Maternity Leave?

I'm three weeks into my maternity "leave," but I hesitate to call it a "leave." Does it make sense to call it maternity stay? Since I left, I have stayed next to my laptop checking me email at least twice a day just to keep up with what is going on a school. I occasionally get email from my students with questions, and even some parents have sent me emails.

My family and friends keep warning me that I will be sorry that I have allowed people to maintain such access to me, but I can't seem to help myself. I feel responsible for what is going on in my classroom even while I'm gone. I don't want my students to feel like I have abandoned them.

Still, I'm sure things will change once the baby comes. Right now, I'm just waiting. When he gets here, I guess that's when the real maternity leave will begin.

The Benefit of Experience

Three days into the school year and it already feels like old times again. If I didn't have a calendar in front of me, I'd think it was late September already. Last week, I felt really rushed to get things together, but today I'm back in my grove. Don't get me wrong, it's not that my day is still not ripe with the usual mishaps and unexpected inconveniences. I am just much better at handling them than I have been in past years.

When I began teaching, many "veterans" told me that my third year would be the "golden one," when everything would come together for me. Well, it didn't. Maybe I'm just a late-bloomer, which is entirely possible given all the evidence from other areas of my life. This is my sixth year, and now I feel like I have the hang of everything.

My husband, who is in his first year of teaching high school, said that he feels awkward because most of the kids know more about the school and the people at the school than he does. That's when the light-bulb went off in my head about why entering my sixth year has made such a difference for me. I also teach at a high school, and it's my fifth year at that school. My first year was at a different location. So, essentially, I spent my last four years learning the ropes as a freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior -- yet from a teacher's perspective, of course.

The students who marched across the stage last May were freshmen when I was in my first year at the school. So, when they graduated, they were the last group of students who knew as much about the school as I did. I guess I sort of "graduated" with them into a new era of my teaching career. This year is a commencement for me. Though I hesitate to say I am beginning my "veteran" years of teaching, at least I am no longer a novice. I'm looking forward to seeing what a difference the benefit of experience makes this year and in the years to come.

Never Stop Learning

Wow! I still can't believe that it's almost time to start the school year. I had a busy summer. My husband is getting ready to start his first year teaching this year. He's been attending classes and doing a lot of preparation work. I've been helping him, but he has been very good about wanting to learn how to do things on his own. What I've been surprised about is how much his classes have helped me. When he would come home and discuss what happened in his classes, it would often cause me to re-think some things about my teaching practice.

His insight as a beginning teacher is so refreshing for me. I didn't realize how many of my thoughts about teaching were sort of "knee-jerk." For example, he said in his syllabus, he was going to allow students to re-do assignments as many times as they wanted to get a higher grade if they were willing to come in after school on his designated "re-do days." He said it really didn't matter to him if it took a student, say, three times to "get" something, as long as they got it before the end of the grading period. He said that sometimes the light bulb doesn't come on for some students until half-way through or almost the whole-way through a unit. What a revelation! How did I miss that? I know it won't apply to every assignment or situation, but what a basic way to offer "differentiated instruction."

Although this summer has been exhausting, I am thrilled about what I learned. Even more so, I am excited about what I might learn as the year progresses and my husband and I share our teaching experiences over the dinner table. Collaboration and idea-sharing are so key to becoming a better teacher. I feel so blessed to be able to do that at home now too.

Great website builder

If you are looking for a way to build a website for your class, you may want to consider using www.weebly.com. I have spent probably the equivalent of 2 days (over several weeks) putting together my website, and it has been virtually effortless. Weebly has drag and drop features that make building the website easy.

One of the great features on Weebly is its built-in blog pages. I plan to use these blogs for daily updates on what was covered in class. Therefore, when a student is absent, he/she can go to the website to learn what was done even before they come back to class. I will also use a blog page with my advanced class so that we can have a discussion board.

If you are interested in looking at my website, please go to www.bized.weebly.com. It is still a work in progress, but I am pretty proud of what I have so far.

Lesson Planning

I guess I am starting to get bored at home, or maybe, I just want to get a head start on next year. I have started making extensive plans for my classes next year. Two of the classes I teach have new GPS standards. So, it was necessary to make revisions. I didn't want to allow myself to get overwhelmed when the school year is underway.

I have spoken to some peers of mine, and they have said that school is not among their thoughts lately. I must admit that I kind of envy their ability to put it out of their minds. I just can't seem to do it. I feel like I will kick myself later if I get really busy and recall that I could have taken some of the hours out of my "lazy days of summer" to get prepared for next year.

I'm pretty excited about the templates I've created for my unit-level plans and daily lesson plans. I think that I will have much less stress on a daily basis.

School's Out...Professional Development Time

Although I have enjoyed the first few days of summer vacation, I realize that I can't allow the whole summer to go by without pursuing some type of professional development. So far, I have signed up for a 4-day workshop next week to develop lessons for Atlas Rubicon. I'm also going to a one-day workshop the following week to help me prepare for a brand new class I'll be teaching next year.

I love my summer vacation, and I think it's necessary to re-charge from a busy school year. Still, I know professional development will help me get ready for next year too. So, I encourage all teachers to seek out ways to improve their practice. Not only are there workshops, but there are online classes, books, and other sources.

Using Blogs in IB Business & Management

This year, I taught an IB (international baccalaureate) Business & Management course for the first time. This was my first experience with the IB program, and I was excited to have the opportunity. I felt that the year went well, but I am trying to devise new ways to improve my students' performance.

I am going to implement an interactive class website next year. The really unique thing I want to do with the website is include a blog where I post prompts related to something that was covered during the week, and students will be given a week to respond. I think requiring them to write weekly in this blog will give them more practice writing, which is essential for writing a long-term research paper called the Internal Assessment and passing the IB exam at the end of the year. Additionally, the components I've included in the rubric for the blog will require them to "dig deeper" in their writing, cite sources, and provide scholarly comments on the postings of their peers.

The components of the rubric were designed to push them toward a more collegiate level of writing. They will be graded on how completely they addressed the prompt, along with whether they referred to any real business issues in their entry. My hope is that the students begin to make more connections with current events or at least recognize that what they are learning in the textbook is more than just theoretical. I also am requiring them to include citations and hyperlinks to reliable sources because I want them to get more practice using the Internet as a research tool.

Negatives Turn to Positives

This week I've experienced some very unexpected and negative things, but I made a promise to myself that I would become a more positive and faithful person. That was the best decision I could have made. It seems like ever since I made that declaration, even the negative things that life has thrown at me have turned into overwhelming positives.

I have gotten such a pouring out of support from people this week. My heart is full, and I am more than persuaded that love, joy, and positive thinking are greater forces in the world than hate, bitterness, and negativity could ever be. I am also convinced that the "good" people in the world outnumber the "misguided" people. It's just that the good people whisper, while the others tend to scream.

Maybe someday the good and positive people will turn up the volume or get an amplifier, but maybe that's not how it's supposed to be. The Bible says the meek shall inherit the earth. Perhaps, people are meant to come to a positive way of thinking through kindness and gentleness, not by being bombarded by positive zealots.

Nevertheless, I feel more than blessed that I have experienced for myself the rewards of staying calm and allowing things to work themselves out. I hope that more people hear the whispers through the screams and are persuaded this way.

Bursting at the Seams

If you're like my school, one of the only high schools on the transfer list, this is almost not funny...

Teacher Appreciation Week

It's Teacher Appreciation Week, and I hope all the teachers reading this have had a good last few days. We've been getting treats each day, such as candy and apples, provided by our PTA. Today, our cafeteria staff made us breakfast. So, I'll admit that we have it pretty good here.

I recently found this blog post called "Screw Teacher Appreciation Week." The author has a problem with her child's teacher, and she is definitely not going to show her any appreciation this week or ever. What's even more interesting than what the author wrote are some of the comments from others.

Check out that post, and let me know what you think. Do you think the room mother's requests are out of line?

A Few Kind Words Go A Long Way

Yesterday was a particularly tough day for me. Besides some of my students behaving badly, I attended a meeting after school, during which someone insulted what I teach. This person basically implied that the business education classes I (and many others) teach were essentially a waste of time. Basically, this person said that due to block scheduling, students are spending less time in core classes and more time in classes that are not as useful.

Now, I understand what this person was "trying" to say, but after a long day, it just did not rub me the right way. I know that what I teach is an elective. I know that my classes are not a graduation requirement, but many students have found them to be very useful.

Nevertheless, the point of this blog is not to discuss the validity of business education courses. I really want to say what a difference another teacher made in my day.

Later, when I was walking in the parking lot toward my car, another teacher stopped me. She was already driving her car, but she pulled off to the side to speak to me. She said she has been so impressed by what I have done during only four years at the school. And she said she just wanted me to know how lucky our school was to have me on staff.

I almost started to tear up hearing her words. She didn't have to pause to tell me any of that. She was already in her car. She could have just kept driving. But she went out of her way to be kind to me. She could not have known how I was feeling, but what a difference she made in my afternoon.

I guess you never know what a few kind words may mean to a person. We should probably be more generous in offering them.

Mock Interviews with Students

Today, I held mock job interviews with my students. I have taught job skills to my classes each year, but this is the first time I've done mock interviews that were video-taped. The suggestion was made during one of our common planning sessions. Then, another teacher at my school did the mock interviews with her class. So, I decided to give it a try.

We only got finished with half the class. So, I can hopefully finish the rest of the class on Monday if students are not absent. I must say I underestimated how exhausting it would be. I tried to maintain the same demeanor with each student, but by the time I was doing my 10th student in the last class, I was pretty tired.

A few of the students really impressed me with what they had to say. Others, who I thought might really "ham it up" based on how they behave in class were actually pretty subdued. Once I'm finished with all the students, we will watch the video as a class and have some constructive criticism. I think watching themselves and their peers on the video is where a lot of the learning will really take place.

Though it has been a lot of work, I think this was a good lesson and a great time to use it. At the end of the year, teachers really have to try to find lessons that will be engaging. This one worked really well. I think I will do this each year toward the end of the term.

Being Careful with Blogs

After today's blogging class, I realize that we have to be careful before using blogs in the classroom. I am going to spend a lot of time this summer developing guidelines for my blog if I decide to implement it. I found great student blogging contracts on the Internet. So, I will use them as a starting point to create my own.

I also learned that it's important to share my intentions for my blog and/or wiki and/or web page with my principal. He has encouraged the use of web pages for student engagement and parent involvement. I was even asked to present a workshop on it at our school. However, I do feel that the more students get used to this technology, the more they might stray away from the original purposes intended by the teacher. Therefore, it's important to be proactive.

Sharing Resources

In our blogging class, our instructor mentioned that blogging would be a great way for teachers to share resources and discuss ideas in lieu of an actual meeting that requires a lot of time. I think she's right, but then I question whether teachers would be willing to openly share their resources or ideas over blogs. For one thing, many teachers are unfamiliar with this technology. Secondly, many teachers feel a sense of ownership over their resources, particularly lessons they may have spent years perfecting. They may not be willing to share these resources.

The unwillingness to share came up at my school when we were implementing the Atlas Rubicon program. I was asked to re-deliver this training to a group of teachers because I teach computer classes. Unfortunately, the attitude of some of the teachers was very negative. I understood that some were negative because they were just frustrated with the program because it kept crashing and freezing. Others were negative because they did not want to make their lessons available to any teacher who may be searching for them. One veteran said, "This is my life's work. Why should I just give it away to anyone?"

I have pondered her question for months. I think I finally have my answer. I think she, and other teachers, should be willing to share their resources because it could improve the performance of other teachers. Therefore, it will, hopefully, improve the success of many more students than just those students a teacher actually teaches in his/her class. I think that should be our goal -- helping students succeed. So, we should share resources because it helps us achieve that goal.

Apples Magazine

I added a link to Apples Magazine. This is a magazine that I founded this year that is for teachers. My husband and I essentially put out the magazine by ourselves each month from August through May. It has been difficult, but rewarding. In the magazine, I share ideas that are designed to make life easier for teachers. The magazine is distributed in several counties across Georgia and Alabama. You can also get it at Barnes & Noble in Columbus. I hope you read the magazine.

Learning More About Blogging

I am taking a blogging class at this very moment that is offered by my school district. I am excited to learn more about the ways I can utilize blogs in my classes. I hope to implement something next school year. My attempts with wikis have had mixed results in the past. So, maybe blogging will be better.

Sunday Night

On Sunday nights, I start to wind down and think about the week ahead of me. Usually, I leave myself in a good position for the coming week on Fridays. Before leaving school, I always get my classroom set up for Monday. I update my boards and even prepare my PowerPoints. Honestly, what I usually have the most trouble with is setting out my clothes for the week and thinking about what I'll be bringing for lunch. Go figure...

6 Weeks Left in School

We just got back from Spring Break yesterday. Now, we have 6 weeks left with no holidays. This is that rough spot, where students start to get restless. Yesterday was a tough day. I could tell that the students didn't want to be here, plus the weather was bad. I'm hoping today will be a better day. I'm trying to have a positive attitude.

Welcome to my blog!

I am a business education teacher in Georgia. I'm new at blogging, but I think it is a useful way to express yourself and connect to others. I teach Accounting I and II, Business Document Processing, and IB Business & Management. The teaching load is stressful, but I guess everyone's teaching load is stressful. Nevertheless, I am happy to have a job in this economy.