Tag Archives: Best Practices

Back to School: Tip #2 Keep your expectations realistic

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Back to School

Yesterday’s post was a reminder that summer is rapidly coming to an end, and the start of a new school year is just around the corner. This realization typically stimulates reflection about how you can ensure this school year will be the best ever. Here is a second post that offers some tips on how to make this happen. Please feel free to post additional tips and hints in the comments section!

To have a really great year, it’s important to keep expectations realistic. Every teacher knows what it feels like to knock yourself out to do a great job on a particular lesson, only to have this overwhelming feeling that it isn’t working. It’s hard not to get discouraged when you feel like you’re floundering.

Don’t expect each lesson to be perfect the first time you execute it. Doing anything new requires practice in order to reach mastery. Making mistakes is part of the learning process. The important thing is to spend time reflecting on what aspects of the lesson you would like to be better, and then come up with a plan to make that happen. In fact, teaching should be a continuous cycle of planning, executing, reflecting, revising, and repeating. Just try to do a little better each time you do the lesson. Remember that you are a learner, too. You and your students are a learning community, and you are all working together to increase your understanding and improve your skills. Achieving success is a process, and a group process at that!

Think about this, too. The longer you’ve been teaching, the easier it will be to diagnose and prescribe solutions for improvement. In some cases, though, it might be better to stop the lesson and move on to something else for awhile. Later, when you’ve got the time and space for productive reflection, you can do a better job of analyzing.

Remember to take time to remind yourself that you are doing your very best. When a lesson does go the way you want it to, be sure to give yourself a well-earned pat on the back.

Back to School: Tip #1 Appreciating the Support Staff

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Back to School

Well, teachers, it’s time to admit that summer is rapidly coming to a close, and the start of a new school year is just around the corner. This realization typically stimulates reflection about how you can ensure this year will be the best ever. For the next few days I’ll offer some suggestions. Please feel free to post additional tips and hints in the comments section!

First, let’s discuss a really simple strategy for ensuring success: Recognizing the significant roles played by the school’s support staff. It’s really important to get to know the school’s support staff, and to appreciate them whole-heartedly. School librarians, secretaries, textbook clerks, custodians, security guards, cafeteria workers, groundskeepers, technology support personnel, and bus drivers all make important contributions to the success you and your students will experience in the classroom this year. It might seem like a lot of extra work to cultivate these relationships, and sometimes it’s hard to remember to be appreciative when you’re feeling short on time, overworked, or stressed out, but every day in a hundred little ways that you may never even know about, these folks will be doing their utmost to support your professional efforts. Time and again you’ll be depending on them to make your job a little easier. Be sure to take the time to recognize their areas of expertise and to acknowledge their contributions!

Here are some easy things you can do. When you pass by a support staff member in the hallway, greet them with a smile and a cheerful hello. Leave a little note of appreciation on your whiteboard for the custodian to find when he or she comes to clean your room. A thank you note is always welcome if someone has done something above and beyond, and letting the principal know about those good deeds is always a good idea. When making out your holiday cards, include a few members of the support staff that have been particularly helpful to you. Above all, be sure to model your appreciation and respect for support staff for your students. Remember that a little bit of effort goes a long way to establishing and nurturing your relationships with support staff.

Have a great year, and tune in tomorrow for another great tip!

You Don’t Have to Be a Perfect Teacher

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We teachers are continuously working towards improving our practice in the classroom. It just goes with the territory. We really, really care. But you don’t have to be a perfect teacher, advises this colleague in a two-minute video published by We Are Teachers. Take a look, and then give yourself permission to follow his advice.

For more inspiration, visit their website at We Are Teachers.com.

The progressive Amos Bronson Alcott: Teacher, philosopher, and reformer

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Amos Bronson Alcott

The Progressive Amos Bronson Alcott: Teacher, philosopher, and reformer

In the early 19th century, the Progressive Movement was responsible for great changes in the field of education. One progressive educator from this period was Amos Bronson Alcott, a teacher, philosopher, and reformer from Connecticut.

Amos was born in 1799 in Wolcott, New Haven County, Connecticut, the self-educated son of a farmer. When he grew to manhood, Amos became a prominent proponent of the Transcendentalist movement, a philosophical movement that emphasized the value of nature and the inherent goodness of people.

Even as a young man, Amos was interested in a career as a teacher. He disliked the rote memorization, lecture, and drill so prevalent in the schools of his day. Instead, he focused on the students’ personal experiences, advocated a more conversational style of interaction with pupils, and avoided traditional corporal punishments. He was one of the very first teachers to introduce art, music, nature study, and physical education into his curriculum. He engaged his students in Socratic dialogue to bring their ideas to the forefront. He treated children as adults, and would allow the class to address disciplinary problems as a group.

In 1834, Amos founded a “progressive school,” the Temple School in Boston. Under great skepticism and criticism almost from the start, the school still managed to stayed open for six years. Eventually it was closed, not because of its unorthodox methods, but because Amos, an ardent abolitionist, had enrolled an African American girl in the predominantly white school.

In 1859, Amos returned to Connecticut, where he was appointed the superintendent of Concord Public Schools. There he revamped the curriculum by introducing calisthenics, singing, and physiology. He insisted that his teachers use the Socratic method in their classrooms. He also established the first parent-teacher association. His work inspired later educational reformers and many of his practices are commonly implemented in schools today.

Amos was also an advocate for women’s rights. This remarkable Chalkboard Champion is probably best known, however, for being the father of Louisa May Alcott, the author of the classic American novel Little Women.

Amos Bronson Alcott passed away from natural causes in 1888. Read more about him at this link to the National Park Service.

Learn how to use Comic Life in the classroom

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Even during the summer, teachers are constantly looking for resources they can use in their classroom. Here is one I am happy to share with you: Comic Life, a download that allows the user to create their own comics. Teachers can use the program to create personalized comics to supplement their instructional programs, and they can also encourage their students to use the program to create their own classroom projects. Here is a tutorial I create a while ago that shows you how to use the program. If you like it, here is the online link to where you can learn more, and where you can download a free trial: Comic Life. Enjoy!