As the new school year approaches, it’s a great time for teachers to set the tone for a successful and fulfilling year. Here are some tips to help you start the year off right:
- Reflection and Goals
A great way to start the school year is to reflect on yourself and set goals for the year to come. Take some time to reflect on ways that you feel you could improve your teaching. Some examples of this could be strengthening your technology skills, adding new teaching strategies, improving your classroom management, getting involved in educational politics, adjusting your mindset, giving your presentations a refresh, and getting more organized.
- Organize
First things first is to make sure your previous year is complete and cleaned out of your classroom. After you’ve done that, create a routine for the new school year. Pick a couple small changes that you will make to make your days run smoother than the previous year. After you’ve done that, create a grading station. This is a low distraction area for you to work on grading. Another way to stay organized is to have a system in place for keeping track of important papers.
- Build Relationships
The baseline way to build relationships with people is to treat everyone with respect and lead by example. Teachers can benefit from building relationships with parents, students, and other teaching professionals.
- Lesson Plan
It’s important for teachers to refresh their lesson plans and keep them interesting and exciting. There are many resources out there for lesson plan curating and ideas. Teachers pay teachers is a great resource with free lesson plans.
- Self-Care Plan
Many teachers are experiencing intense burnout. It’s important to schedule self-care time for yourself in your day. Find a hobby, meditate, or even prioritizing sleep are all ways teachers can practice self-care.
- Plan Ways to Stay Informed and Inspired
Teachers can stay informed and sometimes get a salary advancement on top of that by taking professional development courses. CE Credits Online offers online professional development courses for teachers and are a great way to stay informed. A great way to stay inspired is to keep a positive memory file by saving thank you notes, cards, or pictures drawn by students. Watching movies and reading books with inspiring teachers can also help you stay positive about teaching.
- Create a Positive Classroom Environment
Creating a positive classroom environment will be important to the success of your school year. Building positive relationships with parents and students and outlining the rules for positive behavior are good places to start.
- Be Flexible and Adaptable
Being open to change and new ideas is important to being a great teacher. Differentiating instruction to meet diverse student needs is a great way to show your flexibility and adaptability.
The beginning of the school year is stressful and hectic but it’s important to take some time to reflect and set goals for the new year, organize yourself, build relationships, refresh lesson plans, create a self-care plan, and be flexible and adaptable. By taking time to plan out the year to come you will have a more peaceful and successful school year.