity to interact with teachers and one another in a nongraded atmosphere that isn’t focused on either content or assessment.

Besides the funny talk shows and interviews that students create for the morning announcements, important information that is distributed, and missing it could be crucial. Deadlines, due dates and other information regarding clubs, sports, or honor society are covered in the announcements, and missing them is not good. Also, the announcements allow for insight into what’s happening in our community. Having homerooms would benefit the school as a whole because teachers would have the opportunity to distribute the same information so that everyone is informed easier, faster, and are on the same page.

Homerooms in the morning would allow for a greater good of not just the students, but also the teachers. It would support teachers in getting more planning time, and students to get a warm-up period to help get ready for the day. A compromise to make this happen would be to create this plan for only 2-3 days of the week instead of every day so, other days, class can start on time with first period and not take up much of the day.