With all of the great responses I have read with the Reader Appreciation Month, I decided to go ahead and fill out the survey as well.

Name: Joel
Location: The border of Texas and Mexico
Occupation: Middle School Band Director
Blog: So You Want To Teach?

Tell me some of your favorite things about your job
Inspiring children. Spreading my passion for music, life, and learning. Watching the students grow year after year. Recruiting kids into my program. Being creative with the music. Transforming students from knowing nothing about how to play an instrument to being able to perform complicated (for them) music by the end of the year. Demonstrating the value of long-range planning to achieve crazy…

November is Reader Appreciation Month at So You Want To Teach? Today’s featured reader is Pamela.

Name: Pamela
Location: Michigan
Occupation: Elementary Teacher, Reading Specialist
Blog: Blog may be coming soon, but none yet ;-)

Tell me some of your favorite things about your job
Some of my favorite things about teaching: I enjoy sharing my love of learning and my passion for certain topics. It goes beyond just teaching the material…it’s about making a personal connection with the students. Along those same lines, I love sharing the excitement of a good book. When I introduce it and starting talking about it with excitement, the students can’t wait for me to start reading. When it’s time to stop…

November is Reader Appreciation Month at So You Want To Teach? Today’s featured reader is Jonathan.

Name: Jonathan
Location: The Bronx
Occupation: High School Math teacher
Blog: JD2718

Tell me some of your favorite things about your job
I love kids and I love math. How many jobs can combine them? I guess the guy at the carnival who counts the kids getting on the rides, but he has to clean puke, so that’s out of the question. Honestly, I can, in the space of 55 minutes, (on a good day) get booed for telling a bad joke, discuss planetary motion or the etymology of “radish,” clearly explain how a new-for-them algebra technique flows from their previous knowledge,…

November is Reader Appreciation Month at So You Want To Teach? Today’s featured reader is Jeremy Aldrich.

Name: Jeremy Aldrich
Location: Harrisonburg, Virginia
Occupation: Middle school (6-8) electives – French, Foreign Language Exploratory, and Global Citizenship
Blog: Global Citizenship in a Virtual World

Tell me some of your favorite things about your job
I love the push to keep learning, to keep discovering new questions and to help students discover their own questions.

Tell me some things you loved about your favorite teacher(s)
My favorite teacher, Mr. Newton, helped me feel like I was a good writer. He inspired me to read and to think and to share. He wasn’t fake or shallow with his comments to students….

November is Reader Appreciation Month at So You Want To Teach? Today’s featured reader is Clix.

Name: Clix
Location: Georgia
Occupation: Freshman English; Journalism
Blog: Epic Adventures Are Often Uncomfortable

Tell me some of your favorite things about your job
I seem to be good at it. I get to explore stories and try new ideas and encourage others to do the same. It’s never dull. I love messing with their heads. I love how wee the freshmen are and watching them grow into young ladies and gentlemen (in theory). I love the power of CONTROLLING LIVES – well, at least for an hour or so a day! I love listening to their ideas and seeing the way…

November is Reader Appreciation Month at So You Want To Teach? Today’s featured reader is Pat Hensley.

Name: Pat Hensley
Location: South Carolina
Occupation: I was a high school special ed teacher, now I am a college instructor and educational consultant.
Blog: Successful Teaching

Tell me some of your favorite things about your job
Sharing my experiences and helping unexperienced teachers solve problems

Tell me some things you loved about your favorite teacher(s)
Making me feel that I was important, listening to my ideas, and learning new things from them

List some of your most effective classroom management strategies

1. Improving students’ self concept
2. Have a consistent behavior plan

Name (up to) three other…

November is Reader Appreciation Month at So You Want To Teach? Today’s featured reader is Athena.

Name: Athena
Location: South Texas
Occupation: ELA 9th & 10th grade
Blog: http://athena81469.blogspot.com/

Tell me some of your favorite things about your job
I like the freedom of the job. I used to be in a cube job where I had to punch a timeclock all the time. Every moment of my job was timed. I sat and stared at 4 grey fuzzy walls everyday.

Now, I come to work at my own time. Nobody is watching.

Plus, I have control over my job. I decide what and when I teach. I decide if I am going to stay late. I can…

November is Reader Appreciation Month at So You Want To Teach? Today’s featured reader is Jane Little.

Name: Jane Little
Location: Los Angeles, CA
Occupation: Third Grade Teacher
Blog: My Many Colored Crayons // Moved to Out of The Crayon Box

Tell me some of your favorite things about your job
I love getting to know the kids and I especially love having siblings come up and watching the family grow. It is a real privilege to be part of people’s lives like that. When I taught 5th grade it was hard because the kids left our school at the end of the year. I didn’t get to see them from afar in the next grade. I didn’t…

November is Reader Appreciation Month at So You Want To Teach? Today’s featured reader is Miss Profe.

Name: Miss Profe
Location:The Northeast
Occupation: Middle/High School Spanish teacher
Blog: It’s A Hardknock Teacher’s Life

Tell me some of your favorite things about your job
The kids, the challenge of teaching a second language in the 21st century

Tell me some things you loved about your favorite teacher(s)
They demanded my best; they recognized my potential.

List some of your most effective classroom management strategies
Walking around the room, tapping on the shoulder, not shouting over students

Name (up to) three other blogs that you frequently visit/subscribe

• Ms. Whatsit
• So You Want To Teach?
• RepairKit

November is Reader Appreciation Month at So You Want To Teach? Today’s featured reader is Miss A.

Name: Miss A
Location: Urban city in the South
Occupation: Teacher, World history, African American History 9-12 grade. Mostly 9th grade
Blog: Confessions From The Couch

Tell me some of your favorite things about your job
Facilitating games, watching students “get it,” being able to explore diverse issues and situations.

Tell me some things you loved about your favorite teacher(s)
They were interactive, they were demanding, had high expectations, friendly.

List some of your most effective classroom management strategies
Interactive classroom seating chart, behavior contracts.

Name (up to) three other blogs that you frequently visit/subscribe

• Secondhand Thoughts

…

November is Reader Appreciation Month at So You Want To Teach? Today’s featured reader is Angela Maiers.

Name: Angela Maiers
Location: Des Moines, Iowa
Occupation: National Education Consultant, author, Adjunct Professor teaching post graduate work in the area of reading and literacy
Blog: Angela Maiers

Tell me some of your favorite things about your job
That is a hard one. I LOVE MY JOB. I feel like I have the best of all education worlds. I love teaching grad school, my students are amazingly dedicated teachers, I have the opportunity to travel across the United States helping teachers and schools work at the grassroots level to improve students lives, and my favorite part is working with the…

November is Reader Appreciation Month at So You Want To Teach? Today’s featured reader is Mister Teacher.

Name: Mister Teacher
Location:Near Dallas, TX
Occupation: Teacher, 3rd grade math and science
Blog: Learn Me Good

Tell me some of your favorite things about your job
My coworkers are great, I enjoy all of the funny stories that my job provides, my job is NEVER EVER boring, and when I am finally able to actually TEACH, I feel very rewarded when that little light bulb goes off.

Tell me some things you loved about your favorite teacher(s)
Kept things interesting, used humor, was encouraging.

List some of your most effective classroom management strategies
I do the same stuff…

November is Reader Appreciation Month at So You Want To Teach? Today’s featured reader is Eric Turner.

Name: Eric Turner
Location: Tennessee
Occupation: History/Secondary Ed Student
Blog: Secondhand Thoughts

Tell me some of your favorite things about your job
I love learning and I love the interaction between professor and students

Tell me some things you loved about your favorite teacher(s)
Whew, this is a hard one. I think the things I loved about the teachers I loved is the high standards they maintained, yet were also compassionate, fair, and understanding. Oh, and they each had a great sense of humor. They each inspired me in their own way. How they inspired me is hard to define….

November is Reader Appreciation Month at So You Want To Teach? Today’s featured reader is Gillian King.

Name: Gillian King
Location: Sydney, Australia
Occupation: I run a marketing consultancy, but I started out as a High School teacher
Blog: School of St. Jude — My blog supports the School of St Jude, a free school for bright kids from the poorest homes, in Tanzania. These kids rarely get to finish primary school, and typical class sizes are 60-70, so the School of St Jude is like a haven for these capable kids.

Tell me some of your favorite things about your job
One of my favourite things about the School of St Jude that it was started…

November is Reader Appreciation Month at So You Want To Teach? Today’s featured reader is ms_teacher.

Name: ms_teacher
Location: Northern California
Occupation: Professional Educator (aka teacher); Grade 6, mostly Language Arts and Social Studies
Blog: ms_teacher

Tell me some of your favorite things about your job
Favorite things about teaching: Being able to interact with kids who are mostly good and do try to do what’s expected of them; sharing my enthusiasm for my subject matter – you should hear me talk to them about why I love Mesopotamia, even more than the ever popular Egypt! I also enjoy seeing their growth over the nine months I have them. They come into middle school as scared elementary students…

November is Reader Appreciation Month at So You Want To Teach? Today’s featured reader is José Vilson.

Name: José Vilson
Location: New York, NY
Occupation: 6th Grade Math Teacher
Blog: The José Vilson

Tell me some of your favorite things about your job
My favorite things about my job are the ability to help children achieve their best, inspiring them not only academically but personally. I also like getting up on my stage and performing for them, too. The thrill of a good and well thought out lesson is incomparable. I love the kids’ energies. Their inquisitiveness makes me want to go and teach them, and push them harder. I love the instant feedback I get…

I have spent much of last week and this week with one of the high school band directors thoroughly analyzing our marching fundamentals for the high school band. Though this really doesn’t apply directly to what I do during the school day as a middle school band director, the process we have been through to rethink our entire marching system can be applied to a lot of things that I will do in the classroom this year.

I think it can also be applied to your world as well.

The Process
So what exactly have we done to make these changes? Here’s a basic outline. At the end, I’ll show how it will apply to my routine, and see…