If you expect this blog entry to
detail the deviousness of our less honest students, prepare for shattered
expectations. I sincerely apologize if I just dashed your hopes, but wait, don’t
turn away petulantly in favor of someone else’s blog. Stay. Read. I will make
it worth your while; I’ll tell you a tale of an epiphany (and the quest for
information which ensued).
It was
a warm Tuesday and I was perspiring a bit as I prepared for my observation. I checked the Powerpoint again, then asked my CT if he would steer the ship (do the
computer stuff) while I led the crew. I pointed out the part where he would have to go backwards in the slides—through several
slides, each with various animations—to return to our QuickWrite questions. He
acquiesced, nodded quietly, and then blew my mind. Two oh-so-simple key strokes
and he made my Powerpoint exponentially more efficient.
“What did he do?” you ask with
baited breath. I’ll tell you. He copied and pasted the first question slide in
front of the instruction slide so no backward slide seeking was necessary. So
logical! How did I not see that!? First came my answer: I have not been doing
this every day for years. Then came the epiphany: that was such a life hack! It
was no different than finding out you can make brownies and omelets with a
waffle iron—well, maybe a bit different, but equally astounding. I decided, then
and there, that I must collect more of these tidbits of logic, efficiency, and
wisdom and share them with you, dear reader. And so I did.
First,
I must explain that, as I gathered the advice about to be presented, I noticed
that it fell into two categories: tips/tricks about supplies & technology
and advice for how to make the best of your classroom/school environment. I
choose to share the latter first. Many of these pearls I gleaned from my CT,
others from teachers nearby, but all were worthy of sharing so I present you
with a list:
·
Secretaries and Custodial Staff actually run the
school; make them your BFFs (do not bother them needlessly).
·
If you need copies, the copier will not be working.
Have a back-up plan in place.
·
Similarly, have a file (digital, mental, or
physical) with ideas for supplementing the 30 minute lesson plan that actually only
took 10 minutes. This is classic advice for a reason.
·
Always write something on the paper you just graded besides some
numbers and checkmarks—feedback leads to motivation.
·
Laugh. At. Self. Kids respond to your humiliation…usually
in a good way.
I can personally vouch for the usefulness of the
digital/mental file. We were unable to progress with Romeo & Juliet due to lack of voice on my CT’s part, but we
went to the stack of various worksheets from our autobiography project and—poof,
Bob’s your Uncle—we had a new lesson in no time.
I am sure we can all think of situations in which these
insightful gems could help us shine in the classroom, but I really cannot wait to
share some of the more physical tips and tricks I unearthed. Without further
ado:
·
When computer is acting up, reboot first; call Tech
Person second. The Tech Person falls into the Secretary category. You want this
person as your ally, not trying to hide from you every time your computer
glitches. And 9 times out of 10, a reboot takes care of the problem (shut the
front door! This works for printers too! I just tried it this morning).
·
Teach how to format a paper (actual specifics of
using a document program like Word) before
going to the computer lab. Lab time is a precious commodity and can be saved by
addressing formatting expectations in a simple Powerpoint or handout during
class time.
·
Make friends with local businesses and even
larger corporate stores. Pair this with advance planning and you can source all
sorts of swell things to decorate your room with or re-purpose to organize. (I
have 4’ tall R2D2 pop cooler that would be awesome in a classroom; it was free
from a friendly Pepsi vendor at my old grocery store).
And last, but not least:
·
Forget expensive individual whiteboards, try
instead a package of disposable white plastic plates. They may not last as
long, but they will certainly be something you can afford (thanks to my CT for this
one!).
I am sure each of our CTs, mentor
teachers, and colleagues hold a treasure of such teacher hacks. They have found
them, heard them, devised them, and adopted them so that they can focus on making
class time count. And so they can spend more time looking up how to make
omelets with waffle irons and use hanging shoe racks to store cleaning supplies.
In the spirit of my epiphany, I
also looked up “teacher life hacks” on Bing. I found this Buzzfeed article that had some fabulous ideas as well (for both secondary
and elementary educators). http://www.buzzfeed.com/peggy/insanely-smart-school-teacher-hacks#.qd6zvrZx1
I recommend it highly. But I also
recommend that tomorrow or the day after you ask a teacher near you to share
their hacks and offer some of your own. Maybe if we all hack our teaching
lives, we can free up enough extra time to hang out together and enjoy our
non-teaching lives as well.
Cheers,
Ms. Iseminger
P.S. I am so doing the hanging shoe rack-cleaning supply
thing….that’s just brilliant and I have a lot of cleaning supplies…..hey, that
would work for organizing party supplies for treat day at school and could totally
hang inside the closet door in the classroom. Brilliant!!
