Saving The Golden Goose: Where True Gold Lies
growkit golden teacher Everyone knows by the time they're in 3rd grade that it's teacher's pet who has the honor of cleaning the erasers, wiping down the blackboard, and replacing stubs with fresh, long white pieces of chock that felt amazingly smooth as your fingers slid lightly over their cool hardness as you placed them neatly in the chock tray. Mrs. Conroy smiled at me as she arranged the pages of each student's best cursive writing on the bulletin boards flanking both sides of the clean blackboard. We had everything in place for tomorrow. It would be a great day. And I was, indeed, a good girl who had learned the hard way to wiggle her toes a few months ago with the encouragement of the physical therapy heroes.
golden teacher growkit Frindle, Andrew Clements:Nick Allen once again gets his teacher upset and she assigns him to do an extra report on how new words are added to the dictionary. Suddenly this triggers the best idea ever for Nick. He coins his own new word "frindle." His new word annoys his teacher mightily. The war of words escalates--resulting in after-school detention, a home visit from the principal, national publicity, even money-making for local entrepreneurs, and, finally, the addition of frindle in the dictionary. Amazing!
golden teacher golden teacher Often, students in difficult classes receive little or no praise at school and often not at home. A little praise goes a long way. Any progress the class or students make should be praised either publicly or one on one, depending on the student and the situation. Offer rewards for goals achieved, good efforts by the class or individual. These rewards might be as simple as a sticker or a stamp or a lolly. Your class circumstances will help decide.
golden teacher So, I've been on a journey of learning to listen to myself at a deeper level. And, I invite you to join me on this journey, too. I want to share four of the ways I've been deepening my ability to listen to my self. And, conveniently, they spell S.E.L.F...
golden teacher growkit It was 1997. Some college friends from Newburyport, MA invited me up to relax and take a break from my loss. I went. They asked if I wanted to see a movie, and I said "sure, why not". We drove to New Hampshire as they wanted to see a new Jack Nicholson movie "As Good As It Gets". I enjoy his movies so figured I would at least be entertained, in spite of the depression and continued writers block I was experiencing.
Uses of Huxley (named after English Author & consciousness pioneer Aldous Huxley) are many. (Like Big Sur itself -- "The Land of Many Uses.") People might be hanging out or in Love and Huxley is a favorite place to snuggle and feel safe and free at all hours.
Being outstanding at teaching disaffected learners is actually fairly straightforward - but so few teachers do it. You just need to continually test and adapt new teaching strategies on a small scale. It may be a new lesson starter, using a new resource, instigating collaborative working techniques, student-led projects, negotiation techniques. You test small, then you measure the results. How did it go? What response did it generate? Did all the class engage and work? If it was not successful, you've learnt an important lesson and move on. If it was successful, you roll it out and make it an integral part of your teaching armoury.
Read these to give a background on each child. There may be issues of family problems, health or learning problems as well as academic results. You might also learn of some talent the student has to help engage him/her successfully in class work. Knowing these things about your students will help tailor the ways in which you react to a student's behaviour. (I had an horrific evening after I had admonished strongly a male student sent to me for disciplining. He disappeared from the school. I then found out from the golden teacher he was suicidal. Fortunately for me, all was well).
When we stop obsessing about how difficult teaching our subject or students or whatever is, and start obsessing about adding enormous value to the lives of our students - our success rates soar - and as an added bonus, teaching becomes much more pleasurable.
growkit golden teacher Someone might show specially prepared museum quality photos of petroglyphs (300 -- 20,000+ years old from the Coso Range) aka cave drawings. Or as we sit in circles on pillows we may listen or share the stories of our lives -- or might get in touch with deep seated feelings. Others may temporarily doze off.
golden teacher Feather your own nest. I have the most wonderful bed linens, I feel like a princess every night when I go to bed. I have 2 feather mattresses and a silk, down comforter. I bought them at a discount store we have called, Tuesday Morning. Scour the town for one of your own. You will sink into luxury and know you are special, each and every night.
Being outstanding at teaching disaffected learners is actually fairly straightforward - but so few teachers do it. You just need to continually test and adapt new teaching strategies on a small scale. It may be a new lesson starter, using a new resource, instigating collaborative working techniques, student-led projects, negotiation techniques. You test small, then you measure the results. How did it go? What response did it generate? Did all the class engage and work? If it was not successful, you've learnt an important lesson and move on. If it was successful, you roll it out and make it an integral part of your teaching armoury.