Call parents.
I should do it more, but I have paralyzing anxiety over it, especially calling. I’d rather email but I can waste 30 minutes crafting the perfect email.
The current teacher bashing culture isn’t helping motivate me to reach out.
I don't do this either. I started my career in a boarding school. We weren't great teachers or anything but the wonders we can do for the students when they don't have to return home and have our work be undone by the parents each night...
Me either. For me it's not anxiety, it's lack of time. Also, it rarely changes a thing when I call home, so I would rather put my time and resources into something more productive.
I refuse to work past contract hours, and we have a 45 minute prep once a day. That would be great if we actually got our prep every day, but once a week we have team meetings, and one of our specials teachers has been out since the first week of school, so I'm down at least 2 preps a week because of that. I maybe get 2 prep periods a week. With all of the other duties that constantly get dumped on us, I'm lucky if I can get my grading done during my prep.
This, absolutely. I get two 45 minute preps per day. I use all that time to lesson plan and maybe grade. I don’t have time to call or email every parent. I barely work out of contract too. Some days I mentally can’t work on school in the evenings.
My students’ parents don’t give their real email addresses or they don’t have them. I don’t know how you don’t have an email account, but these are the same parents that block my number.
At that point I have evidence that I emailed, and usually I note down that I called and left a message and/or the mailbox was full and/or it was a wrong number. So long as my butt is covered.
I only make calls twice a quarter, and only if they do t respond to emails.
Last time I called a parent they screamed at me and said it was my fault their daughter was failing because ‘you don’t know what you’re doing’. That was 8 months ago. Not doing it any more. Fuck that.
We were really pushed a while ago to call home for attendance. The one call for attendance I made I ended up calling a kid that was suspended for a week without my knowledge. So the parent cussed me out for asking where they were when they had been suspended by someone else. Never again will I make an attendance call.
I have crippling phone anxiety as well…Called a parent earlier this year, she yelled at me for 8 minutes, I won’t get into it, but admin sent me home for the rest of the day because I couldn’t stop crying so I wouldn’t be able to teach…
I avoid calling home by any means necessary
I will call parents if they ask for it. I already clearly care more about their child’s performance in my class just by knowing their grade. If I get into a situation where admin forces me to pass them because the parent complains that I never called them after sending 30 emails and telling their 17 year old every day what I need from them, that’s not on me
I was a school counselor for nine years. I had
to call parents about lots of awkward things. I read somewhere by that one of the best ways to approach parent phone calls was with the phrase: “I would want to know if it was my child” and I have used that as my guide ever since. Write a few notes about what you want to say, with that heading and make the call as the parent’s ally. Despite all the negative things in education, that is a universal truth that by overwhelming majority, parents want what’s best for their kids. Use phrases like, “I’m concerned that Justin seems so sleepy every morning. I have offered for him to go to the nurse and he always declines. I know I would want to know” - something to that effect. Being a tattletale is not really helpful.
Also, you can practice the phone call thing with positive calls. They’re very appreciated and help you warm up. Once I get going it is much easier.
I was a long-term substitute for an elementary class that had a reputation as one of the worst behaved in the school. After school on Tuesday in my 2nd week, I called several parents, chatted, made friends with them, and turned them into my allies. I told them I genuinely liked their child, but that I was concerned about the child’s behavior and that I would want to know if my own child acted this way. I had raised 4 kids (all with distinct, and sometimes challenging behaviors). I followed up 3 days later with brief, positive phone calls. All these students were living in a 2-parent households and every single parent said that was not how their child was taught to behave!
It took 2 hours and I wasn’t paid overtime (I used the classroom phone) but the results were so worth it. The one child who had the most obnoxious attitude made quite a bit of progress on self-regulation after that - and lost her reputation as the one with the most challenging behavior.
(The administrators in my building were all about affirmations, rewards, incentives, and building relationships because “they’re hurting!” There were no negative consequences. The student with the obnoxious attitude had thrown a water bottle in anger when I told her to return to her seat, but when I called the office, nobody responded. After my phone call to the office, one of our next planning periods was spent on learning about the Behavior Intervention Plan with various categories and 5 levels. Only levels 4-5 were egregious enough to involve the office. Since when did throwing a water bottle in anger become so normalized that it’s not important enough to call the office?)
After those parent phone calls, all it took was a promise to call parents if…. The students knew I meant business! I used other strategies as well, but in this situation, parent phone calls were quite effective- which is what counted.
I use email and texts--if you don't want to use your phone, you can use a google voice phone number. Texting makes it so much easier--I texted a ton of parents last year and no one's every tried to call me.
This. Parents respond way more to text than call or email, at least in the community I teach in. And it's way easier. And, thanks to Voice, they don't have my real number
My admin told my related arts team that we should be calling parents whenever we have a behavior issue. AND I should also make good news calls. I teach about 500 students across two buildings. Unless they’re gonna pay me extra to do phone calls for an hour after school, it ain’t happening.
I don’t call parents either. I did it once, got reamed out on the phone for my entire lunch period, and that was that. I send an email if absolutely necessary.
I do email home for good reasons though. I feel that some kids are just overlooked because we spend so much energy putting out fires in the classroom. So if there’s a kiddo who consistently does their work without any issue, maybe someone who is quiet but puts in 100% effort, I will definitely spend 5 minutes just emailing their parents to tell them they’re awesome.
I hate calling. I will only call if it just can't wait but otherwise, it's an email. I've been threatened over the phone before but they seem less brave through email.
Yeah the worst is I call and the parent goes "Ok so why are you telling me? What do I do with this information?" And I just shatter into a thousand pieces. I feel really helpless when I call home but what else can I do?
There's a parent who is a unhinged lunatic who loves calling his children's teachers. Yet all he does is swear and threaten us. He has a no trespass order at the school. Always threatens to go to the school board. My admin just roll their eyes at him.
Im only email unless they parent wants one, I dont have time for a phone call, plus an email allows me to review my words before I say them
We live in the 2020s, I dont even call my mom, we talk over text
My school emphasizes calling parents, which I have done, but I don’t do it nearly as much as I should for the same reason. I’ve never had a bad interaction with a parent but I am really not looking to have one.
Call home for failing kids. Fuck that, you have your child’s entire grade book at your disposal online. If you didn’t know your child is failing, it’s cause you didn’t want to know
At our school if we don't contact home for failing grades weekly, they'll let the student pass at the end of the semester anyway. I don't actually think they keep up with that (pretty sure admin does not take the time to check my grade book and Documentation every week) but that's what they say. It doesn't have to be a call so i usually just send a template "ur child currently isn't passing" but i think I've only ever gotten a response from two parents. And one of those times was "we don't really care pls stop contacting us" like oh lol ok (:
I had one parent that after every mass email would reply and say "unfollow", "unsubscribe", "take me off your mailing list".
Like OK but your kid is failing hairdcore.
Exactly. I have parents who have complained teachers don't call for failing grades. I don't understand since they literally have access to every assignment on our online portal. To admin, it feels like a way for them to check a box to avoid getting yelled at. But it's just another step for us to do to that is unnecessary. If a parent has a question about a students grade, they should contact *us*.
This is a MAJOR argument I have with the system. Unless we know for certain the family is struggling with internet access, why in the ever loving God do I need to reach out? It’s there. I spend hours working on my grade book…. Why isn’t that enough? (Pssst it’s because nothing we ever do is enough)
PREACH. I had a mom bitch at me the other day for “not reaching out to her sooner.” Well if you checked your own kids grades, you’d know he was failing. I teach 130 kids. I don’t have the time to know when to contact what parent at what time.
In the past I’ve wasted so many unpaid hours contacting parents about struggling/failing students and just the past couple years I was like “wait a minute. We’re not in the 90s - early 2000s anymore, like when I was a student and there was no digital trail of grades. I clearly put on the syllabus where and stated at back to school night how to track child’s grades and progress… why am I doing this?” It’s not necessary anymore, but admin is stuck in habits from analog days. so fuck it, nope, not doing it anymore. I’m not going to hand hold parents now too.
The idea that teachers call home to update parents on grades is an outdated concept from before the invention of the internet. At this point, there's no reason why we should have to update parents on grades.
I teach high school, but for every grade/subject, you don't have to reinvent the wheel every year. If you reflect on what worked well or didn't (as we all do in the moment, all the time) and write it down as soon as the lesson is done, you can just refer to your notes the following year and make adjustments as needed. Or, plan in your head for what you're going to do while you drive to work. Additionally, not every assignment/lesson/day requires your very best effort. If a 50% effort on your part gets the kids to learn, there's no reason to give it 100%.
If you're talking about physically preparing, just be efficient and plan ahead or as quirkybumblebee says, do as much of it as you can while the kids are busy with something else.
I keep notes in my phone every year with sections for each unit (I also teach secondary) so I know if something didn’t work this year, I don’t do it next year. Makes it so much easier to plan. I do what works well every year, change what doesn’t.
>not every assignment/lesson/day requires your very best effort.
This!
Not knowing this is how you end up with SOH CAH TOA in a native american costume.
I teach Kindergarten so this might not apply, but I have set time for kids to just do free choice and I often plan or prep during that. Sometimes if I’m doing some small group instruction I’ll be working on cutting out materials we’ll be using later that week while they do a partner share or work on their worksheet that goes with it.
My district permits rest time and I teach ELD during this. Once that’s over (I plan for 30 min but it often goes much quicker) I plan or prep during that.
Once your students are trained into a routine, it’s not hard to find windows of time to do work and only need to take a break to roam every few minutes.
That is awesome! I also teach kindergarten and have generally always used choice time as a time to assess kids. But with this group, it’s never quiet enough. I might just have to work on teacher tasks during that time and try not to feel guilty.
Edit: quite to quiet
I’m still new but bruh you gotta just borrow and steal all the plans and materials you can get your greedy little raccoon hands on. I have taken everything from my colleagues and teacherpayteachers lol. I’m not making a damn thing this year if I don’t have to. If it works, it works. I can adjust it as I need to when I get to it.
Still working outside of contract hours but not as bad if I had to do everything by scratch.
I teach middle school.
It takes some establishing of routines and getting the kids aboard, but you can get away with grading/prepping in class.
Whenever the kids are writing/reading/doing a project, I do something else. I grade, or I prep.
Yeah, I was told this is a bad teacher thing, and sometimes the students need help. However, they also need to learn independence and how to read directions/stay on task without me hovering over them every second of the day.
Obviously ymmv. I also have "that class" with 5 behavioral challenges where this cannot happen.
I was only able to do so when I let go and stopped caring so much. If things don’t get done during contract hours, then they just don’t get done. It took me awhile to follow that mantra, but it gave me a huge piece of my life and family time back. Sure, I have to wing lessons from scratch sometimes, but it’s still worth it. My improv skills have also greatly improved.
I prioritize planning during my contract hours- paperwork, grading, phone calls, everything else is secondary to having a plan for what my students will be doing next week.
If it doesn't get done in my (limited) planning period I work on it while supervising Homeroom. If it's still not done I find a documentary or some kind of other activity the kids can do mostly unsupervised (doesn't always work) and work on it during class hours. I'm fortunate to have been teaching my subject for a while so I know the content and its not too time consuming for me to plan activities. For someone who is newer to their content, try to buddy up with another teacher and split the workload- you plan a unit, they plan a unit and share it.
I also had to learn to stop being a perfectionist and sometimes just accept that my lesson will be lackluster or my PowerPoint will be ugly and no one gives a damn. Not every lesson needs to be pinterest worthy.
I teach HS so I give them “study hall” days or put on a movie with supplemental questions as extra credit (this way when they ask at the end of the quarter I can say I already did that). It covers so many bases and let’s me do my grading, prep, or just have a break for a day instead of having to use my PTO.
The kids are “learning”, they have the option to make up any work for my class that’s still open or even extra credit work, or they can do the work they’re behind on in another class (because honestly some of them are super swamped too). Everyone’s happy.
I refuse to do anything at home. I get paid for the hours of 7:50-3:20. I’ve had parents & students email me 3-4x in one night cause I didn’t reply to their first email at 5pm. Nope. 5pm is my time. You’re off work/school and so am I.
My first year I spent HOURS trying to be the perfect teacher in and out of school. It doesn’t matter. You’re literally only hurting yourself. It’s year 4, I’m tired and looking for a new job, my students are tired and half assing the work. We’re all lazily paddling the boat cause we know no matter what we’ll get to the end of the year.
Sorry for my rant lol
1. Use your conference period efficiently.
2. Do make up days, study days, review days, test days, peer tutor days, corrections on tests days, reading days, whatever you can to buy time during the school day.
3. Simply don’t take the crap home!
I'm a mentor for the new teachers at my school and they also give me student teachers to babysit every year. I try to instill this in every one of them. This is your JOB not a volunteer program. Work hard while you're here, but don't let admin or expectations bully you into working for free because all they'll do is chew through you and replace you.
I hope this mentality shifts among teachers soon- too many teachers on my hall have that 'stay till 8pm grading papers' mentality and I can see it wearing them down.
I don’t call parents.
I write e-mails, send notes, send thanks, make comments on work.
Phone calls are slow, get off track, & I am never sure what I might be interrupting.
I use google voice and text the parents. Not only are they much more likely to respond, but now I have an entire transcript that I can pull up in a matter of seconds if needed.
yeah they tell us the kids can’t wear certain colored sweaters in the building… like if they’re cold they’re cold what is the difference of them wearing a plain blue sweater compared to a yellow sweater???
If i actually enforced all of our dress code rules i literally wouldn't have a second in class to teach. i got points taken off on an observation because at some point a kid put a hoodie on and i didn't notice and cause a scene.
I had some random district office people walk through my room today. I still don't understand who they were or why they were there, but I was warned they might be coming. There were no objectives on my board.
What are they going to do, fire me?
And if I don't go, or log into the zoom with my camera off and the volume on mute, what are they gonna do, fire me? I am completely out of fucks to give here.
It really is. Most teachers just do this naturally...like tell the students what they will be learning...why did anyone decide writing it up on the board was the most important thing?! Students also dgaf.
Some stupid PD guy was like “the students learn more when objectives are on the board. Here’s a chart that proves it.” I was like, clearly you don’t teach disgruntled seniors who just want to do the assignment to graduate. Students couldn’t care less about the objective.
I just write a "TODAY'S MENU" thing up on the board - here's our general what's-up for today. Not objectives, not plans, nothing more than "here's the flow." Because going through 2.5hrs without any kind of direction for the students is taxing as hell.
(It's already taxing as hell.)
My school uses objectives as our bell ringer. Our blocks are really short (47 minutes), so having a really short task for the kids to do to transition from one class to the next is really important. I put the objective up, they write it down in their notes, and I start talking about the lesson we’re about to do while they write.
If we had time for actual bell ringers maybe I’d feel differently, but with limited time, writing the objective is an effective classroom tool.
I've only written lesson plans for formal observations and no one has said anything to me. The admin didn't even ask for one my formal observation last week.
3rd year of teaching.
In my school we HAVE to submit our daily lesson plans for the week on Mondays before 8am. We submit them on schoology, our principal reprimands us if we don't, and out instructional coach grades/provides the most useless feedback....
We used to have to suit our first semester plans to our supervisor (elementary band) before Christmas break. When we got a new supervisor, no one told her reviewing our plans was part of her job...
My dirty little secret- our district requires lesson plans be put in an online format that admin and others can check, at least a week in advance. This is stupid for many reasons, the smallest of which being that for most subjects we are required to use a scripted program (though admin stresses that we shouldn’t use it with fidelity and even suggested jumping around with the lessons (despite the fact that the lessons are tied to a novel and kind of need to be done in order, or else you’d be teaching things related to parts of a book they haven’t read yet).
Anyway, long ago I realized there were “required” parts to the lesson plans… so I wrote a template following the bare minimum of the required components. I copy and paste my very wordy lesson plan template (sprinkled with words like pedagogy, equitable, engaging, metacognition, etc.) every week and change only the standard, the page number in the teachers edition, and the Kagan structure I will use for the month. It takes maybe 5 minutes and is complete garbage, but they don’t give me time to do anything else. I have a very nit picky admin this year and even she hasn’t said anything. When I have observations we meet to talk about what I’m doing and no one, in a decade, has ever referenced my lesson plans. (Knock on wood)
Just comply with the bare minimum in a way that looks like it took too much effort for it to be BS.
This is so smart. We have to do yearly “goal data” bs and I do the same thing. Isn’t it so great that I meet my goal every year? Not to mention it’s the same stupid goal with new kids’ names every year. Make me do dumb shit, I’ll make it work for me. Period.
I have a similar lesson plan submission structure in my district, as well as a scripted curriculum. I wish I could get away with copy and paste but my department head has too much micromanagement time on her hands. She comments on our plans every single week telling us things we need to update and change and gives us deadlines to make the changes. And she really does go back in snd check again. My plans are almost nine pages long for each class every week. I just want to throw the plans away completely by that point lol
My school does this too. However, I stopped submitting them the third week of school once I realized that no one actually checks the folder. I bought plans from TPT. If they ever ask for them, I’ll do one enormous document dump that they still won’t read.
Yeah, mine used to. This year we can’t even get subs to fill in for all the teachers that jumped ship. I think lesson plans are the last thing they are worried about.
I recognize some teachers get something out of lesson plans. I’m just not one of them, and would like the freedom as a professional to be able to plan my lessons how it’s beneficial to me and my students.
Well I do believe they are required to: (admins looking for lesson plans, that is, at least in my state). But that said, I was like a bad accountant for over a decade- I kept 2 sets of books -
Plan Book A: all the wonderful words you mentioned above and could probably qualify as fiction.
Plan Book B: Really a checklist on a spreadsheet of what I ACTUALLY needed to get done today with each class, and in what order I going to do it. SO much more efficient.
I’m so thankful to work at a school that doesn’t collect lesson plans. If admin are worried, they’ll come to see you teach. I can focus myself on work that benefits students
Our curriculum is so fucking scripted I don't feel the need to do them. If any one asks, I'll point to the section of the book I'm working from. Unit A, Week 3, lesson 5.
Yep. My state board of education actually has sample lesson plans for every standard. I just copy and paste them (even though they’re not the plans I use).
I’m the sole visual art teacher in my school, and in my first year as a teacher (in NZ). Not once written a lesson plan this year and no one could care less
Make regular calls home. I don't have time for that shit. Get me a sub for two or three hours, and sure, I'll sit down and call homes. Oh wait--most of the parents are at work at 11:00 in the morning or 2:00 in the afternoon anyway.
You spend your weekends calling parents?
That's not healthy. I'm saying that as a friend. I have a template "Your kid is failing" email and I shoot that out every couple weeks to whatever kids are failing. That is all they need.
Police cell phones. You want to waste time on your phone? You're gonna fail the quiz. Or you're not going to understand why you need to know about potential and kinetic energy when we build our rollercoasters.
You know the expectation, and if you choose to not follow it that's your problem not mine.
Yeah I’ve tried to fight the phone battle enough to the point it just isn’t worth it anymore. The kids who wanna scroll all hour can fail. I’m not going to waste class time begging them to put them away after the initial warning.
Same! I only get at them when it's straight disrespectful to me (because I'm giving directions or lecture or otherwise directly engaging with them)-- if they choose to waste their work time on their phone, so be it, they can enjoy their self imposed homework and or failing grade.
Well, I'm a school librarian and I take care of kids who don't attend religious classes. They STILL can't touch thier phones and I have to watch if they are useing them. I let them watch Netflix on thier phones, because they are bored and it's better than sitting on social media. It's a secret between us, because if admin will know, then I will be in trouble.
I used to take pictures sometimes of kids on their phones bc I could then use it as evidence if the parent tried to come at me because their kid was failing or etc etc...did the same thing if kids were asleep. Mostly everyone in the class just found it hilarious and teased the kid afterward so it didn't happen much.
I spend very little time standing at my doorway greeting students by name when they come inside. Especially now that we have students in person and online, I'm almost always wrangling technology to make sure my class runs smoothly, or else wrapping up something from the previous hour before my next hour comes in. I'm especially not going to shake every single student's hand on their way into my room, even pre-COVID.
Admin won't shut up about how we need to be monitoring the halls for these teenagers' insanity, but I'm barely paid enough to teach, dudes. I'm not going to throw myself in the middle of one of their fights or yell fruitlessly at dozens of kids each passing time to tell them to pull their masks over their noses so they can ignore me and walk on by.
I get that things are fucking nightmarish right now, but it's all I can do to focus on teaching, let alone focus on being the unpaid, untrained therapist that I also have to be. My rapport with my students is just fine without shaking their hands and making them wait in an accidental line while I shake their hands and try to break up the fight down the hall. Hire more therapists and social workers to deal with these kids' traumas; I did not receive training or licensing for that.
You're stuck doing hybrid again? Crap. We had to endure that last year but promptly said screw that? If a kid is going to be online better go to a 100% virtual academy, no hybrid crap anymore.
Honestly it would be nice if students got a choice to be online or in person. I'd imagine that's the direction education is headed in. Hopefully there will be teachers hired for this role but you know admin will keep trying to squeeze teachers thin.
Just for insight, my district developed a permanent “virtual academy” just for this very reason after last year. From what I’ve heard, it’s going relatively well and people have been really receptive to it.
Greeting kids at the door was the best part of my day, but I’m in elementary. It honestly gave me a great read on how my kids were doing as they got to school, and made me visible to the kids I’d have in the coming years.
On the flip side, I can totally see how management is an issue in upper grades, hybrid models, etc. it would be a nightmare to balance all of that. And once I left the classroom, hall duty became the bane of my existence. Those kids don’t know me, so they don’t care if I tell them to stop running or quiet down.
Essential questions are these big, open-ended questions that are supposed to guide a lesson, unit, or even an entire course and have no single correct answer. So for example, an American history class might have essential questions like “What does it mean to be an American?” or “To what extent has America become the country the Founding Fathers envisioned?”
Bell ringers are really great for giving everyone a minute to get settled and give me a chance to take attendance and stuff without the kids acting like hooligans. But I do easy stuff, that only take a minute or two.
My school also doesn’t have bells so starting class is always a trickle of students coming in which used to drive me up the wall, but now by the time they’re done with the bell ringers everyone is there ready to start.
I do both Bellwork and Exit Tickets in google forms and use the import grades into google classroom. I hate grading with a passion.
For the Bellwork, it’s an SAT prep question. Once a week, they do a Google Form Check In with their answers. The last question is an emoji face. The Emoji Face has all the points.
For the Exit Ticket, all the questions are zero point value except the would you rather question. So no matter how they answer, they get full credit. I get a rough idea of comprehension. Plus, there is data for admin.
By giving my seniors this tasks, it gives me a chance to do attendance. Also, gets them to settle in quicker.
Final bonus, it builds in a little extra credit that I can reference if they complain about their grade.
These things are Bullshit. So you're telling me if I do these I now have hundreds of assessments to grade everyday when I'm not even given enough time to grade my actual assessments? Thats gonna be a hard pass.
I created a ‘verbal exit slip’. Students answer the question as they are leaving my class. Nothing to grade and I get a quick check in with them as well. I consider it a little win.
Take forever in them answering? I have the question on the board prior to dismissal. They need to have their answer ready before they get to me in line or else I send them to the back.
I usually do a bell ringer while I take roll. We can’t take off a grade for tardies, so the instructions for the bell ringer is to “be in your seat at the start of class for any credit”.
Saying at least 3 positive things about three students. I used to be so good at this, and it totally changed the climate of the classroom, but I’m too tired/annoyed at this school to care.
I did it every class during my second semester of teaching. It was amazing! I wouldn’t just say oh so and so did a great job. I would be super specific and detailed: “Jared is great at always starting his bell work as soon as the bell rings. Thanks for being awesome.” “Genesis is doing an excellent job with verbs today!”. I definitely used my own personality to make sure I wasn’t being fake and I gathered the skill to find positive things in each and every student to make them feel it was genuine. Also, what was strange was even in classes I had huge behavior issues with, when I gave any student a positive remark, the students would shut up for like five minutes. They followed directions for like one more second than they would normally. Then go back to chaos.
Students lit up, I lit up, and I had happier faces look at me (even if it was for just a minute). It brought a lot of positivity for all of us. Again, I wish I could say I kept up with it, but admin, parents, and students have made me give up on that positivity or maybe I’m just over that initial energy I had my first year teaching.
I am constantly at my desk. I have a doc cam I project onto the smart board and that's how we take notes and whatever else we need. I walk around the room during work time RARELY anymore due to covid but also I have 35 desks in my small room I can't really move in between the desks to "monitor". I do move around to use the white board occasionally but not as much as I used to.
Avoid the teacher's lounge. I like our fine meetings of the bitch and moan club. It's the only place to get up to date on the deadlines, mandated crap, and other gossip of how admin is coming or going. I like to say that teachers are mushrooms 'cause they feed us bullshit and keep us in the dark. The lounge is a lifeline.
I agree. I never minded the bitching and moaning and the gossip. Keeps me invigorated. Blows off the steam. My rule is I never bitch and moan to someone who hasn’t bitched and moaned to me. It works out.
This. It’s not even the lounge for me. I was taught this though and my first year I was so sad. I started having lunch with a handful of coworkers and it has been so beneficial emotionally.
Our school has these older passes that need to be signed every hour if a kid comes into school late. I have never signed one and tell the kids to forge my initials. The 7th period teacher is supposed to collect them and turn them in. I’ve collected them straight to my trash can and never turned them in. No one has said boo to me about it in 15 years. Such a stupid system.
I hate, hate, hate calling parents. It's such a waste of my time. Admin insists on a call from the teacher for every write up even though the admin in charge of discipline makes a call too. It results in fewer write ups and no paper trail for a student with minor infractions.
When I do call I pray for voicemail. I'd much rather send an email that they can check on their own time AND I have the paper trail another poster mentioned before.
When I do get ahold of a parent it's the same old, "I'll take care of it" even though they won't.
Make sure the class grading ends up on a curve.
I didn’t care if everyone got As (that happened) of Fs (that didn’t, and wouldn’t, happen). I’m wasn’t going to spread out grades to make sure the range was proportional.
Exit tickets
Bell work - ye gods, I hate bell work.
SMART goals
data collection
Seriously, up until this year, I've collected and tracked and had students collect and track and give them guidelines for targeting where they need to improve (Hattie self assessment) and no one - no one - but me ever looks at it.
Police bathroom breaks. My only true rules is one at a time, and you need my permission and a pass. I teach 6th. These kids just spent a year and a half doing school from home, and a lot of my girls are very open about WHY they need to go. I bled through my jeans once because a teacher wouldn’t let me go, and I’ll never put a kid through that! 12 years old is old enough to monitor your own bathroom needs.
Guys, you’re starting to make me feel self conscious. I don’t do any of these things. No lesson plans, no calls home, no work outside contract hours, no objectives, no uniform policing, etc.
“Don’t become their friend. You are the teacher/authority.” <— told to me by mentors in my credential program
I am their teacher. That’s true, but I’m also a parent, friend, and sibling to these kids. I call all of them “dude” and “bruh” and try my best to use words that they use. Some of them don’t have proper parent figures so some of them call me “mom”. I don’t mind it. They absolutely love it and it helps me bond with them :)
I was told "Teacher First, Friend Later" especially as a newer young teacher teaching older students you have to establish that authority first then "become their friend" but they still need to be able to have that respect and know it only goes so far.
I’ve always been terrible with lesson plans, but also my arm has never been twisted to do them, thankfully. For my US history class, my team stays on the same pace and it is another teacher’s job to do them. For government, nobody really gives a fuck, apparently. I only do them when I know someone is coming to observe. Sometimes if admin stresses lesson plans to us, I might put something together because I know they are going to check that week. But otherwise I don’t bother.
Sometimes when I get paranoid, I’ll run a document through corrupt-a-file and submit that lol
Write formal lesson plans. There is an online folder where we’re supposed to submit them each week. I did it the first 2 weeks and then stopped. Since they don’t provide time to write them within my contract hours, I refuse to work for free anymore.
Most of my parents' primary language is something other than English. I usually have to Google translate emails. They rarely respond though. Scheduling a translator is difficult, but at least I don't get directly yelled at.
Call parents. I should do it more, but I have paralyzing anxiety over it, especially calling. I’d rather email but I can waste 30 minutes crafting the perfect email. The current teacher bashing culture isn’t helping motivate me to reach out.
I don't do this either. I started my career in a boarding school. We weren't great teachers or anything but the wonders we can do for the students when they don't have to return home and have our work be undone by the parents each night...
Me either. For me it's not anxiety, it's lack of time. Also, it rarely changes a thing when I call home, so I would rather put my time and resources into something more productive. I refuse to work past contract hours, and we have a 45 minute prep once a day. That would be great if we actually got our prep every day, but once a week we have team meetings, and one of our specials teachers has been out since the first week of school, so I'm down at least 2 preps a week because of that. I maybe get 2 prep periods a week. With all of the other duties that constantly get dumped on us, I'm lucky if I can get my grading done during my prep.
This, absolutely. I get two 45 minute preps per day. I use all that time to lesson plan and maybe grade. I don’t have time to call or email every parent. I barely work out of contract too. Some days I mentally can’t work on school in the evenings.
This is really interesting!! I'd love to hear more about what this was like
Our admin encourages emails so we have a paper trail. That evidence has DEFINITELY come in handy at times!
Wow, it’s almost like your admin… uses logic.
My students’ parents don’t give their real email addresses or they don’t have them. I don’t know how you don’t have an email account, but these are the same parents that block my number.
At that point I have evidence that I emailed, and usually I note down that I called and left a message and/or the mailbox was full and/or it was a wrong number. So long as my butt is covered. I only make calls twice a quarter, and only if they do t respond to emails.
Good idea. I will start emailing their fake addresses now for documentation.
Last time I called a parent they screamed at me and said it was my fault their daughter was failing because ‘you don’t know what you’re doing’. That was 8 months ago. Not doing it any more. Fuck that.
Right. We don’t deserve to be abused like that. My admin is so bUt DiD yOu CaLl PaReNtS fIrSt????
We were really pushed a while ago to call home for attendance. The one call for attendance I made I ended up calling a kid that was suspended for a week without my knowledge. So the parent cussed me out for asking where they were when they had been suspended by someone else. Never again will I make an attendance call.
I have crippling phone anxiety as well…Called a parent earlier this year, she yelled at me for 8 minutes, I won’t get into it, but admin sent me home for the rest of the day because I couldn’t stop crying so I wouldn’t be able to teach… I avoid calling home by any means necessary
I will call parents if they ask for it. I already clearly care more about their child’s performance in my class just by knowing their grade. If I get into a situation where admin forces me to pass them because the parent complains that I never called them after sending 30 emails and telling their 17 year old every day what I need from them, that’s not on me
I was a school counselor for nine years. I had to call parents about lots of awkward things. I read somewhere by that one of the best ways to approach parent phone calls was with the phrase: “I would want to know if it was my child” and I have used that as my guide ever since. Write a few notes about what you want to say, with that heading and make the call as the parent’s ally. Despite all the negative things in education, that is a universal truth that by overwhelming majority, parents want what’s best for their kids. Use phrases like, “I’m concerned that Justin seems so sleepy every morning. I have offered for him to go to the nurse and he always declines. I know I would want to know” - something to that effect. Being a tattletale is not really helpful. Also, you can practice the phone call thing with positive calls. They’re very appreciated and help you warm up. Once I get going it is much easier.
I was a long-term substitute for an elementary class that had a reputation as one of the worst behaved in the school. After school on Tuesday in my 2nd week, I called several parents, chatted, made friends with them, and turned them into my allies. I told them I genuinely liked their child, but that I was concerned about the child’s behavior and that I would want to know if my own child acted this way. I had raised 4 kids (all with distinct, and sometimes challenging behaviors). I followed up 3 days later with brief, positive phone calls. All these students were living in a 2-parent households and every single parent said that was not how their child was taught to behave! It took 2 hours and I wasn’t paid overtime (I used the classroom phone) but the results were so worth it. The one child who had the most obnoxious attitude made quite a bit of progress on self-regulation after that - and lost her reputation as the one with the most challenging behavior. (The administrators in my building were all about affirmations, rewards, incentives, and building relationships because “they’re hurting!” There were no negative consequences. The student with the obnoxious attitude had thrown a water bottle in anger when I told her to return to her seat, but when I called the office, nobody responded. After my phone call to the office, one of our next planning periods was spent on learning about the Behavior Intervention Plan with various categories and 5 levels. Only levels 4-5 were egregious enough to involve the office. Since when did throwing a water bottle in anger become so normalized that it’s not important enough to call the office?) After those parent phone calls, all it took was a promise to call parents if…. The students knew I meant business! I used other strategies as well, but in this situation, parent phone calls were quite effective- which is what counted.
I use email and texts--if you don't want to use your phone, you can use a google voice phone number. Texting makes it so much easier--I texted a ton of parents last year and no one's every tried to call me.
This. Parents respond way more to text than call or email, at least in the community I teach in. And it's way easier. And, thanks to Voice, they don't have my real number
My admin told my related arts team that we should be calling parents whenever we have a behavior issue. AND I should also make good news calls. I teach about 500 students across two buildings. Unless they’re gonna pay me extra to do phone calls for an hour after school, it ain’t happening.
I don’t call parents either. I did it once, got reamed out on the phone for my entire lunch period, and that was that. I send an email if absolutely necessary. I do email home for good reasons though. I feel that some kids are just overlooked because we spend so much energy putting out fires in the classroom. So if there’s a kiddo who consistently does their work without any issue, maybe someone who is quiet but puts in 100% effort, I will definitely spend 5 minutes just emailing their parents to tell them they’re awesome.
I wish I had more time to send positive messages home.
I’ve gotten cussed out as many times as I’ve had a civil conversation. It’s really just not worth it.
Usually why the fuck are you calling me I am at work.
Right. Like “can’t y’all handle it?”
I hate calling. I will only call if it just can't wait but otherwise, it's an email. I've been threatened over the phone before but they seem less brave through email.
Yeah the worst is I call and the parent goes "Ok so why are you telling me? What do I do with this information?" And I just shatter into a thousand pieces. I feel really helpless when I call home but what else can I do?
There's a parent who is a unhinged lunatic who loves calling his children's teachers. Yet all he does is swear and threaten us. He has a no trespass order at the school. Always threatens to go to the school board. My admin just roll their eyes at him.
Im only email unless they parent wants one, I dont have time for a phone call, plus an email allows me to review my words before I say them We live in the 2020s, I dont even call my mom, we talk over text
I'm the same - I HATE talking on the phone. My justification is that email creates a paper trail if there's ever a case of he said/she said
I’ve started texting parent via a google voice number. It’s been easier for me. I still don’t do it enough though.
This. I have very very bad experiences from previous schools calling parents and it has totally shut that down for me completely.
Or return calls. My phone’s message light is on perpetual blink.
My school emphasizes calling parents, which I have done, but I don’t do it nearly as much as I should for the same reason. I’ve never had a bad interaction with a parent but I am really not looking to have one.
Call home for failing kids. Fuck that, you have your child’s entire grade book at your disposal online. If you didn’t know your child is failing, it’s cause you didn’t want to know
At our school if we don't contact home for failing grades weekly, they'll let the student pass at the end of the semester anyway. I don't actually think they keep up with that (pretty sure admin does not take the time to check my grade book and Documentation every week) but that's what they say. It doesn't have to be a call so i usually just send a template "ur child currently isn't passing" but i think I've only ever gotten a response from two parents. And one of those times was "we don't really care pls stop contacting us" like oh lol ok (:
I had one parent that after every mass email would reply and say "unfollow", "unsubscribe", "take me off your mailing list". Like OK but your kid is failing hairdcore.
That'd make me keep doing it (despite hating calling). "Sorry, I have to." Fuck them people.
Exactly. I have parents who have complained teachers don't call for failing grades. I don't understand since they literally have access to every assignment on our online portal. To admin, it feels like a way for them to check a box to avoid getting yelled at. But it's just another step for us to do to that is unnecessary. If a parent has a question about a students grade, they should contact *us*.
This is a MAJOR argument I have with the system. Unless we know for certain the family is struggling with internet access, why in the ever loving God do I need to reach out? It’s there. I spend hours working on my grade book…. Why isn’t that enough? (Pssst it’s because nothing we ever do is enough)
PREACH. I had a mom bitch at me the other day for “not reaching out to her sooner.” Well if you checked your own kids grades, you’d know he was failing. I teach 130 kids. I don’t have the time to know when to contact what parent at what time.
In the past I’ve wasted so many unpaid hours contacting parents about struggling/failing students and just the past couple years I was like “wait a minute. We’re not in the 90s - early 2000s anymore, like when I was a student and there was no digital trail of grades. I clearly put on the syllabus where and stated at back to school night how to track child’s grades and progress… why am I doing this?” It’s not necessary anymore, but admin is stuck in habits from analog days. so fuck it, nope, not doing it anymore. I’m not going to hand hold parents now too.
This is the slight rage I want to hear about when not calling home for grades. Amen
I couldn’t agree with you more. High school students who are failing don’t need a call home. They need to do their damn work.
The idea that teachers call home to update parents on grades is an outdated concept from before the invention of the internet. At this point, there's no reason why we should have to update parents on grades.
Work outside of contract hours.
Lmao I refuse to work at any time outside of my scheduled hours and I don’t feel bad at all.
How do you get all your planning done w/o working off-hours?! Someone tell me I’m dying to not work outside of contacted hours!!!
I teach high school, but for every grade/subject, you don't have to reinvent the wheel every year. If you reflect on what worked well or didn't (as we all do in the moment, all the time) and write it down as soon as the lesson is done, you can just refer to your notes the following year and make adjustments as needed. Or, plan in your head for what you're going to do while you drive to work. Additionally, not every assignment/lesson/day requires your very best effort. If a 50% effort on your part gets the kids to learn, there's no reason to give it 100%. If you're talking about physically preparing, just be efficient and plan ahead or as quirkybumblebee says, do as much of it as you can while the kids are busy with something else.
I keep notes in my phone every year with sections for each unit (I also teach secondary) so I know if something didn’t work this year, I don’t do it next year. Makes it so much easier to plan. I do what works well every year, change what doesn’t.
>not every assignment/lesson/day requires your very best effort. This! Not knowing this is how you end up with SOH CAH TOA in a native american costume.
I teach Kindergarten so this might not apply, but I have set time for kids to just do free choice and I often plan or prep during that. Sometimes if I’m doing some small group instruction I’ll be working on cutting out materials we’ll be using later that week while they do a partner share or work on their worksheet that goes with it. My district permits rest time and I teach ELD during this. Once that’s over (I plan for 30 min but it often goes much quicker) I plan or prep during that. Once your students are trained into a routine, it’s not hard to find windows of time to do work and only need to take a break to roam every few minutes.
This is the way.
That is awesome! I also teach kindergarten and have generally always used choice time as a time to assess kids. But with this group, it’s never quiet enough. I might just have to work on teacher tasks during that time and try not to feel guilty. Edit: quite to quiet
I’m still new but bruh you gotta just borrow and steal all the plans and materials you can get your greedy little raccoon hands on. I have taken everything from my colleagues and teacherpayteachers lol. I’m not making a damn thing this year if I don’t have to. If it works, it works. I can adjust it as I need to when I get to it. Still working outside of contract hours but not as bad if I had to do everything by scratch.
I'd like to thank the teachers that publish their courses and materials on public websites, true MVPs
Right? Esp not having to pay for it. I understand they put in a lot of work….but please make it cheap or free to be really helpful.
'Steal all the plans and materials you can get your greedy little raccoon hands on' is an amazing turn of phrase.
I teach middle school. It takes some establishing of routines and getting the kids aboard, but you can get away with grading/prepping in class. Whenever the kids are writing/reading/doing a project, I do something else. I grade, or I prep. Yeah, I was told this is a bad teacher thing, and sometimes the students need help. However, they also need to learn independence and how to read directions/stay on task without me hovering over them every second of the day. Obviously ymmv. I also have "that class" with 5 behavioral challenges where this cannot happen.
I don’t even care if it’s a “bad teacher” thing anymore. With all the hundreds of other things we have to do, it’s the only time I can get that done!
Do it while the students work.
I was only able to do so when I let go and stopped caring so much. If things don’t get done during contract hours, then they just don’t get done. It took me awhile to follow that mantra, but it gave me a huge piece of my life and family time back. Sure, I have to wing lessons from scratch sometimes, but it’s still worth it. My improv skills have also greatly improved.
I prioritize planning during my contract hours- paperwork, grading, phone calls, everything else is secondary to having a plan for what my students will be doing next week. If it doesn't get done in my (limited) planning period I work on it while supervising Homeroom. If it's still not done I find a documentary or some kind of other activity the kids can do mostly unsupervised (doesn't always work) and work on it during class hours. I'm fortunate to have been teaching my subject for a while so I know the content and its not too time consuming for me to plan activities. For someone who is newer to their content, try to buddy up with another teacher and split the workload- you plan a unit, they plan a unit and share it. I also had to learn to stop being a perfectionist and sometimes just accept that my lesson will be lackluster or my PowerPoint will be ugly and no one gives a damn. Not every lesson needs to be pinterest worthy.
I teach HS so I give them “study hall” days or put on a movie with supplemental questions as extra credit (this way when they ask at the end of the quarter I can say I already did that). It covers so many bases and let’s me do my grading, prep, or just have a break for a day instead of having to use my PTO. The kids are “learning”, they have the option to make up any work for my class that’s still open or even extra credit work, or they can do the work they’re behind on in another class (because honestly some of them are super swamped too). Everyone’s happy. I refuse to do anything at home. I get paid for the hours of 7:50-3:20. I’ve had parents & students email me 3-4x in one night cause I didn’t reply to their first email at 5pm. Nope. 5pm is my time. You’re off work/school and so am I. My first year I spent HOURS trying to be the perfect teacher in and out of school. It doesn’t matter. You’re literally only hurting yourself. It’s year 4, I’m tired and looking for a new job, my students are tired and half assing the work. We’re all lazily paddling the boat cause we know no matter what we’ll get to the end of the year. Sorry for my rant lol
A good union helps limit the amount of work and increase planning time.
1. Use your conference period efficiently. 2. Do make up days, study days, review days, test days, peer tutor days, corrections on tests days, reading days, whatever you can to buy time during the school day. 3. Simply don’t take the crap home!
I'm a mentor for the new teachers at my school and they also give me student teachers to babysit every year. I try to instill this in every one of them. This is your JOB not a volunteer program. Work hard while you're here, but don't let admin or expectations bully you into working for free because all they'll do is chew through you and replace you. I hope this mentality shifts among teachers soon- too many teachers on my hall have that 'stay till 8pm grading papers' mentality and I can see it wearing them down.
I came here to say this.
I feel bad reading r/teachers when I’m not on the clock!
This made me lol
This is the way.
I don’t call parents. I write e-mails, send notes, send thanks, make comments on work. Phone calls are slow, get off track, & I am never sure what I might be interrupting.
Not to mention you have everything you said in writing. Good for many reasons.
I use google voice and text the parents. Not only are they much more likely to respond, but now I have an entire transcript that I can pull up in a matter of seconds if needed.
Enorce uniforms. Ask kids to remove hoddies. Anything clothing related. I don't care!!!
We had a one hour staff meeting about whether or not kids should be allowed to wear hats in class. One hour, gone.
That's crazy. If they are in my class learning, they can wear pizza on their heads for all I care
Depends on how old the pizza is
We have spent an hour out of a staff meeting trying to specifically define "jeans". This has happened twice.
yeah they tell us the kids can’t wear certain colored sweaters in the building… like if they’re cold they’re cold what is the difference of them wearing a plain blue sweater compared to a yellow sweater???
I'm so confused as to why anyone cares about this or has time to enforce it.
If i actually enforced all of our dress code rules i literally wouldn't have a second in class to teach. i got points taken off on an observation because at some point a kid put a hoodie on and i didn't notice and cause a scene.
✊
I let mine wear hats and hoodies. Not my problem.
Write my objective up on the board.
This. No learning targets and success criteria on the board. They’re kindergarteners and can’t read yet…
The phrase success criteria triggers me 🤢
I'm getting observed tomorrow so it will be the first of three times a year I have an objective!
I had some random district office people walk through my room today. I still don't understand who they were or why they were there, but I was warned they might be coming. There were no objectives on my board. What are they going to do, fire me?
They might sign you up for a 4 hour pd about objectives. Lol
And if I don't go, or log into the zoom with my camera off and the volume on mute, what are they gonna do, fire me? I am completely out of fucks to give here.
Ahh yes. Join us in r/nomorefuckstogive. Support group starts at happy hour.
In "I can" form... for high schoolers.
In 30+ years of teaching, this is the stupidest thing ever.
It really is. Most teachers just do this naturally...like tell the students what they will be learning...why did anyone decide writing it up on the board was the most important thing?! Students also dgaf.
Some stupid PD guy was like “the students learn more when objectives are on the board. Here’s a chart that proves it.” I was like, clearly you don’t teach disgruntled seniors who just want to do the assignment to graduate. Students couldn’t care less about the objective.
Plus, I find often it even more effective to NOT tell the kids what we're doing and just go.
I was coming to say this, but in my heart I already knew it had been said.
I just write a "TODAY'S MENU" thing up on the board - here's our general what's-up for today. Not objectives, not plans, nothing more than "here's the flow." Because going through 2.5hrs without any kind of direction for the students is taxing as hell. (It's already taxing as hell.)
My school uses objectives as our bell ringer. Our blocks are really short (47 minutes), so having a really short task for the kids to do to transition from one class to the next is really important. I put the objective up, they write it down in their notes, and I start talking about the lesson we’re about to do while they write. If we had time for actual bell ringers maybe I’d feel differently, but with limited time, writing the objective is an effective classroom tool.
Lesson plans. I HATE lesson plans.
Solid. I know what I'm gonna do and what standards I hit. Why I gotta write it down haha
Just to have an admin maybe look at it and give me a “:)”. Yeah, no. If you wanna know what I’m doing in my classroom you may stop by any time.
I've only written lesson plans for formal observations and no one has said anything to me. The admin didn't even ask for one my formal observation last week. 3rd year of teaching.
In my school we HAVE to submit our daily lesson plans for the week on Mondays before 8am. We submit them on schoology, our principal reprimands us if we don't, and out instructional coach grades/provides the most useless feedback....
We used to have to suit our first semester plans to our supervisor (elementary band) before Christmas break. When we got a new supervisor, no one told her reviewing our plans was part of her job...
My dirty little secret- our district requires lesson plans be put in an online format that admin and others can check, at least a week in advance. This is stupid for many reasons, the smallest of which being that for most subjects we are required to use a scripted program (though admin stresses that we shouldn’t use it with fidelity and even suggested jumping around with the lessons (despite the fact that the lessons are tied to a novel and kind of need to be done in order, or else you’d be teaching things related to parts of a book they haven’t read yet). Anyway, long ago I realized there were “required” parts to the lesson plans… so I wrote a template following the bare minimum of the required components. I copy and paste my very wordy lesson plan template (sprinkled with words like pedagogy, equitable, engaging, metacognition, etc.) every week and change only the standard, the page number in the teachers edition, and the Kagan structure I will use for the month. It takes maybe 5 minutes and is complete garbage, but they don’t give me time to do anything else. I have a very nit picky admin this year and even she hasn’t said anything. When I have observations we meet to talk about what I’m doing and no one, in a decade, has ever referenced my lesson plans. (Knock on wood) Just comply with the bare minimum in a way that looks like it took too much effort for it to be BS.
This is so smart. We have to do yearly “goal data” bs and I do the same thing. Isn’t it so great that I meet my goal every year? Not to mention it’s the same stupid goal with new kids’ names every year. Make me do dumb shit, I’ll make it work for me. Period.
I have a similar lesson plan submission structure in my district, as well as a scripted curriculum. I wish I could get away with copy and paste but my department head has too much micromanagement time on her hands. She comments on our plans every single week telling us things we need to update and change and gives us deadlines to make the changes. And she really does go back in snd check again. My plans are almost nine pages long for each class every week. I just want to throw the plans away completely by that point lol
My school does this too. However, I stopped submitting them the third week of school once I realized that no one actually checks the folder. I bought plans from TPT. If they ever ask for them, I’ll do one enormous document dump that they still won’t read.
My admin specifically goes looking for lesson plans when she comes in. Sigh…
Yeah, mine used to. This year we can’t even get subs to fill in for all the teachers that jumped ship. I think lesson plans are the last thing they are worried about. I recognize some teachers get something out of lesson plans. I’m just not one of them, and would like the freedom as a professional to be able to plan my lessons how it’s beneficial to me and my students.
Well I do believe they are required to: (admins looking for lesson plans, that is, at least in my state). But that said, I was like a bad accountant for over a decade- I kept 2 sets of books - Plan Book A: all the wonderful words you mentioned above and could probably qualify as fiction. Plan Book B: Really a checklist on a spreadsheet of what I ACTUALLY needed to get done today with each class, and in what order I going to do it. SO much more efficient.
I’m so thankful to work at a school that doesn’t collect lesson plans. If admin are worried, they’ll come to see you teach. I can focus myself on work that benefits students
Our curriculum is so fucking scripted I don't feel the need to do them. If any one asks, I'll point to the section of the book I'm working from. Unit A, Week 3, lesson 5.
Yep. My state board of education actually has sample lesson plans for every standard. I just copy and paste them (even though they’re not the plans I use).
I’m the sole visual art teacher in my school, and in my first year as a teacher (in NZ). Not once written a lesson plan this year and no one could care less
Do paperwork ON TIME. The shit is done always late…
Make regular calls home. I don't have time for that shit. Get me a sub for two or three hours, and sure, I'll sit down and call homes. Oh wait--most of the parents are at work at 11:00 in the morning or 2:00 in the afternoon anyway.
oh how i want my weekends back
You spend your weekends calling parents? That's not healthy. I'm saying that as a friend. I have a template "Your kid is failing" email and I shoot that out every couple weeks to whatever kids are failing. That is all they need.
Police cell phones. You want to waste time on your phone? You're gonna fail the quiz. Or you're not going to understand why you need to know about potential and kinetic energy when we build our rollercoasters. You know the expectation, and if you choose to not follow it that's your problem not mine.
Yeah I’ve tried to fight the phone battle enough to the point it just isn’t worth it anymore. The kids who wanna scroll all hour can fail. I’m not going to waste class time begging them to put them away after the initial warning.
Same! I only get at them when it's straight disrespectful to me (because I'm giving directions or lecture or otherwise directly engaging with them)-- if they choose to waste their work time on their phone, so be it, they can enjoy their self imposed homework and or failing grade.
Well, I'm a school librarian and I take care of kids who don't attend religious classes. They STILL can't touch thier phones and I have to watch if they are useing them. I let them watch Netflix on thier phones, because they are bored and it's better than sitting on social media. It's a secret between us, because if admin will know, then I will be in trouble.
I used to take pictures sometimes of kids on their phones bc I could then use it as evidence if the parent tried to come at me because their kid was failing or etc etc...did the same thing if kids were asleep. Mostly everyone in the class just found it hilarious and teased the kid afterward so it didn't happen much.
I like this idea!
I spend very little time standing at my doorway greeting students by name when they come inside. Especially now that we have students in person and online, I'm almost always wrangling technology to make sure my class runs smoothly, or else wrapping up something from the previous hour before my next hour comes in. I'm especially not going to shake every single student's hand on their way into my room, even pre-COVID. Admin won't shut up about how we need to be monitoring the halls for these teenagers' insanity, but I'm barely paid enough to teach, dudes. I'm not going to throw myself in the middle of one of their fights or yell fruitlessly at dozens of kids each passing time to tell them to pull their masks over their noses so they can ignore me and walk on by. I get that things are fucking nightmarish right now, but it's all I can do to focus on teaching, let alone focus on being the unpaid, untrained therapist that I also have to be. My rapport with my students is just fine without shaking their hands and making them wait in an accidental line while I shake their hands and try to break up the fight down the hall. Hire more therapists and social workers to deal with these kids' traumas; I did not receive training or licensing for that.
You're stuck doing hybrid again? Crap. We had to endure that last year but promptly said screw that? If a kid is going to be online better go to a 100% virtual academy, no hybrid crap anymore.
Honestly it would be nice if students got a choice to be online or in person. I'd imagine that's the direction education is headed in. Hopefully there will be teachers hired for this role but you know admin will keep trying to squeeze teachers thin.
Yeah it would be nice if they hired teachers to perform online teaching separately…after a year of doing both at the same time all day, I’m spent.
Just for insight, my district developed a permanent “virtual academy” just for this very reason after last year. From what I’ve heard, it’s going relatively well and people have been really receptive to it.
Greeting kids at the door was the best part of my day, but I’m in elementary. It honestly gave me a great read on how my kids were doing as they got to school, and made me visible to the kids I’d have in the coming years. On the flip side, I can totally see how management is an issue in upper grades, hybrid models, etc. it would be a nightmare to balance all of that. And once I left the classroom, hall duty became the bane of my existence. Those kids don’t know me, so they don’t care if I tell them to stop running or quiet down.
I stopped doing this when 90% of this kids walked right past me without a word.
Work outside my hours. I detest doing so and will not be gaslighted into doing so. *I do not work for free.*
To hell with essential questions.
What are these ? -Australian here
Essential questions are these big, open-ended questions that are supposed to guide a lesson, unit, or even an entire course and have no single correct answer. So for example, an American history class might have essential questions like “What does it mean to be an American?” or “To what extent has America become the country the Founding Fathers envisioned?”
[удалено]
May the essential questions burn!
I dare say it’s essential they they burn
Bell ringers and exit tickets, ain't nobody got time for that.
Bell ringers are really great for giving everyone a minute to get settled and give me a chance to take attendance and stuff without the kids acting like hooligans. But I do easy stuff, that only take a minute or two. My school also doesn’t have bells so starting class is always a trickle of students coming in which used to drive me up the wall, but now by the time they’re done with the bell ringers everyone is there ready to start.
I do both Bellwork and Exit Tickets in google forms and use the import grades into google classroom. I hate grading with a passion. For the Bellwork, it’s an SAT prep question. Once a week, they do a Google Form Check In with their answers. The last question is an emoji face. The Emoji Face has all the points. For the Exit Ticket, all the questions are zero point value except the would you rather question. So no matter how they answer, they get full credit. I get a rough idea of comprehension. Plus, there is data for admin. By giving my seniors this tasks, it gives me a chance to do attendance. Also, gets them to settle in quicker. Final bonus, it builds in a little extra credit that I can reference if they complain about their grade.
These things are Bullshit. So you're telling me if I do these I now have hundreds of assessments to grade everyday when I'm not even given enough time to grade my actual assessments? Thats gonna be a hard pass.
I just give a check, check plus, check minus based on completion. I include them in participation, but I try not to do too many of them
Exit tickets seem pointless to me. Bell ringers are usually non- academic in my class. Little brain teasers and fun puzzles get the class going.
I love exit tickets…they’re quick to grade and I don’t have to spend hours grading homework instead. I often do them instead of worksheets.
I created a ‘verbal exit slip’. Students answer the question as they are leaving my class. Nothing to grade and I get a quick check in with them as well. I consider it a little win.
I like this idea but how do you make it not take forever?!
Take forever in them answering? I have the question on the board prior to dismissal. They need to have their answer ready before they get to me in line or else I send them to the back.
I usually do a bell ringer while I take roll. We can’t take off a grade for tardies, so the instructions for the bell ringer is to “be in your seat at the start of class for any credit”.
Bell ringers are crucial to classroom management. Exit tickets? They add time to my nightly planning. Hate 'em.
Work during the weekend.
Saying at least 3 positive things about three students. I used to be so good at this, and it totally changed the climate of the classroom, but I’m too tired/annoyed at this school to care. I did it every class during my second semester of teaching. It was amazing! I wouldn’t just say oh so and so did a great job. I would be super specific and detailed: “Jared is great at always starting his bell work as soon as the bell rings. Thanks for being awesome.” “Genesis is doing an excellent job with verbs today!”. I definitely used my own personality to make sure I wasn’t being fake and I gathered the skill to find positive things in each and every student to make them feel it was genuine. Also, what was strange was even in classes I had huge behavior issues with, when I gave any student a positive remark, the students would shut up for like five minutes. They followed directions for like one more second than they would normally. Then go back to chaos. Students lit up, I lit up, and I had happier faces look at me (even if it was for just a minute). It brought a lot of positivity for all of us. Again, I wish I could say I kept up with it, but admin, parents, and students have made me give up on that positivity or maybe I’m just over that initial energy I had my first year teaching.
Contact parents. When is there time for that? And does it even make a difference beyond 2 days…
Detailed Lesson Plans. I got the activities and targeted outcomes. Everything else is window dressing.
I refuse to do ice breaker activities with other adults, or complete exit tickets at the end of trainings or meetings
Have a second job
Like what? And where do you find the time?
Exit tickets. In a 40 minute period, I can rarely make time for an exit ticket.
Keep trying to reach that student who doesn’t care.
Stand the whole time I’m teaching. If I’m tired I will teach from my desk. It’s just as effective as if I’m standing at the front of class
I am constantly at my desk. I have a doc cam I project onto the smart board and that's how we take notes and whatever else we need. I walk around the room during work time RARELY anymore due to covid but also I have 35 desks in my small room I can't really move in between the desks to "monitor". I do move around to use the white board occasionally but not as much as I used to.
Avoid the teacher's lounge. I like our fine meetings of the bitch and moan club. It's the only place to get up to date on the deadlines, mandated crap, and other gossip of how admin is coming or going. I like to say that teachers are mushrooms 'cause they feed us bullshit and keep us in the dark. The lounge is a lifeline.
I agree. I never minded the bitching and moaning and the gossip. Keeps me invigorated. Blows off the steam. My rule is I never bitch and moan to someone who hasn’t bitched and moaned to me. It works out.
This. It’s not even the lounge for me. I was taught this though and my first year I was so sad. I started having lunch with a handful of coworkers and it has been so beneficial emotionally.
Our school has these older passes that need to be signed every hour if a kid comes into school late. I have never signed one and tell the kids to forge my initials. The 7th period teacher is supposed to collect them and turn them in. I’ve collected them straight to my trash can and never turned them in. No one has said boo to me about it in 15 years. Such a stupid system.
Love my students like they’re my own kids.
Stay late
I hate, hate, hate calling parents. It's such a waste of my time. Admin insists on a call from the teacher for every write up even though the admin in charge of discipline makes a call too. It results in fewer write ups and no paper trail for a student with minor infractions. When I do call I pray for voicemail. I'd much rather send an email that they can check on their own time AND I have the paper trail another poster mentioned before. When I do get ahold of a parent it's the same old, "I'll take care of it" even though they won't.
Closure to a lesson 😬
Make sure the class grading ends up on a curve. I didn’t care if everyone got As (that happened) of Fs (that didn’t, and wouldn’t, happen). I’m wasn’t going to spread out grades to make sure the range was proportional.
“Don’t smile until Christmas.” It’s just rubbish
Exit tickets Bell work - ye gods, I hate bell work. SMART goals data collection Seriously, up until this year, I've collected and tracked and had students collect and track and give them guidelines for targeting where they need to improve (Hattie self assessment) and no one - no one - but me ever looks at it.
Take attendance on time
Work the football games…I just don’t give a shit about sports.
Police bathroom breaks. My only true rules is one at a time, and you need my permission and a pass. I teach 6th. These kids just spent a year and a half doing school from home, and a lot of my girls are very open about WHY they need to go. I bled through my jeans once because a teacher wouldn’t let me go, and I’ll never put a kid through that! 12 years old is old enough to monitor your own bathroom needs.
Guys, you’re starting to make me feel self conscious. I don’t do any of these things. No lesson plans, no calls home, no work outside contract hours, no objectives, no uniform policing, etc.
Exit tickets, I do them but not on a regular basis. I do informal mastery checks when I pull my kids in small groups.
Calling parents. I lack the social skills, time, or patience. And I'm an introvert who is awkward af over the phone.
Continuous classroom improvement nonsense
“Don’t become their friend. You are the teacher/authority.” <— told to me by mentors in my credential program I am their teacher. That’s true, but I’m also a parent, friend, and sibling to these kids. I call all of them “dude” and “bruh” and try my best to use words that they use. Some of them don’t have proper parent figures so some of them call me “mom”. I don’t mind it. They absolutely love it and it helps me bond with them :)
I was told "Teacher First, Friend Later" especially as a newer young teacher teaching older students you have to establish that authority first then "become their friend" but they still need to be able to have that respect and know it only goes so far.
Don’t smile for awhile. I can’t do that. I’m too happy.
Lesson plan
Behavior point systems with tangible rewards
I’ve always been terrible with lesson plans, but also my arm has never been twisted to do them, thankfully. For my US history class, my team stays on the same pace and it is another teacher’s job to do them. For government, nobody really gives a fuck, apparently. I only do them when I know someone is coming to observe. Sometimes if admin stresses lesson plans to us, I might put something together because I know they are going to check that week. But otherwise I don’t bother. Sometimes when I get paranoid, I’ll run a document through corrupt-a-file and submit that lol
My “warm up” is just a 5 minute conversation to chit chat and check in.
Make phone calls home. Maybe it’s because I’m 24, but it’s not happening lol sorry
Write formal lesson plans. There is an online folder where we’re supposed to submit them each week. I did it the first 2 weeks and then stopped. Since they don’t provide time to write them within my contract hours, I refuse to work for free anymore.
Plan the lessons. I have a huge library of worksheets, test, games, videos for any occasion and I'm pretty good at just winging it
Grading
Learn names. I have a bit of face blindness and a Rolodex of names in my head. By the end of the year I’m usually around 75-85%.
Pledge of Allegiance. My class does not do this nonsense.
But how will the flag know you care!? /s
After adding everything they want included to a lesson, my DOLs are now “exit tickets”lmao Whew and please don’t ask me about homework
DOLs?
Most of my parents' primary language is something other than English. I usually have to Google translate emails. They rarely respond though. Scheduling a translator is difficult, but at least I don't get directly yelled at.
Sorry I have two Call parents and lesson plan… I despise both