Counting Down

When getting the children to stop, I found it really useful to just count down from 5.

This gives children the time to finish their last sentence etc. and then when they have to pack away, count up from 1 and reward the first table to be ready.

Ajeng also suggested the following related idea:

Whenever someone loses their concentration, I always tell them: “I’m going to count until 10 for you to finish this. They take it as a challenge and will try their best to finish on time.”