I teach middle school. I’m crying today because a student who has expressed how much he hates me brought kitchen shears to school last week. He has admitted to wanting to hurt people and has threatened other students. His mother knew he brought the shears to school. She feels it was justified because she claims he is being bullied by staff and students. They have made these same claims against other schools he has attended. She is also claiming that this behavior is a manifestation of ADHD and undiagnosed disabilities. I’m not even sure why he and his mother have targeted me as the staff member who is the subject of their most intense hatred. We have a meeting about this student tomorrow. In the last meeting, admins had me seated as far from the mother as possible and had me take an alternate route in the hall to create as much distance as possible when his mother was in the front office. I’m trying not to panic about tomorrow, but I’m also having thoughts about what I would need to do to avoid being stabbed with kitchen shears. I’m 5’1 and 98 pounds. In reality, I’m defenseless. He’s currently suspended and I know my fears are somewhat irrational. I’m just scared and don’t really know what to do. I have a family and keep thinking about my own children and how much I want to be safe for them.

What have we done to our educators???

I just stopped grading last week's work because I looked at 20 assignments (answers to discussion questions asking their OPINION) and 13 of them either Googled or copied from someone else.

I sent an email to them all to the effect of:

My brothers and sisters in Christ. I can tell when you cheat. When you and the guy next to you turn in word-for-word identical answers, you cheated. When you usually give me a six-word sentence fragment with two of the words misspelled, but all of a sudden you come across with three graduate-level compound-complex sentences perfectly spelled and punctuated, you cheated. Knock it off or you WILL fail.

This may or may not work, but I'm pissy this morning because it's cold and rainy and why the hell y'all cheating for the easiest class in the building, dammit.

(This also means I still have more than 200 to grade, but I'm not doing it until they fix themselves. They have ONE CHANCE, and if they don't fix it TOMORROW, the F stands.)

Sou auxiliar de sala em uma escola particular extremamente elitizada, e ultimamente tem uma sala que me faz entrar em ataque de pânico TODA vez que eu vou lá, toda aula que eu estou lá eu saio para chorar no banheiro. É uma sala de 7° ano, com cerca de 25 alunos, mas dentro desses alunos têm 5 capetas que tiram a paz de qualquer um.

É uma sala complicada, porque tem 3 alunos com hiperatividade diagnósticados, 1 TOD e mais 3 em investigação, esses alunos passam completamente do limite, arremessando materiais um nos outros, começam a se empurrar, brincam de lutinha no meio da aula, pegam materiais de outros alunos, mas fora isso são completamente sem educação, alguns chegam a me empurrar, a me xingar e sinceramente só tenho forças pra chorar.

Não só isso, mas também sinto muita agressividade deles em relação a mim, como se eles me olhassem com maldade.

Toda vez que eu entro naquela sala simplesmente me dá vontade de desistir da licenciatura. Então professores, como tem sido a experiência em sala de aula com essa nova geração?

I've lost a touch of faith in public education today, at least in my district. We had PD today, and a brand new curriculum was introduced, seemingly out of the blue. This isn't specifically impacting my grade (5th) this year, but I AM TIRED. I am so tired and frustrated with these expensive, boxed, scripted curricula that have no significant impact on student learning. Right now we use Wit and Wisdom, but that's it's own post for another day.

What happened to the art of teaching? I feel like I'm being disrespected in my profession. I have schooling and experience, yet my colleagues and I are treated like mouth pieces for corporate "educational" slop.

We are in a literacy crisis and the suits have decided that the solution is complicated, over-leveled curriculum that, ultimately and time-consumingly, needs to be adapted to fit the needs of students.

We SAY that every student is a unique learner and should have their individual, educational needs met. And then we expect them all to do the same exact thing in the same exact way. Make it make sense.

P.S. Wit and Wisdom is garbage.

I tutor 1-1 and do not tutor math very often, and I do not teach in a classroom. I am simply curious. I am learning about authentic instruction in many of my college classes and the examples often include English, science, history, etc, but not math. Based on the 12 values of authentic learning, do these same sorts of things come up in your math classes? Are you role-playing math? Do you relate it to their lives beyond general "math is important!" kind of things? Are they making "math portfolios"?

As a k-12 student, I came from a not exactly top of the line school with a 150 students total, so I am really not sure what a math class is supposed to look like. Would love to hear it!

Hey everyone, looking for some realistic cramming advice and maybe a little encouragement.

To give the quick backstory: I got my temp certification for ELA 5-9 back in 2017. It expired after 5 years, COVID happened, and I ended up taking a year off from teaching, so the state extended it for another 5 years. I’m finally back in the classroom now teaching middle school.

Honestly, life has completely thrown me for a whirlwind lately. Between a recent personal health emergency, losing both parents, teaching middle schoolers full-time, and raising a 2-year-old, I feel like I’m barely keeping my head above water.

My American Board class wraps up on December 1st, and I still have to take both my ELA 6-12 subject area exam and my PTK exam. There’s a small chance I might get an extension, but I’m not counting on it. Looking at my schedule, I realistically have about 15 hours (3 days) to study for the ELA 6-12 exam/ PTK.

I’ve been glancing at the study guides and the material looks *heavy*. For anyone who has taken the ELA 6-12 subject area test recently—especially on a tight timeline—what should I actually focus on?

Any advice, study sites that actually help, OR maybe yr experience with American Board would help me!

At least you don’t have to waste time making the tests, so what’s the big deal?

These people aren’t checking their work. A lot of times the questions are written in a way that no 11-12 year old can comprehend.

Oh, and the answer choices are often wrong. One time there was a question where students had to pick a sentence that was the metaphor. The “correct” answer had the word “like” in it (which by default made it a smilie, not a metaphor).

Edit: this is Virginia and the district is Fairfax :)

Currently have a new principal and he doesn’t have kids. Due to his age, he likely won’t either. I really think the experience of parenthood brings empathy that doesn’t come naturally to most people without children. You just don’t know how hard it is until you have your own little ones and balance a career and family. My husband had a principal once and he was so rude about teachers taking sick leave for their kids…. Until he had his own and that was a reality check. When you’re in a position where you’re managing employees with families, the experience is invaluable. And when you are also in charge of managing children, that experience is also beneficial. I’ll probably get some hate for this but it’s how I feel. I’m tired having admin where their work is their whole life and expect the same from teachers.

Hello all,

As the title states, I just landed my first job as a teacher! It is English 9-12 (unsure of grade as of now) in a rural school.

My background is not in education, and I will be completing an ALP program concurrently with my first term teaching.

I have a few questions:

•For those who have gone the ALP route, what advice do you have?

•for veteran/ trad path teachers, what advice would you give a first year teacher to succeed?

•what is a good lesson planning hack to promote critical thinking and engagement within these grades ?

• the term starts in January, but a year ago I booked a cruise for Mid January. Should I cancel this, or how do I navigate pre-planned vacations in k-12?

• I want to do something along the lines of having a cart in my classroom with items like pads, toothbrushes, mouth wash, snacks, pencils and mints/gum. For the more intimate items I plan on having a brown paper bag for students to discreetly grab what they need without judgement/ prying eyes. Has anyone done something similar to this? If so how did it go?

Hi all. I am a career- changer into teaching HS. I started my first job at a Catholic high school. I really love it overall - I am super passionate about my subject and I like the age group.

That said, I struggle with classroom management (which I anticipated). I teach mostly college prep (aka not honors) students , and while they are not extremely disrespectful or disruptive, I do often have to ask them to be quiet, redirect/recall their attention, deal with complaints about “too much work,” and lots of chatting as most of my classes have several sets of friends in them.

I am a pretty laid back person. I do not let the kids just do whatever they want, but some chattiness doesn’t bother me, and while it annoys me when they complain about having to do actual work in class, I just tell them it is what it is and move on. I’ve given a few after school detentions to kids who directly defied me (pulled out tablets after explicitly being told not to, or being overly talkative/talking while I’m talking) but I haven’t kicked anyone out of my classes yet. There was petty drama with a colleague who flipped out when she found, literally, two crumpled balls of paper next to, rather than in, a wastebasket after I taught in her classroom (I teach in a different room every class) - long story short, there were other issues with this person, but after she interrupted me teaching another class to complain about the crumpled paper, I took it to our dept chair who dealt with her excessive/petty scrutiny and overstepping.

Rationally, I think I’m doing ok, but I feel really insecure about my classroom management skills because of that colleague’s attitude towards me and because, being at a Catholic school, it seems the expectation is to be very strict with the kids and maintain strict compliance and discipline at all times. That’s just so tough for me because it’s not my personality. I focus more on teaching the subject, not yelling at kids for giggling (I have colleagues who do this regularly).

I’ve already learned so much about how I want to do things differently next year, and I am slowly but surely implementing better management in class, but still in small ways, i.e. calling out kids more for side conversations, threatening to kick them out especially after asking the dean to visit my most challenging class. She came by after a school assembly and ended up yelling at those kids for interrupting / not listening and encouraged me to kick kids out for talking too much. They were all hungry and had just sat through a 2 hour prayer service so I KNEW they would be difficult when I saw them, but I also know she’s right to hold them to high expectations for behavior, and I absolutely appreciate the admin support. I don’t want to squander it!

My students do shape up after my reminders and threats to kick them out of class, but I worry I’m not “following through” enough to meet the expectations of my school. I am getting through lessons and I can see general improvements in skills in my subject, so I don’t think I’m totally failing to teach them, though some days are a true struggle.

My chair and admin say they think I’m doing a good job so far, but I don’t know - I am so insecure about it this and I really want to stick with this career and do right by my students. Does what I describe sound normal? Does it sound like I have no control over my students??

Also if warranted, please just reassure me the confidence and classroom management skills come with time and I’m not a total lost cause as a teacher!

I (37F) just accepted an art position. The curriculum is set for me, which is amazing!! Still, it's a lot of different age groups. Art teachers (or any specials teachers) how do you keep it straight what grade level you're teaching and what to teach/assign? Does your brain feel like a constant tornado of change??

Thanks!!

Bonjour,

Je suis finissante au baccalauréat en enseignement et je fais des remplacements dans des écoles primaires à Sainte-Foy Québec. je suis choquée par l'attitude de certains élèves et leur manque de respect. Je rentre chez moi avec parfois l'envie de pleurer.

Je suis face à un dilemme : changer de domaine ou persévérer en essayant de trouver un poste dans une autre école ? J'aime enseigner et j'aimerais continuer, mais je me demande si le fait d'avoir un poste permanent m'aiderait à gagner davantage le respect des élèves.

Merci pour votre aide

Hey y'all,

I'm looking to change careers from recruiting to teaching. Full context below, but will also include a TL;DR at the end:

I'm a white guy in his early 30's from Georgia. Both my parents taught for 30 years in public schools in a small, poor, primarily black town. I went off to college, got a psychology and linguistics degree, but never knew what I wanted to do with my life. My parents suggested teaching, and I reluctantly agreed. Began substitute teaching (all levels at different points) and working as a parapro in my old school. I don't know if I was "good", but I really tried and had some success in building relationships. I really liked the work, but I was super young and hungry to go out into the world and do other things. So, luckily, I did. I worked in tech recruiting in Silicon Valley for a few years, moved to Atlanta and did the same, moved to New York and worked in headhunting, and now my wife and I are moving back to Atlanta.

Throughout my whole career though (9 years at this point), I felt I was missing meaning and joy in my work, so I started thinking back to my days teaching. I never got a Master's, I don't have a teaching license, and I know things have changed since I very briefly taught, but I'm really being drawn back into it.

How realistic are my odds of making it? Should I aim for high school or middle school? For those of you with experience taking the GACE, how difficult is it? Is navigating certification while teaching as daunting as it sounds? Is it better to go for an MAT?

TL;DR: wanting to go back into teaching after 9 years away with no certification - what are my odds of success?

I started the class with a Do Now that I put up on the projector. As they were working on it, someone asked if I could tell them their midterm grade. I went over to my computer and froze the screen so that no one would see the grades.

What I didn't realize was that I had already frozen it earlier, so I actually UNFROZE the screen and revealed the grades! It was up there for maybe a minute before I noticed, and I rushed to turn off the projector as soon as possible. I think it showed about 14 people's midterm grade, but it didn't show any other grades in their class or their overall average.

How serious is this? I know that this could be a potential FERPA violation. Should I tell anyone about this? I don't necessarily want to snitch on myself, but I also don't want to get reprimanded. It was such a total accident.

I've come to the realization that some of my students straight up have EVEN BUSIER days than I do 😭😭 (and I'm currently working what is essentially 2.5 jobs with a fully packed [and draining lol] M - F schedule, morning to evening)

I noticed this because one of the students I tutor on Thursdays from 7 - 8:30 PM was talking to me about his day, and mentioned how after school ended he had extra math classes, then a piano lesson, and THEN tutoring with me .. like????? and it's practically guaranteed this kid wakes up earlier than I do to get to school on time, so he quite literally has a longer workday than I do :O

it got me thinking about just how many kids/teens have schedules that look something like:

• An entire regular school day

• After-school academic classes (like Kumon, Sylvan, Think Zone, RSM, etc etc)

• Sports // music lessons // other extracurriculars

• MORE 1 on 1 tutoring sessions

• and then probably still even more homework after all of that ?!?!

like look, I know extracurriculars + extra academic support can be GREAT opportunities, and obviously every family's schedule varies wildly, but sometimes I hear what some of my students have planned for their day and I'm just like ... yo when do you get to REST or simply BE A KID 😅
Some of my students have schedules that would stress out a fully grown adult and I genuinely feel for them

Retired HS math teacher. Lots of credentials. Still young. Want to help kids with math at HS level but not be part of SpEd dept in my state. Best companies to tutor with? How else to land a PT math retirement gig?

Hi all,
So a bit of a background, I am an ECT 2 science teacher in a different school and whole different part of the country to where I did my training and ECT 1.
I know I shouldn’t compare because every school is different, but since starting at this school I feel like I’ve just been thrown in and told to figure it out myself. My ECT 1 school was so good at having SLT always doing learning walks and giving feedback atleast once a day with the main focus on positive feedback.
My current school very rarely do learning walks and when I do get observed it’s for around 2 minutes and I don’t hear any feedback at all, it leaves me thinking all day that I’m doing something wrong. I do randomly get my books searched and get told I’m doing this wrong and that wrong but I have never ever been given positive feedback. I live in constant fear of getting told I’m doing yet another thing wrong.
Today I had a member of SLT come in, asked the students a few questions and walked out. Then came in my head of department and started looking through student books, asking students questions about what they were doing and then aggressively flicking through my book cupboard. He then walked out saying you were doing a poster lesson which is a massive NO and you’re on a support plan now.
This did shake me up a lot I was fighting back tears the rest of the day as I’ve always been so so supported in my previous schools and now being told I’m doing a new thing wrong every day.
After school the member of SLT asked to speak to me, he started off with “I don’t want to ruin your weekend but I saw some really concerning things” the concerning things in question being:
The lesson didn’t have a starter
I was sat down and then started walking when he came in?
One of the student didn’t know what he was doing
There was a countdown on the board with music
And that I was doing a poster lesson
- now I would have never ever done a poster lesson had I been told it was a massive no in this school, infact I heard my mentor say once that he was doing a poster lesson, but to get such intense feedback and be put on a support plan for something I didn’t know I felt really targeted and broke down crying ( cringe I know I couldn’t help it)
But now I feel like I’ve ratted out my science department for not supporting me and I dread going in on Monday and I absolutely hate the fact that no one is telling me how to do something but will tell me off for doing it wrong.
Any advice on how to go about this!

One thing that doesn't get talked about enough in teaching is that we don't always have to come up with a consequence the second a student misbehaves. Sometimes we're frustrated, the student is upset, and trying to handle everything right then just makes things worse. Instead of reacting immediately, it can help to calmly say, "I'm going to think about this, and we'll talk after class." This gives everyone a chance to cool down and allows us to respond thoughtfully instead of out of frustration. Of course, unsafe behavior needs to be addressed immediately, but not every mistake requires an instant consequence. When things settle down, we can ask the student what happened, who was affected, and how they might make things right. Sometimes giving them a chance to take responsibility teaches more than a punishment we came up with in the heat of the moment. The hard part is remembering to pause when you've got 25 other students waiting on you! Teachers, have you ever delayed a consequence and found that it worked better? Or have you had situations where waiting actually made things harder?

Asking teachers who've had this conversation. When a kid freezes in maths, the easy thing in a parent meeting is to say "needs more practice". Then the parent goes home and adds an hour of worksheets, and the kid gets more anxious, not less.

I feel like the wording matters a lot here. Saying the child gets stuck when they're under time pressure lands very differently from "weak in maths".

What do you actually say? Any phrases that worked, or ones you stopped using?

I am a special education teacher in an elementary school. I have been told there are complaints that I am not staying longer after school in case a teacher wants to stop by and ask me a question. Admin has told me I should stay after contract time each day. Is this reasonable? I would love advice on how to address it.

* Our contract is from 8:15-3:35 each day. I am usually there from 8:00-3:40 each day, unless there is an IEP meeting, and then I'm there till around 5 pm.

The topic of this podcast is Direct Instruction (uppercase), a specific scripted curriculum, not direct instruction (lower case), the more general term for describing explicit teaching.

From the Sold a Story Website:

> Zig Engelmann's Direct Instruction has a strong evidence base -- so why is it so hard to find in schools? We look at why schools jeep giving it up and visit a charter network in North Carolina that's stuck with it for more than a quarter century.

So, what did you think of this episode? This episode confirmed one of our discussion suspicions thus far: that schools have a hard time implementing Direct Instruction because it's really challenging to implement and requires a lot of positive admin oversight. I found it frustrating to hear testimonial from ineffective admin on this episode.

I was also shocked to see on the National Institute for Direct Instruction website how few schools use Direct Instruction in America.

Do you think if your school implemented Direct Instruction your next school year, would you make the switch?

I'll provide my thoughts in the comments once we get a discussion going.

I’m a middle school teacher, and something happened a little over a week ago that’s still bothering me. A student used the N-word, and I reported it to our dean.

What really frustrated me was how dismissive he seemed about the whole situation. I also tried bringing up the fact that, from what I understand, this student had a history of using similar racist language last school year. That concern seemed to get brushed aside, too.

Now, I get it. Admin can’t tell us every little detail about student discipline, and I’m not expecting them to expel a kid over this. I also understand that administrators have their hands tied when it comes to discipline.
But seriously, at what point do we start taking this stuff more seriously especially when it’s apparently not the first time? I’m particularly frustrated because we’re constantly being told to document behavior, report incidents, and follow procedures. Yet when we actually report something serious, it sometimes feels like nothing comes of it.

It’s been over a week, and I’m still pretty disappointed with how this was handled. I don’t want to just shrug my shoulders and move on, especially when we’re talking about racist language.

I recently experienced a stressful situation at school and would appreciate some honest advice.
I was contacted at the last minute to attend an IEP meeting as an alternative participant. I had a class to supervise, but no substitute was physically present yet. I informed a neighboring teacher and an educational assistant that I needed coverage, then went to the meeting. Unfortunately, my students were without a substitute for a short period before coverage arrived. I later emailed the front office about the missing substitute.
A parent raised a concern. My principal spoke with me afterward and said the parent was okay. The IEP case manager also apologized for the substitute coordination issue. My principal has continued treating me normally, and I haven’t received a formal warning.
I acknowledge that I should have confirmed coverage before leaving, and I’ve learned from it. However, I’m worried about whether this could affect my employment, contract renewal, or J-1 program.
For those who have experienced something similar:
Was it handled through a verbal reminder or formal disciplinary action?
Can teachers be held accountable for substitute coordination failures involving multiple staff members?
Should I be concerned about my job security as an international teacher?
I’m not avoiding responsibility. I just want to understand how these situations are typically handled. Thank you!

I need new scissors for me, the teacher, that fit in small hands. Any other small handed teachers have a favorite brand of scissors???
For reference my hands are about the size of an average 5th graders 🙃