My big to-do is getting ready for next year. I'm switching from teaching sixth grade to teaching high school. Right now the plan is two Math I courses and one Math II Honors course first semester, and two Math II courses and one Math II Honors second semester. I'm liking the idea that this time next year I will have taught and tweaked Math II Honors twice. I have a friend that teaches science as a semester class in seventh grade, and I'm envious that she gets more opportunities to complete her curriculum and make improvements.
So, without further ado, I'd like to talk about what I want to Keep, Change, Start and Stop...
Keep
- "Interactive" Notebook- I love the organization of us all being on the same page, and knowing exactly where to direction a student when they're struggling (even better, when a student uses it without prompting!). They're not very interactive (I don't do many foldables) but that's something I'll need to work on at some point.
- Class Jobs- I might have to do some modifying of what jobs are available, but I LOVE having the extra help around class. My most used class job was group leaders; group leaders would help me pass out and collect things throughout class. I handed them each (three in each class) a small stack of papers and they passes them out. They also collected papers at the end of class, so I didn't have 27 students trying to turn in their paper in at the same time. Another job that seems minor, but I loved having, was door monitor. They didn't really monitor the door, but whenever we went anywhere (we had to walk as a class everywhere, and I had to escort them) I had one student responsible for closing the door when everyone was out of the room.
- Class Economy- Part of my classroom management was a class store. Students earned points for behaving, doing class jobs, doing extra work, or helping me. Students could redeem this points for supplies and rewards in my class store. I had a link to a pdf of the "prices" for each item on my class website, and I also created a google form they used to submit an order. I think this is one of the reasons my classes ran so smoothly; students loved earning points and were super cooperative.
Change
- Standards Based Grading- I want to keep the idea that grades are reported by learning target, but in a district that's still on a 0-100, A-F scale its a huge stresser trying to grade based on understanding. So I want to continue to break up grades by skill, but each question will be worth two points (one for showing work, one for correct answer) and grades will be calculated normally.
- Notes- This past year my goal was to do cornell notes, and I started out the year doing so, but it faded away. I tried letting up control, and putting more responsibility on the students, but they didn't keep up with it and I didn't enforce it. I'm not sure if I'll do cornell notes again this year, but I have found some awesome pins about explicitly teaching students how to take notes and I am going to do that, in some form.
Start
- Daily reflections of lessons- I found my lesson plans from my first year. Man, were they detailed! AND I reflected on each lesson each day!! I think that stopped when I stopped printing my lessons and didn't have a pretty blank box staring at me everyday. This year I bought a lesson plan book (this past year I used a google spreadsheet); I'm trying hand written lessons and I want to start reflection again each day.
- Teaching high school- This seems like a duh, at this point, but with switching districts, schools, grades, standards, I think one Start is enough.
Stop
- Talking so much- I think I talk too much sometimes and my words are losing their value.
- Grading everything- Ok, I've gotten away from grading EVERYTHING, but I still grade too much. I'm not sure if that's just part of being a math teacher (my ELA, Science and Social Studies friends don't grade nearly as much as I do) or if I'm over doing it. I'll have to find someone (more multiple people) in the math department at my new school with more experience and find out what they do.
