5 Steps That Took Me From “I Hate Teaching” To “I Love Teaching”

See if you can relate “I regret choosing this profession! I wish I was still back in college! I just want to go live at home and never have to work again! Oh wait, teaching provides insurance benefits, so I guess I’ll just stick it out.” Ever been there? It doesn’t have to be that way. This can all … Read more

Why Experience Is The Best Teacher

“You’ll understand when you’re older.” We tell that to our students, and they don’t like. We hear it when we start out in the teaching world and we don’t like. I remember an experienced band director told me once that he would tell me how to be a better teacher if he knew. He just … Read more

50 Things Every First Year Teacher Should Know

The first year teacher is often a very lonely and isolated person. They often feel like everyone else has everything already figured out, and they are the only one struggling. That is not the case. In fact, so many of us are in survival mode and dealing with our own issues that we forget to … Read more

10 Things I Wish Someone Had Explained Before My First Teaching Job

I participated in the Reform Symposium recently and hosted a session entitled 10 Things I Wish Someone Had Explained Before My First Teaching Job. 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. Professional Sanity Get a handle on classroom … Read more

Help A New Student Teacher Out With Resources

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 … Read more

15 Tricks To Transform Yourself From Classroom Bully Into A Favorite Teacher

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 … Read more

Rookie Mistakes

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 … Read more

Planting Seeds of Belief

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 … Read more