21 Things Teachers Do Every Single Day But Don’t Get Recognized For

21 Things Teachers Do Every Single Day But Don’t Get Recognized For

by | Humor, Teacher Issues, Teaching Blogs

Everyone is aware of the usual teacher responsibilities, such as grading papers, writing lesson plans, and attending staff meetings. But anyone who has been in the classroom knows there’s a whole lot more to the job. Not everybody knows about the numerous day-to-day duties that sometimes overwhelm teachers and interfere with actual teaching. Take a gander at this list. I need a cup of coffee just reading it.

1. We create materials and search online for engaging lessons.

Due to budget cuts, textbooks are outdated or nonexistent. Teachers have to scavenge and create curriculum. Luckily, we are creative and resourceful people, creating our own curriculum and looking on sites like Teachers Pay Teachers.

2. We differentiate lessons and analyze homework.

One size fits all does not work with education. I know teachers who create four different spelling lists to accommodate the needs of their students. We also spend extra time looking at homework so we can better understand the learners in our classrooms.

3. We help fellow teachers.

Teachers are collegial. When a colleague needs to borrow materials or books, we drop what we are doing to look for them. That’s just who we are, and it happens pretty much every single day.

4. We document, document, and then document some more.

In order to qualify students for any type of special assistance, we must document all academic and social behaviors daily. Sometimes, even by the minute. It’s not our favorite part of the job, but it’s important.

5. We input endless data.

The documented data we collect has to then be organized and analyzed. This includes grade books, IEP data, RTI, and assessment. Graphs are created. Goals are set. The paperwork is endless.

6. We read over daily plans and organize all materials before the day begins.

Although teachers are smart, we aren’t all Jeopardy! champions. We need to review materials and plan effective lessons. This takes time, and it usually means we’re coming in early and staying late.

7. We attend committee meetings.

There are now committees for organizing committees. At my school we have committees for safety, social, technology, curriculum, budget, and staff development. The list is long, and even more tasks are assigned at these meetings. These are usually on a volunteer assignments, so teachers are giving their free time to help the school.

8. We respond to lots of parent questions.

Although technology makes our lives easier, it also makes us more accessible. Communication apps enable parents to contact us every second of the day with any and all questions they have. We get questions about behavior, student eating habits, attendance, and more. And we have to take the time to respond.

9. We jam and fix the copier.

When we are running late, the copier we need to use is going to be jammed from the previous teacher, who was also running late. We spend a lot of time unjamming or finding someone who can fix the copier.

10. We stress about standardized testing.

All teachers stress about students being stressed. We stress about our test preparations, test results, and administrators’ reactions. Standardized testing is synonymous with stress. And we think about it all the time.

11. We manage technology.

Read the rest of this list at Weareteachers

Related Content:

In the Wake of Tragedy, How One Teacher Found a Way Through

Teachers Are Leaving the Profession Because of Large Class Sizes, and It’s Changing the Face of Education

Teachers Are Leaving the Profession Because of Large Class Sizes, and It’s Changing the Face of Education

by | Teacher Issues, Teaching Blogs

Crowd control is not only for sporting events, concerts, and angry protesters. It’s now required every single second of the day in some of our public school classrooms.

I teach in Las Vegas, where class sizes are the largest in the nation. Just last year, I stood frozen in the middle of my classroom. It was filled to capacity with five-year-olds, including seven with IEPs and behavioral issues. 

Students were dumping crayons, throwing books, and crawling under the tables. I felt like a first-year teacher again, white-knuckling it until the dismissal bell and praying I wouldn’t scream, “Will you ALL please shut up and go home?” I had lost all control.

This scenario isn’t rare or unique. All over the country, teachers are hanging up their whistles, renting U-Hauls, and leaving the public school classrooms they once loved being in.

What happened to reasonable class sizes?

I started my teaching career at an at-risk school in the mid-1990s, on the heels of class-size reform. My room had 17 third graders, and it was a great learning environment. What a wonderful way to feel!

Fast forward to 2018. My friend Nicole Gonzalez is in a middle school math class with 40 students packed together in an 800-square-foot room, tight as sardines in a can.

“With these large numbers, it has become increasingly more difficult to recognize students that may be struggling,” Gonzalez wrote to me. “It’s almost like they are invisible.”

It’s true. The more students in one room, the louder, smellier, and more distracting it becomes. Individual teacher-student interactions and meeting student needs are impossible.

Read more here!
In the Wake of Tragedy, How One Teacher Found a Way Through

In the Wake of Tragedy, How One Teacher Found a Way Through

by | Teacher Issues, Teaching Blogs

Going above the call of duty is synonymous with being a teacher.

We don’t do it for teacher-of-the-year awards. They only collect dust. We don’t do it for extra pay. That will never happen. We do it because our teacher hearts won’t let us do anything else.

This sums up speech teacher Laurie Nanni perfectly. She works at Sue Morrow Elementary School in Henderson, NV, where I teach kindergarten in an adjacent classroom. Back in 2004 when she was teaching second grade, a brown-eyed boy with a contagious spirit that could illuminate the room walked into her classroom.

His name was Quinton Robbins, and though Laurie loved all her students, she had a special bond with him that would last a lifetime.

Laurie remembers Quinton in second grade.

When your teacher heart gets shattered.

On October 1, 2017, my Las Vegas community was completely shaken to its very core. In one of the worst mass shootings in US history, a shooter opened fire on the Route 91 Harvest Festival, from a suite on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay Hotel, killing 58 people. Quinton Robbins, age 20, was one of the victims.

Days after the tragedy, I could hear Laurie’s guttural sobs of anguish through the walls of my classroom.

Read more here at Weareteachers.

New Teachers, You Will Survive Back to School Night

New Teachers, You Will Survive Back to School Night

by | Teacher Issues, Teaching Blogs

Dear New Teachers,

As you no doubt already realize, teaching is tough. But guess what? You are tougher, I promise. Right now you may be wondering if you will ever look forward to Back to School Night. Honestly, maybe not. However, right now you fear the unknown. The nightmares you have in your head of accidentally letting a four-letter word slip or parents verbally accosting you will probably never come to fruition. These tricks will help make your first Back to School Night flow smoothly and painlessly. Trust me.

Stop at Starbucks

Back to School Night Ideas

Caffeine is essential for Back to School Night. It’s like speed dating without the date. Smile, show genuine interest and concern for the student, make brief small talk and move on to the next family. Keep circulating, and whatever you do, don’t get backed into a corner by Helicopter Harriet who will tell you her child’s entire life history starting with the delivery. Politely point out that another parent just arrived.

Keep presentations short

I don’t know about you but I don’t like public speaking in front of anyone taller than four feet who may possibly be judging me. Back to School Night is usually held at the end of the night when everyone is tired. Families will not have the focus or the desire to listen to the entire algebra curriculum in one sitting. Amelia’s three year old brother may be screaming to high heaven that he didn’t get the same package of Smarties that his sister, the student, received for attending. Have handouts with bullet points that can be perused at home. A digital presentation can be helpful in sticking to the relevant data and maintaining your focus and of those in attendance.

Go on a scavenger hunt

Back to School Night ideas

Scavenger hunts are great ways to keep the parents busy on Back to School Night while you are making your way around to meet everyone. These hunts help parents become acquainted with the classroom and resources available to their children. On the scavenger hunt list, provide opportunities to go to the art room, cafeteria or library. This way, parents and students become more comfortable with the actual building. I still have trouble locating everything at my school, and I have been there for 10 years.

Read the rest of the article at https://www.weareteachers.com/first-back-to-school-night/

How to Return to Teaching Without Kicking or Screaming!

How to Return to Teaching Without Kicking or Screaming!

by | Teacher Issues, Teaching Blogs

Five Steps to Ease Back into the First Day of Teaching

 Really??? Do we have to return to teahing? Don’t get me wrong. Teachers love their jobs, love that they make a difference, look forward to having a brand new group of little humans to educate, blah, blah, blah. All that said, the first day scares us sh**less.

Whether this is your twentieth year or your first year, the butterflies are relentlessly running relays in the pits of our stomachs. Perhaps, it’s the fear of the unknown or the fear that we are going to forget how to teach, and the kids will be standing on the tops of their desks singing Post Malone songs. I really have no idea what songs those would be, but my daughter seems to enjoy his tunes.

First Day Fears

Even though we prepare all summer by scouting Pinterest, eBay, and Amazon for new bulletin board ideas, lesson plans and materials, the first day still makes us feel like we are thirteen and beginning our first year of middle school hell. We play the scenarios over and over in our minds. What if I put Hannah on the wrong bus? What if I have five kids that won’t stop crying? What if I have the worst class ever and start swearing at the kids out of nowhere? Can that happen? It probably has. There are steps that can be taken to help ensure your first day runs as smooth as a tub of well-churned butter.

Be prepared.                                                                                   

When you walk into your room on the first day, you want to be mentally as well as academically prepared. You don’t want to be silently cussing out the teacher who is using the only working machine to copy sets of journals for his or her entire class. Too early in the year for “Run-Off Rage.”

Materials should be organized and laid out ahead of time. This means making the most of the few days that are assigned before school starts. Often, there will be staff meetings that take up valuable planning time, so it is essential that any free preparation minutes are used wisely. It is tempting to want to catch up with EVERYONE, but time flies and checking items off your list is the only real way to alleviate stress.

It’s a good idea to arrive at least a half an hour early or stay late to feel like you have accomplished several important tasks each day. I know you don’t get paid for it, but the extra time will pay dividends in peace and sanity on the first day of school. 

Ease into your routine sleep schedule.

It’s tempting to want to party hard on those last few days before school starts. By party hard, I mean staying up to all hours of the night finishing your latest Netflix binge series. This is not a good idea.

If you wish to get any sleep on the Sunday before the first day, my advice is to start the week prior to your start date. Set a realistic bedtime that is within an hour of the time you will be going to bed during the school year. If you sleep in until noon, it will defeat the purpose. Set your phone alarm the same way in the morning, within an hour of your school wake up time. This will get you on a solid sleep schedule, and you will not feel as though a Mack Truck has plowed you down on the first day. Actually, who are we kidding? You will feel that way, regardless.

Related Article-Simple Slumber

Tune in to Tune out

This is a big one. The first few days of school, there are often introductory meetings that take you though your entire college education in a matter of a few hours. I often look around the room and I can just tell that someone or EVERYONE wants to stand up and yell, “For the love of peace, STFU. I can’t handle one more thing stuffed into my overflowing brain.”

My suggestion is to have a song handy to hum silently to yourself to block out information overload. Yankee Doodle, It’s a Small World, the Barney Theme, something that will help you to resist the urge to run out of the room crying.

 Important information given, but it will be more than likely be repeated at a later date or on handouts. There is only so much information that your brain can handle, so it is important to tune a lot out at the beginning meetings, or at the least, do not assign everything so much importance. It will drive you CRAZY.

Make a list and check it twice.

You don’t want to forget something and have it stress you out on the first day. It’s sort of like forgetting the tickets on the way to a concert. It causes unneeded backtracking and anxiety. What I find extremely helpful is to keep my phone by my bedside, so I can keep track of those voices that echo in our heads at 3:00 in the morning reminding us that we have to write our back to school parent letter or buy material for our bulletin boards. You know it will be completely gone in the morning, so jot  it down on “The Notes” section on your phone. I take great delight in deleting each item when completed. Celebrate the simple successes!!

Over, not under

For the first day, over-prepare. Make extra copies for the kids that register on the first day, and have plenty of extra pencils sharpened. Know what you will do in case someone throws up, wets their pants, or won’t stop crying. It is a good idea to write out your entire first day schedule in detail, so it is fresh in your mind. (NotePad on phone)

Write an overview of that schedule on the front whiteboard, so it is there and will keep you on track. Prepare for something to go wrong. If it does, always keep going strong. I tell my daughter the same thing when she’s doing her dance routine. When your skirt falls off,(like it has) pretend like nothing happened, and everyone will think nothing did. (I do think people noticed the skirt) If you didn’t make enough copies, tell the students that it’s cooperative learning and pair them up. Solve problems proactively.

Set the stage for good classroom management.

Classroom management is the hardest teaching skill to learn and also one of the most important. Your management system should be emphasized, taught and utilized on the very first day. Don’t say, “I go easier on the first day” or, “I go harder on the first day.” Students should know the rules, the expectations and the consequences, and they should be enacted right away.

If a student breaks a rule on the first day, the consequence should be implemented. Positive reinforcement is your friend, especially in the younger grades. Saying, “Wow, look at how hard Noah is working!” usually creates a chain reaction. The other students straighten up and begin acting like angels from above. Classroom Management 101.

For the older grades, scan the room for the wise cracking student, more than likely sitting at the back of the room. This is the student who’s been watching YouTube videos all summer long and is looking for the perfect moment in time to blurt out something sarcastically funny in order to increase popularity points.

But alas, this is what you have been preparing for. Resist the urge to humiliate by using retaliatory sarcasm. Humor is fine, but make it a short comeback, and quickly move on with the lesson. A short conference after class outlining future consequences might do the trick while simultaneously forging a rapport with the student.

Here We Go

Relationship building is key to effective classroom management. With large classes, it becomes a balancing act, but targeting 5-7 students a day will help foster those important relationships. These tips serve as a starting point. Although we are professional educators, the first day of anything is the toughest.

Building a strong foundation will serve to create a productive and healthy environment for our students and ourselves. Every educator has a different environment and circumstance, and the ability to go with the flow is key. Please comment any advice you have as you may really help someone struggling. Here is to a happy, successful school year.

Pin It on Pinterest