4 ways to help back-to-school students focus

As students come back to school, many will be excited to reconnect with friends as they start the school year. Excitement is excellent, so how do you focus that energy into productive learning activities? Here are some ideas to help your students focus as they come back to school.

Keep them active, empower them to take charge and get creative, like designing and making posters⁠(opens in a new tab or window)! Posters are a fun way to engage your students.

Why not leverage some of that energy for your lesson? Ask your students to summarize⁠(opens in a new tab or window) their break in a poster. With Canva for Education⁠(opens in a new tab or window), you can set up a poster template, or let them create their own using Canva’s Poster Templates⁠(opens in a new tab or window).

The best part about your students creating posters on Canva is you can easily print them for your classroom walls. Try using poster mockups⁠(opens in a new tab or window) to see your design before printing. And, when working in Canva, students can continue working on their poster after class has ended. There are so many ways you can use posters to engage your students. Why not encourage them to make a poster for their favorite movie, musical band, or even an imaginary holiday destination?

There’s so much for your students to chat about with each other, it’s hard to keep them focussed. Why not channel this enthusiasm to create presentations that do the talking for them? Talking presentations in Canva are easy, super fun, and offer a way for your students to practice their presentation skills without the nerves that come with standing in front of a classroom.

Why not ask your students to create a presentation about their dream vacation, or work in groups to create, and later record, a presentation about three things they did in common and three different things they did on their break? For more talking presentation activity ideas, check out this video⁠(opens in a new tab or window).

You can set yourself, and your students, up for success by getting organized. Use Canva to design class schedules⁠(opens in a new tab or window) or daily agendas⁠(opens in a new tab or window) so everyone knows what they’ll be doing throughout the week. You can show your students your daily agenda, and empower them to use Canva in their own designs. It’s a great activity that lets them express their creativity, comprehend and remember their new daily agendas, and stay organized.

Weekly agendas are a fantastic way to talk to your students about routines and building habits⁠(opens in a new tab or window). Because once you lay out their school schedule, they can expand it to include other things they do from when they wake up to when they go to bed.

This can show them habits they already have and can help them identify times and opportunities to create new habits. Like meditating between waking up and breakfast, or maybe reading at their leisure, creating "I can" statements to help kids ownership of their learning⁠(opens in a new tab or window), doing some exercise, or going for a run between getting home from school and dinner. New school years are a new start, an opportunity to start working towards a better self and creating new habits is the best way to do that.

Did you know Canva for Education⁠(opens in a new tab or window) is free for teachers and schools? Head here to learn more and sign up⁠(opens in a new tab or window)!