So much to do! As teachers in grades 4-6 enter their first classrooms, Kathleen Palmieri offers keys to getting started. She includes accessing mentors, keeping track of planning, Google tools, engaging students, finding sources for class libraries and décor, and self-care.
Where there are challenges, there are also opportunities for creativity, novelty, and adventure to put a barricade between us and burnout. Stephanie Farley offers strategies to help teachers avoid or at least soften the sense of emotional exhaustion that leads to collapse.
Wondering how to set up your new classroom? Or just ready to make some changes in your familiar space? Creating Your Dream Elementary Classroom is the book for you, writes teacher educator Linda Biondi. It’s filled with ideas from pros to benefit newbies and vets in grades K-6.
The First-Year Teacher’s Survival Guide offers abundant ideas to help navigate the ever changing world of the classroom. Reviewer Linda Biondi notes it is designed to help ease the pressures and demands of day-to-day teaching for new and veteran teachers alike.
If you’re having tough times at school this year, new teachers and veterans alike can relieve some of the stress that comes when everything seems to be going wrong. Tested advice and actionable ideas from author, veteran teacher, and classroom survivor Julia Thompson.
After considering his early years as an English teacher, looking at research and talking with teachers and administrators, teacher educator Sean Ruday shares four recommendations to help new ELA teachers’ first years in the classroom be as successful as possible.
John Campbell and Christian van Nieuwerburgh look at four broad areas of formal and informal coaching: student success and well-being, educational leadership, professional practice, and community engagement. A helpful, quick read, says teacher and mentor Alex Valencic.
Carol Pelletier Radford’s 2017 books can help beginning teachers by giving their mentors detailed guidelines, a clearly defined schedule, and routines that allow flexibility for both mentor and mentee, says school district new-teacher liaison Michael DiClemente.
In the 3rd edition of “101 Answers for New Teachers and Their Mentors,” Annette Breaux adds ideas for using tech in lessons, connecting via social media, and reflecting regularly. “Practical and easy to use” by all teachers, says PD consultant Anne Anderson.
In this helpful how-to article Judith Wencel, founder of SUCCESS in the Middle, distills 20 years of experience effectively recruiting and preparing community tutors and mentors – dispelling the myth that “nobody will volunteer in middle schools.”
