Remember the first time you realized you were riding a bicycle by yourself? Probably not. But what about when you first got to drive solo? Your parents trusted you enough to give you the keys and go out on your own! It was a great feeling. If you’re like most people, you were so scared of messing up that you were nervous and overcautious. Do you ever see the “Student Driver” cars where they put their turn signal on two blocks before turning and check the mirror seven times before changing lanes?

For many of us, teaching was once like that.

For some, it still is.

Fast forward
What happened after a few years? You began to drive like a pro! Some…

Denise comments:

I am in a teaching program, half way through and I just completed my first to “teaching” classes.  Now I have this hugh feeling I’ve made a BIG mistake and that teaching isn’t what I thought it was or that I’m not cut out for it. Not to mention the outlook for finding a job looks bleak. Seems like the writing is on the wall…  Problem is I have been a stay at home mom for 13 years and don’t know what else I could do?  I really do not want to finish the program because I feel I am wasting my time, my money and my heart isn’t in it anymore.  I have always wanted to help…

I have been asked to participate in the Reform Symposium and will be hosting a session this afternoon called 10 Things I Wish Someone Had Explained Before My First Job. Feel free to join at 4:30EST today. I don’t normally do these online training things, so hopefully this works. Go to the link here.

A lot of these things are topics I’ve covered before, but here is what looks to be the outline for now.

…

KMB writes:

I’m starting student teaching this Spring and would really like some advice, tips, and resources to help me out. I’m sure 12th graders are very bright, and I don’t want to bore them. I also want to appear knowledgable and professional. Anyway, please contact me if you have any suggestions. Websites with lesson plans, blogs, the latest technology, etc. would all be helpful.

As a middle school band director with limited experience coming up with lesson plans and really has lost touch with edublogs lately, I’m throwing this one out to my readers. Leave links and answers in the comments.

Ramona writes:

I am a first year teacher struggling with classroom management at the elementary school level. I have some logistical challenges because I don’t have my own classroom and travel between classes and schools with a cart. I also have almost 300 different students I see every week. But mostly my problem is that I don’t like to humiliate children and make them feel bad, which seems to be what most classroom management looks like. Of course a child feels embarrassed if you administer some kind of punishment to him or her in front of the whole class. But it seems like if I don’t do that, the kids will walk all over me and I will quit (sooner…

This year I am in the position to be able to work relatively closely with two first-year teachers and a second-year teacher. I also am working full time with a third-year teacher. One of my primary objectives this year is to be able to talk through some of their challenges and hopefully offer some suggestions for how they can better grow as teachers through the process. I see them making a lot of the mistakes that I used to make. In my discussions with some of the more experienced folks around me, I hear them refer to these as rookie mistakes.

We all make mistakes in our jobs on a daily basis. Some mistakes that we make are more normal than…

Shelly Sanchez Terrell is an English teacher living in Germany. She is also the co-organizer and co-creator of the educational projects, Edchat and The Reform Symposium Conference. Find more of her challenges on her education blog, Teacher Reboot Camp or in her free e-book, The 30 Goals Challenge. Find her on Twitter, @ShellTerrell.

I remember having a lesson observed for my teacher certification. The lesson didn’t go well and my observer made it a point to let me know how miserably I failed. I have gotten critiques before, but this one was different. I felt like a failure. My observer had not liked one thing I did in my lesson. I felt as if I wasn’t a good teacher. No teacher likes that feeling….

This guest post was written by Atticus from www.atticusparker.com/education

I was chuffed earlier this month when Joel asked me to write guest post for his edublog SYWTT. I was however also nervous. Joel has created an enviable web presence with SYWTT through an obvious passion for teaching, hard work and obvious dedication. I didn’t want to let him down.

The topic he suggested was ‘How To Make This Year The Best of Your Career’. Wow, I thought. A topic like that calls for an action plan. A list. So I have resorted to an old favourite of blog readers – the list article.

Many blog articles today feature a list. Do Lists. Don’t lists. They are attractive because they…

This is a guest post by Pat Hensley from the blog Successful Teaching. As we gear up for the upcoming school year, So You Want To Teach? is featuring articles about making this school year the best year ever.

I have been teaching about 30 years now and I still love teaching! I have taught all grade levels including the university level and I still feel the same way. After teaching special education classes for 28 years in public schools, I now teach teachers getting their master’s degree in special education and write a blog called Successful Teaching. I really appreciate Joel for giving me the opportunity to be a guest writer on his blog.

Of course, at the beginning of the year,…

This is a guest post by Kathryn Laster, who teaches math in a suburb of Dallas, TX. She writes:

This year was my 20th year of teaching, so my humble opinions qualify as part B of your “call for guest bloggers.” I really started working on my formal philosophy as a grad school assignment, and I have been slowly tweaking it for several years. Since this was a milestone year for me, I thought it would be appropriate to really re-think and re-visit my philosophy, and your call for guests inspired me to do so. My brief resume: this year, I taught ESL algebra 1, pre-calculus, and AP calculus AB, and this is also my 10th year to sponsor…

This is a guest post by Drew, who currently teaches 7th Grade Texas History in the San Antonio area, where he has taught since 2004.

Maybe this job doesn’t pay enough for those with heavy material needs. But, working here has helped me with the most important part of my life.

10. Family – My comfort level with my material for class has improved each and every year. I spent Friday nights, usually until the wee Saturday morning hours, setting up lesson plans for the next week. I was never able to get ahead on my work. I had two preps and no lesson plans from other teachers to guide me. By November of this school year, I had stopped bringing…

This is a guest post by Drew, who currently teaches 7th Grade Texas History in the San Antonio area, where he has taught since 2004.

Shout out to my college roommates for always giving me a hard time about being cultured.  Was I full of myself, or what?  Nothing goes together better than Austin and music.

8. Music – I actually played Ted Nugent’s ‘Great White Buffalo’ in class because the song tells the story of buffalo from the Native American perspective.  I didn’t think much of it until our 3-on-3 basketball tournament yesterday at TAKS celebration.  One of the teams, 3 girls from one of my classes, made t-shirts at home and their team name was….White Buffaloes. I wonder if they’ll…

This is a guest post by Drew, who currently teaches 7th Grade Texas History in the San Antonio area, where he has taught since 2004.

A wise investment is just that. Find ways to invest in your school and yourself.

6. Next year – To complement our emphasis on relationships at school, I will be leading a field trip to Washington, D.C. in 2011. This requires advance planning and nothing matches the looks I get from the students who will be attending. You can just see the excitement in their eyes. In others there is dread because their parents and siblings will be joining them.

7. Professional Development – My personal fav. I did the first-ever book study with ATPE at www.atpe.org. I…

This is a guest post by Drew, who currently teaches 7th Grade Texas History in the San Antonio area, where he has taught since 2004.

Here I discovered the proper use of multimedia and how proper procedures can help ensure mental well-being.

3. Movies – I have used movies in the past, but mostly to kill time.  This year, I wrote some great questions for the movies I used.  I suppose I set my expectations higher as far as how I used movies like ‘The Alamo’ or ‘National Treasure 2’.  My students compared the information from our textbook to how Hollywood presents historical facts.  Kudos to Nicolas Cage for the ‘hysterical’ side of the facts.

4. Procedures – I have…

This is a guest post by Drew, who currently teaches 7th Grade Texas History in the San Antonio area, where he has taught since 2004.

At the end of this, my sixth year, I have a few moments to reflect on the road taken.

While I am looking at this year with the rose-colored glasses all teachers wear on the last day of school, I urge one and all to take whatever time necessary to enjoy all that you have accomplished this year. But do so as objectively as possible. All teachers have growing pains every year, but don’t let those get in the way of what you did right. In no particular order, here is what I did right this…

Ivy writes:

I am in my first year as a Special Education teacher. My class is out of control. Kids are yelling at each other. Nobody is focused on their work. I am yelling and screaming and they are talking back and yelling back at me. Everybody is trying to help me out. Some say I need to be more positive, some say I need to be stronger and more strict. I do not know what to do. As a group, they are against me. The situation is very confrontational. I can not stop them going crazy. The kids know it. They are going crazy but they do not care. Some kids even have a lot of fun of it….

This is a guest post by Liz Cutten, who helps run FindCollegeCards, a college student blog that helps students learn about everything college.

All college professors are different, but what you’re going to find out is that all of them are human, and many of them are going to be impressed by the same things. I went to college over 6 years, and what I had found out is that most professors will honestly look at the good students in a different way, compared to those that are bad.

Now, I know when you read the title, you’re probably thinking, “I don’t want to be suck up!”, and that’s fine. I’m not writing this to show you how to…

Do you hate your job? I just finished my third week of school and am excited about how much fun my job will be this year. It’s super exciting. I remember back when I was a first year teacher, though. It wasn’t quite like this. This was underscored this week when a couple of anonymous readers (disgruntled and hey) left the following comments:

It’s interesting reading all these comments and I was searching the internet for other jobs I could do if I wasn’t a teacher.. My story is the opposite. I have a great bunch of students and a really supportive (mostly) group of parents also. I am disgruntled by the workload and also extra things that end up taking…

Are you looking for a new job this summer? I know some people are sticking it out in their current district just because of the insecurity with the recession and current economic situation. I also know that some people have graduated from college and are moving into the world of education. Others have chosen to leave the teaching profession entirely. Are you looking for a new job this summer? Care to comment about your questions/fears/experiences?

This is a guest post by Edward Kim from The Certification Map Team.

Joel, thanks for letting us write a guest post on your blog. This site is a great source for educators who want meaningful information with a down-to-earth touch.

For Joel’s regular readers, thanks for taking your time time to read this post. I want to start out by asking you a simple question: Do you know your state’s teacher certification requirements? How many of you have experienced or heard horror stories about people trying to navigate through your state’s Department of Education website trying to figure out the certification process (not to mention long phone conversations with the DOE that lead nowhere). It can be a…