DearAnxiousTeacher

  Great topic, especially in today’s age where people no longer revere authority figures, including us teachers, as they did in the past. Students today have no problem asking for your phone number, cursing in front of you, or saying something highly suggestive or explicit, making us both uncomfortable. Students scrutinize what we say and may look to manipulate or twist our words for their betterment. Instead of researching evidence for an argumentative essay, students will research to find your social media accounts with an A+. We have all been to that bachelor or bachelorette party, where one of your friends went a little too hard. You wish you could delete the picture where you are the innocent bystander. I’ve heard of the horrors of a teacher being recorded by students. It feels like we are under a microscope. Here is advice on how to maintain and manage professional boundaries: Be mindful of your language. Labeling groups of students as “they” or “them” can be inflammatory. ...

    So you’re putting your lesson plans together.   How do you start your lesson? What’s the hook? A simple way of thinking about your teaching is to follow the model: I do, We do, You do. I do:  This will include your Do Now (hook), your instruction, modeling, and direct teaching. Keep this portion of your lesson to 10–15 minutes. Sometimes we make the mistake of lecturing too long, losing our students’ interest. You should target all sensory modalities (vision, hearing, and touch) to help students gain, process, and make use of new knowledge. Your lesson should start with something interesting and fun. Relate it to your students as much as possible. Knowing your students’ abilities is crucial to teaching them. If something is very abstract, make it concrete by providing plenty of analogies or metaphors to help students understand your content. Visuals will help with abstract concepts too. Music and YouTube videos can also assist with getting ideas across. Humor and...

  Class Rules should be short, positive, and not wordy. Too many rules will create confusion in your class. I recommend 3-5 rules tops with a general set of consequences to be posted somewhere in front of your classroom. These rules should be taught on the first day of school. If you’re considering adding more rules, look at your class procedures first; perhaps a class procedure can take the place of a rule instead of adding extra rules. Too many rules will also make you look like a drill sergeant or a control freak, and students might be overwhelmed trying to follow all your rules. My class rules are REP: Respect, Effort, and Participate. Showing Respect is also following class procedures and directions. Respect is a broad category that encompasses more factors than just being courteous and kind. Also, fewer rules are better, because when you’re disciplining students, you may forget which rule or infraction was broken. You don’t want to be scrambling to tell the student what rul...

    Tons of teacher personalities exist. I’ve worked with a lot of talented teachers. This one is great with discipline! Everyone loves this teacher! Now, here is your content expert! You then wonder about your own fit. What makes you special? Who are you in the field? Overthinking and comparing yourself too is not helpful. Never compare yourself to anyone. Then you deal with teachers who have massive egos who like to flex their “God-like” teaching abilities, igniting insecurities in our minds. First, you really need to be choosy about who you inquire advice from. Find someone who shares a similar teaching persona or philosophy to you. You need to trial and challenge everything you hear. Trying and seeing for yourself should always be the mantra of everything. Even me! There are a lot of poor teachers out there not to heed advice from. So if something sounds odd, believe your gut feelings or intuition. Stupid advice that floats around with teachers like not smiling until the h...