Help Keeping Your Teaching Resolutions
January 2, 2013
Making a New Year’s Resolution is easy. Keeping it? That’s a different story altogether. Personal goals end up competing with teaching goals. The busy whirl of heading back to the classroom crowds out all those plans, and the next thing you know, it’s March and those teaching resolutions are long forgotten.
How about some help with those goals? I’ve gathered some of the best resources from ReadWriteThink and Thinkfinity to help make sure your good intentions all become accomplishments in 2013!
- Learn something new: Did you set the goal of learning a new technique or strategy to use in the classroom? Try these resources to get started:
- ReadWriteThink’s Strategy Guides cover areas ranging from teaching with technology to reading in the content areas.
- Want to learn more about content area reading? Register for our Free Webinar: Using Formative Reading Assessment to Enhance Content Area Learning.
- Watch Doug Buehl’s webinar on Meeting the Demands of the Common Core: Mentoring Readers of Science and Technical Texts on demand.
- Find even more webinars and additional resources in the Professional Development area of the Thinkfinity site.
- Collaborate more with other teachers: You can share ideas, give other teachers some advice or feedback, and ask questions about your classroom and students on the Thinkfinity site.
- Visit the Community Hub, The Lounge, or the Online Tools for Educators to connect with teachers across the U.S.
- Discuss specific strategies in the content area social groups on the Thinkfinity site:
- Plan activities further in advance: What teacher hasn’t found herself scurrying at the last minute to figure out what to do in class tomorrow–or even later this afternoon! I know I have. Use these calendars to find activities and sketch out your month in advance:
- This Day in the Arts, from ArtsEdge
- Calendar of Historical Events, from EconEdLink
- Calendar, from EDSITEment
- Calendar Activities, from ReadWriteThink
- Calendar, from Science NetLinks
- Help families and students learn at home: Families are often eager to try fun, educational activities at home, but it takes time to round up the materials and get them into a parent’s hands. Here are some ready-made materials you can use right now:
- Use Parent and Afterschool Resources from ReadWriteThink to give families everything they need to try activities outside the classroom.
- Point families to the Wonderopolis site for a daily activity that take advantage of the kinds of questions kids ask every day.
- Share the ReadWriteThink podcasts Chatting About Books: Recommendations for Young Readers and Text Messages: Recommendations for Adolescent Readers to give families book recommendations on a wide range of topics.
- Publish your ideas: Want to share your teaching strategies with teachers everywhere? ReadWriteThink welcomes contributions from educators who want to write or review for the site. Fill out our online interest form and you’ll be on your way to publishing a lesson plan, a classroom printout, or a strategy guide on the site!
Whatever your goals, I hope you meet them and have a fantastic 2013.