Weekend Reading 7/3/16 General by Joel Wagner - July 3, 2016July 3, 20160 Well, I hope you're having a nice productive weekend and are ready to get a new week started. I know that we have some international readers, but in the United States, we are celebrating Independence Day this weekend. While you have some time left in the weekend, here are some cool things you can fill it with. A new podcast Malcolm Gladwell has a new podcast out called Revisionist History. From the podcasts's about page: Welcome to Revisionist History, a new podcast from Malcolm Gladwell and Panoply Media. Each week for 10 weeks, Revisionist History will go back and reinterpret something from the past: an event, a person, an idea. Something overlooked. Something misunderstood. Because sometimes the past deserves a second chance. An few older podcasts I actually learned about Malcolm
A Step-By-Step Framework for Incremental Growth Inspiration by Joel Wagner - June 14, 2016June 14, 20162 I want you to watch the first 3:40 of this TED Talk by Benjamin Zander Notice the Dramatic change in the piano player from 7 years old to 11 years. Huge difference. But from 8 to 10, there is seemingly no change. What's happening is incremental change. Each year, the child improves dramatically, but it is not always evident, until BAM, it all seems to fall into place. Michael Hyatt writes about The Power of Incremental Change Over Time on his blog: I am not opposed to massive action. I have used it myself to achieve certain results. But it causes most people give up before they ever start. They just don’t think they can make the investment...What these people don’t realize is that they could
From Burnout Into Ignited Passion: How Blogging, Information Overload, and Running Made Me A Better Teacher Inspiration by Joel Wagner - May 28, 2013July 6, 20161 I don't care if it's your teaching job or your personal habits or your social life or what it is, we all face burnout at one time or another. Or another or another or another. At times, I can feel like we are in a dark tunnel with no escape and we don't have the energy to escape. Ummm, not that I have ever experienced that, of course. ANYWAY, you may or may not be struggling with this now. I would guess at this point in the school year, none of us in the United States are wanting to ever teach another school year. It happens. So I present to you an autobiographical short story that addresses this concept. Once upon a
10 Things I Wish Someone Had Explained Before My First Teaching Job New Teachers by Joel Wagner - January 8, 2011June 5, 20162 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 management early Practice selective ignorance Don’t argue with students The phone is your friend Learn from the experience of other teachers Ask questions When someone offers you advice, try to implement the suggestions; if they don’t work, figure out why not and try again Learn to listen Have fun Kids feed off of whatever energy you transfer One of the top ways to fight burnout is to
50 Reasons To Love Your Job As A Teacher Reader Appreciation by Joel Wagner - November 30, 2007August 5, 201612 In November of 2007, I had Reader Appreciation Month. During the course of that month, I interviewed a number of my readers and gained some powerful insight into what makes teachers tick. This article summarizes 50 reasons to love your job as a teacher. As we come to the conclusion of Reader Appreciation Month, I want to summarize some of the things that we have learned. Today, I'll focus on some of the reasons my readers have shared with me about why they love their jobs. Edutopia put together a slide show of 20 Inspiring Reasons Why You Love To Teach. But here are my 50 reasons to love your teaching job. 50 reasons to love teaching Sharing my experiences Helping inexperienced teachers solve problems The