New Year's Resolutions

During this forthcoming school year, I will be a better teacher. Like George Foreman used to say when he was a Meineke muffler pitchman, “I guar-an-tee it.” A Teach For America teacher told me last year that he’d never heard someone lament, “My first year went great, but my second year was a nightmare.” Humans—intelligent ones, anyway-- learn from mistakes. So what mistakes did I make during my first year of teaching that I plan to rectify this year? Here are just a handful.

1. Raise your hands before speaking! I was a bit lax on this after I found the policy difficult to enforce. Big mistake. At times last year my insistence on students raising their hands rubbed my students the wrong way. I won’t care this year. Raising hands is necessary for my classroom to function the way I want it, so raise your damn hand.

2. You waste my time, I will waste yours—but not in a way that makes me waste even more of mine. Detentions stink because you have to serve them along with the chuckleheads who are fooling around in your class. I plan to hold them, because they are a necessary evil, but I will only hold them once a week. If you can’t make it, sorry, that is four demerits. Don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time.

3. Bi-monthly Shout-Out becomes Students of the Month. I had planned to pick one student from each class to praise twice a month. Not a bad idea, but I found this to be one extra thing to worry about. This year, I’ll make it once a month, and be more consistent in my application.

4. Start tutorials sooner in the year. Some kids are so far behind, they may never pass the state test. I need to identify this struggling readers and start working with them ASAP. They may not want the extra help. If this is the case, I need to scare their parents into letting them stay after to get this help.

Next year will be better. These are four ways I plan to make it happen.