It is a good start to speak to each child individually within the first few minutes of their first day in your class. It helps to reinforce their name - ask them to say their name when introducing themselves, even if you know them quite well already.

At the end of the day I made sure that, once again, I shook the hand of each child to say goodbye and to have a few words about something they had achieved or done well during the day. I used it as a reassurance for those that had perhaps been a little nervous or, for example, to praise a child with behavior difficulties who had interacted successfully with others during the day.

Try it out - The end of school handshake proved to be the most useful and one that I tried to fit in each day. It was a fantastic opportunity to have a few short, quiet words with individuals as they left for home - praising, reminding, re-building, encouraging, thanking… so many positives came out of it.

With my class I also used the handshakes investigation on their first day as it was a great maths activity to get an idea of their mathematical thinking.

We have 30 children in this class. If everyone shook hands with everyone else, how many handshakes would there be in total?

It is a good start to simplify the problem:

What if there were 2 children? How many handshakes would there be? What about 3 children? 4… 5?

This can be acted out with a group at the front of the class and the whole class counting the number of handshakes. Children can then record using pictures – encourage them to be systematic.

For KS1 and lower KS2 keep the task limited to small groups and counting the number of handshakes. Drawing pictures is a good way of recording results. Introduce larger groups or the whole class for older children and keep a tally, then record the results in a table. 

For upper KS2 use a table of results to explore the number pattern or through algebra with a generalised rule.

When I used this with Y5 and Y6 children they were always keen to generalise and find a rule.  The relationship between the number of children and handshakes is more difficult to understand than the pattern in the table – often the case with making generalisations.

Look at the drawings of handshakes. In a group of 4 children there is a total of 6 handshakes. 

If there are n people and each person had n-1 handshakes then the total would be n (n-1). However this would include each handshake twice so it needs dividing by 2. So the correct formula is n (n-1)/2.

Check it for 7 people: 7 x (7-1) ÷ 2 = 21.