The best method for random selection in your classroom - no resources needed!

I don't know about you, but I get quite frustrated with physical resources like using lollipop sticks pulling slips of paper out of a hat when I want to do random selection in my lessons. As I teach 10 different classes, it also gets quite difficult to organise these resources and it can get very time consuming and expensive! Well, I recently came across a fantastic free tool that seems to have solved all my problems and I can't wait to share it with you!

The tool is called "Wheel Decide". It comes as an app for both iOS and Android as well as a web version too. It's really easy to use: simply add the options you want to select, change the colours up if it matters to you (this is important to me, haha!) and click on the wheel! It will spin (with optional cool sound effects - the kids love them so I always leave them on!) and land on a random option. You have the choice for the wheel to remove each option after it has been landed on too which is quite a handy feature depending on what you're using it for!

Here are some suggestions on how you can use it in your classroom!
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• Selecting student names at random for questioning
• Selecting topics to discuss in class
• Selecting keywords from the lesson that students need to define (you can use individual whiteboards for this)
• Class reward selection if they have behaved well
• Brain break ideas
• Classroom jobs
• Conversation starters / get to know you ideas
• Decide which table gets released from class first
• Selecting someone for "secret student" (let me know if you want another blog post explaining what this is!)
• Have a letter of the alphabet for each option and students think of a keyword starting with that letter
• Choose a selection of keywords and ask the students to all write a sentence using that word (mini whiteboards)
• Have a range of questions on the wheel and students have to answer whichever is selected
• Use as a behaviour management tool so everyone whose name is still on the board for being good all lesson gets their name on the wheel and the winner gets a prize.
• Number each option up to 5 or so and let the wheel decide how many minutes of game time students get at the end of a lesson
• Use with the department to decide who takes the next meeting minutes (haha jk - I always do it)

So there you go, hopefully this has given you a solid foundation to feel confident using Wheel Decide in your classroom too! If you come up with any other ideas, please feel free to share below!