Personal: Last year, once the school year took off, I was so wrapped up in reading professional books/articles/etc or working on stuff for school or the kiddos, that I lost track of making sure I have enough time for me to just read for fun. I push that idea with my kiddos so much, I need to remember to give myself that same chance as well. This year, my goal is to give myself a little bit of time each day, even if its 10 minutes before bed to just read a (non-teacher/professional) book.
Organization: On the whole I was pretty organized last year...except for the piles of paper I inevitably always had on my table in my classroom. I would either get it graded but not enter the grades at the same time or get it graded but forget to hand it back to my kiddos, or there would be 50 million things my admins would need from me right then and there and I wouldn't get a chance to grade the work right away. My goal this year is to implement a "touch it once" grading method so I can get the papers back to the kiddos ASAP. One of my teammates and I are planning on doing "grading parties" on Friday evenings each week so we can get everything graded, entered into the grade book, and into our kiddos mailboxes so they can go home on Monday.
Planning: Now that I have a year of teaching under my belt, and I'm staying in the same grade level, I have some plans I can reference as I write my new plans for this year. Having last year's plans as a resource will be helpful in planning and hopefully I can plan at least 2-3 weeks ahead.
Professional: Nevada requires teachers to complete 6 credits of CEUs every 5 years for license renewal. Now even though my license is good through 2017, I was able to complete 3.5 of those credits during the 2013-2014 school year. I'd like to get the rest of the credits done this school year so that way I'm not stressing about them once it's time to submit my renewal application.
Students: We used technology in a whole bunch of different ways in my classroom last year, but I noticed alot of times when I would give my kiddos group research to do, they would always ask me to find things online for them, or just still to their textbooks and other resource books we had in our room. My goal this year is to get my kiddos to be more self-sufficient with completing research online and more familiar with using technology as part of their own presentations in my classroom.
Motto: "New school, new year...things will be better" I loved almost everything about teaching last year. But the admins at my building were ineffective, didn't support the teachers, heavily played favorites, and there was a severe lack of communication all around which led to the entire staff having a depressingly low morale. Working at a charter, we're able to put in transfer requests to our sister schools, and I was lucky enough to get a 4th grade position at our charter's brand new campus for the 2014-2015 school year. The admin team for the new school is amazing (we've already had staff team building days and their communication is quick, on time, and clear). I'm also lucky since two of my teammates from my other school are transferring with me so we'll all be together in 4th grade again. Which is why I keep telling myself that this year will be a better year than last year.
What goals are you setting for yourself? Link up and share! Or...leave a comment below!
I had the same organizational goal last year and did really well with it, I hope it goes well for you! It is a huge weight lifted when ALL grades are done! Thanks for linking up!
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