Emergency Sub Plans You Can Leave Today (Grades 6-8)
Quick answer: Print one self-contained packet per class period, add a half-page note with the seating chart, the fire route and the names of two reliable students, and leave a roster the sub can mark. Anything that needs your password, your projector or your explanation does not belong in an emergency folder. Ten minutes of printing beats an hour of planning you will not get.
What do I leave if the bell rings in twenty minutes?
Work backward from what a stranger can hold in one hand. One packet, one instruction line at the top, one place to put it when finished. Middle schoolers test an unfamiliar adult in the first four minutes, so the packet has to start without a launch.
- Print the same packet for every period. Differentiating for a sub day costs you time and buys nothing.
- Write the room number, your name and the period on every page. Packets migrate.
- Name two students per class who can point to the pencil drawer. Do not name your favorites; name the ones who are steady.
- Leave a printed roster with a box for absences and a box for names to flag.
- Put the whole thing in a labeled folder on the desk, not in a drive folder.
What should an emergency packet for grades 6-8 actually contain?
Forty minutes of work that a student can do alone, plus ten minutes of overflow so the fast finishers do not go looking for trouble. A puzzle format holds a middle school class better than a page of practice problems, because it has an ending they can see coming. A compass-and-ruler geometry pack works for the same reason: the instructions are pictures, and the sub does not need to know the math to say yes, that looks right.
Include an answer key even if nobody grades it that day. It tells the sub whether the class is guessing, and it saves you the reconstruction on Monday.
Print-and-go for tomorrow morning
- Geometry with Compass & Ruler, Grades 7-9 — $12.99, instant download
- Escape Room: The Missing Match Schedule, Grades 5-9 — $14.99, instant download
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What does not work when a stranger covers middle school?
A movie. Students know it is filler, the sub loses the room in the dark, and you get nothing back. A worksheet with no instructions on it, because the sub cannot supply the missing sentence. Anything behind your login. Group work you have not already assigned, since a sub cannot arbitrate who sits with whom in seventh grade. Silent reading with no accountability page, which lasts about nine minutes.
Also skip the phrase continue where we left off. The sub does not know where that is, and neither will the class by third period.
How do I make sure the work still counts?
Attach a grade to the packet before you leave, and say so on the first page. Collect it as students exit rather than at a table, so the pile stays in period order. Tell the sub to write the period on the front of each stack with a marker. If you want it to count for more than compliance, pick something that feeds the next lesson: a math escape room gives you a diagnostic on ratio and schedule reasoning without you writing one.
What if I am out more than one day?
Two days is still an emergency folder. Three or more is a plan, and the difference matters: a sequence needs an order of operations, a place for student work to accumulate, and a note about what to do if a day gets lost to an assembly. That is where a full unit or a curriculum sequence pays for itself, because someone else can follow the page numbers.
Frequently asked questions
How many pages should an emergency packet be?
Six to eight for a fifty-minute middle school period, including a cover page and one overflow task. Fewer than five and you will get a discipline referral instead of work.
Should I leave a digital version too?
Only as a backup for a student who is remote. Do not make the digital copy the plan. Devices are the first thing to fail on a sub day.
What if the sub is not certified in my subject?
Assume they are not. Choose work where the instructions carry the lesson and the key carries the check.
Can I reuse the same emergency packet all year?
Once per class, not twice. Keep two packets in the folder and swap the used one out the week you return.
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