SYWTT Voicemail Blogging & Technology by Joel Wagner - July 19, 2009June 30, 20102 I recently got my Google Voice invitation and decided to set it up. In playing around with the settings this afternoon, I realized that I could set up a widget to connect my readers directly to my voicemail. I don't know how many people are interested in connecting to me this way, but I thought it might be a nice way to provide some opportunities for increased communication. Who knows, this may open up a way for me to get some questions from readers. If the response is positive, I might even post the phone number so maybe some of you could share the number with friends who don't do the whole blogging thing, but have questions about teaching problems.
Thank You! Personal by Joel Wagner - October 16, 2008July 5, 20103 I told one of my former college professors about my blog shortly after it first started back in 2007. She liked what she saw and decided to use some of my material in one of her classes. In fact, she used So You Want To Teach? as an assignment for one of her classes this semester. Each of the students was assigned to leave a comment on something that I posted on here. Imagine my surprise when I got an email from her last week asking for my mailing address so that her class could send me a card. The card came in the mail today and I want to thank Dr. Witt for her wonderful work and inspiration as
Life Lesson 5: Blessed Are The Poor In Spirit General by Joel Wagner - October 15, 2008July 1, 20100 Today is Blog Action Day. The topic of choice for this year is poverty. I want to approach it from a completely different viewpoint than most of the bloggers are. I want to look at the spiritual aspect of poverty. And seeing the multitudes, [Jesus] went up on a mountain, and when He was seated His disciples came to Him. Then He opened His mouth and taught them, saying: "Blessed are the poor in spirit, For theirs is the kingdom of heaven." Matthew 5:1-3 (NKJV) Something that has become very evident to me over the past few years is just how self-centered I am. A lot of the time, I say selfish things as a joke, but I also realize
Not The Best Day Ever Revisited General by Joel Wagner - March 7, 2008July 2, 20102 A few weeks ago, I wrote about an experience I had where a student left my classroom crying and went to talk with the counselor. Read about it here. Be sure to read the comments below the article also! Since then, I apologized. I also made the commitment to slow down my teaching style. I wanted to take a chance to revisit that incident and follow up on some of the things that have happened since then, as well as some of the aftermath. On the Monday morning following the weekend when I had decided to slow things down, I was amazed and surprised to see the other band director walk in just before the percussion class. I left this
Transforming A Tense Relationship Where There Is Low Respect Inspiration by Joel Wagner - November 2, 2007July 5, 20104 Recently, a reader wrote to me saying: I am currently midway through student teaching and am struggling with classroom management (surprise!). I am not really getting any feedback from my cooperating teacher, other than "use short, quick redirects" and "your emotions are too transparent to students". I worked in business for 18 years prior to this experience and I'm just struggling with how to try and turn a tense situation around. I have read through the articles posted on this site and they have given me some good ideas to work with. Here is my question: What can you do to turn around a tense relationship with students who do not regard you as "the