This Friday is notoriously the most difficult day to teach all year…

Why?

It’s HALLOWEEN!

And, it’s on a Friday this year!

As always the best approach is to be proactive. If you want to have a good Halloween with your students then you better have something fun planned. However, that doesn’t mean it can’t be educational as well. For example, since I teach U.S. History I usually do something involving the Salem Witch Trials.

If you’re looking for Halloween activities that are both fun AND educational then check out this site: www.Kids-Halloween-Activities.com

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Teaching doesn’t necessarily get easier. In fact, I would say that this year is my toughest year teaching.

Why?

It’s not the kids…it’s my working conditions. Over the past four years I have seen my working condition deteriorate…my work hours have increased, my planning time has decreased, the number of students I have has increased, the number of classes I teach has increased, and this year my pay has actually decreased. Yes, you read that right…I am actually making less money this year than I did last year.

I can go on and on, but as you can imagine this “chipping away” of the teacher’s working conditions takes its toll.

Then the other day I got an email from a former student I taught just a couple of years ago. The email was a nice reminder of why I do what I do…why I continue to teach…

I pasted the email below. It’s from a boy named Carlos (I left out his last name for privacy). Carlos was an ESOL student who started my class roughly half way through the first quarter.

I posted his email below not to toot my own horn, but rather as a friendly reminder of how important a teacher’s job really is. I will continue to teach the best way I know how despite the deterioration of our working conditions because the fact of the matter is…I make a difference.

To all the teachers out there who are making a difference in the lives of their students everyday I say Thank You!

Here’s the email from Carlos:

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Start email
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Dear Mr. Waxler,

I recently got a hold on your email. I was looking through some old papers and up came your name. It may be hard to remember, but i was one of your U.S history students. My name is [name removed], but everyone just called me Carlos. I went to Haile middle in 2006 when I was in eighth grade. I just wanted to let you know that I truly enjoyed your class and the best part about it is that I learned more in that class than I have in my current history classes. I can honestly say that I consider you to be THE best teacher that I have had. All the knowledge that I acquired during that class definitely helped me my freshman year. Now I am a sophomore and I am very grateful for your hard dedication to teaching. Thank you and keep up the good work.

Your former student,
[name removed]

P.S: Don’t worry if you don’t remember me.

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end email
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Here’s a great teaching strategy you can use to activate and build upon background knowledge at the beginning of a new unit of study.

It’s called: “List-Group-Label”

The steps are quite simple:

1. At the beginning of a new unit have each student generate a list of words/phrases/names that they would associate with the new topic.

2. Next, put students into groups and have them combine their individual lists.

3. Next, have students group their words/phrases/names into categories.

4. Finally, have students label the categories.

For example, I may tell my students to create a list of everything they can think of related to the topic of the American Revolution. Next, I put students into groups and they start combining lists, grouping words/phrases/names into categories, and then label their categories.

Students usually come up with categories such as Causes of the Revolution, Effects of the Revolution, Major Battles, Important Events, Famous People, and Famous Quotes. Each category has items from their various lists written under it.

This activity works great to not only tap into and build upon prior knowledge, but it also effectively sparks the students’ interest in the new topic.

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Are you looking for more teaching strategies?

For more effective teaching strategies that you can start applying to your very next class make sure read eTeach: A Teacher Resource for Learning the Strategies of Master Teachers @ www.TeachingTeacher.com

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Are you still having trouble getting students to complete their homework?

Personally, I am always looking for new ways to improve the percentage of students who complete their homework.

Here’s something one of my colleagues recently told me about…

When students do not complete the homework they must fill out a “Homework Responsibility Card”.

The card is quite simple and may look something like this:

**********
Today’s Date:

Student Signature:
**********

Cards are available as soon as students walk into the classroom. Any student who did not complete the homework must fill out a card.

This way every student is handing in something. The teacher is either collecting the homework or is collecting the “homework responsibility card”.

The homework responsibility card works well for several reasons:

1. Students do not want to fill out the card…so to some extent it works as a minor punishment.

2. Students are forced to actually think about why they did not do the homework.

3. By having students sign the card they are accepting responsibility of their actions.

4. The teacher has a copy of student excuses that can be used during parent-teacher conferences.

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Are you still having problems getting your students to complete homework?

For more homework strategies that you can start applying to your very next class make sure read eTeach: A Teacher Resource for Learning the Strategies of Master Teachers @ www.TeachingTeacher.com

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