Shaping Little Minds

The education system is far from perfect. We suck it up and make it the best experience for our students. But what happens when we start using our voices?  Our voices become a ripple effect, no matter what age we teach. Change can start to happen within education, all because we spoke up. 

Today, I have the incredible Carla Ward on the podcast talking about why it is CRITICAL for educators to speak out and stop staying silent. 

Carla a passionate Early Childhood Educator with over 20 years of experience in the profession. She’s the founder of Early Learning Foundations, where she supports educators through workshops, consulting, and professional development resources that empower them to thrive in their careers.

3 KEY TAKEAWAYS:

• You don't have to be loud and extroverted to speak up
• Raising our voices can change the negative rhetoric there is around teaching, specifically early childhood education
• You aren't going to be everyone's cup of tea and that's OKAY!

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• Grab a seat at Transform Your Teaching: End the Year with a BANG. Day 2 is happening Wednesday!
• Get my free workshop on the key elements to help you thrive in the classroom

MORE FROM CARLA:

• Grab your seat at her FREE workshop 6 Key Decisions to Make Before Starting an ECE Podcast
• Follow Carla @elfoundations

MORE FROM ME:

• Follow Adva @coachforteachers

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The end of the school year can feel overwhelming, stressful, and honestly never ending. This episode is your step by step guide to help you wrap up your year, without draining what’s left in your tank. I will take you through various different actions you can take in order to not only end your year without burnout but also feel confident in your readiness for the new school year. 

• Segment 1: "What to do now so you don’t hate yourself in August"
• Segment 2: "Leave your classroom like a gift to future you"
• Segment 3: "You are not behind—you’re exactly where you need to be"

3 KEY TAKEAWAYS:

• As stressful as the end of the school year might, it is the perfect time to document, reflect and organize so that you come into the next school feeling confident and organized.
• Future you will be so grateful that you took the steps to clean and organize at the end of this school year.
• Feeling behind will never get you to where you want to be. It's important to know that you are exactly where you need to be. 

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• Grab your seat to a 3 day event for teachers
• Get my free workshop on the key elements to help you thrive in the classroom

MORE FROM ME:

• Follow: @coachforteachers
• Grab the Show Notes for this episode

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In case no one's told you... I give you full permission to rest each day and whenever you feel you need it.

In this episode, Adva dives into the culture we currently live in as US citizens and why creating space for rest is a better option. You'll learn that society encourages and promotes busy-ness, even if it comes at a cost. Adva will uncover why that's harmful to most human beings, what the research says regarding rest, and give you a chance to reflect on your beliefs around rest and productivity.

3 KEY TAKEAWAYS:

• Rest is critical to our well being as humans. It heals your body, boosts creativity, reduces stress, improves productivity, and enhances decision making.
• In order to walk away from teaching being all consuming, there are shifts that need to be made and boundaries that need to be set. 
• Rest is a super power for all human beings, but especially for teachers who are always trying to keep up with the workload.

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• Grab your free guide to help you stop feeling like work and life are in competition. 5 Steps to Create Harmony at Work and in Life.

MORE FROM ME:

• Follow Adva @coachforteachers
• You can learn more about the podcast through my website. www.coachforteachers.com/podcast 

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If you've ever wondered what it would be like to integrate AI into your day to day as a teacher, this is the episode for you.

In today's podcast episode, I had the pleasure of having Chris Hull, a former educator turned founder of Otus, an education technology company. Otus provides schools across the U.S. with comprehensive solutions for assessments, data management, and insights into student performance. 

What we've covered on today's podcast:

• how AI can support teachers in their day to day
• helping teachers feel more comfortable integrating AI into their classrooms
• Benefits students can have from being exposed to AI in the classroom
• Thoughts on teachers who are resistant or anti- technology inside the classroom

Get my FREE resource, 5 Steps to Create Harmony between Work and Life

Connect with Chris on LinkedIn

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When our students have big emotions, we know the tools they need in order to help them regulate those emotion. When we have those big emotions, have we truly learned to regulate them? In today's episode, I dive into steps you can take to help yourself regulate your own emotions so that you can show up different in your life outside of the classroom, no matter what kind of day it was at school. 

Get Your Copy of The Teacher Playbook

Get my free workshop on the key elements to help you thrive in the classroom

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There's a burnout crisis in the teaching world and my mission is to help as many teachers as I possibly can navigate the "how" of navigating and healing burnout. In today's episode, I dive into my journey through burnout and the 3 key actions I took to help myself come out of burnout and avoid it rearing it's ugly head again after going back to teaching. 

• Morning Pages
• Unlearning
• Creating time for REST

Tune in to hear more about these actions and how they can help you to navigate and heal the burnout you might be struggling with currently. 

Please keep in mind that I am only sharing what has worked for me. If you need outside support, please don’t hesitate to go get it. I am not a licensed therapist - I am here to share what’s worked for me. 

Get Your Copy of The Teacher Playbook

Get my free workshop on the key elements to help you thrive in the classroom

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If you've ever heard yourself say... "I have to work after hours in order to be a good teacher." Or something along the lines of: "there's too much work to be able to leave work at work." This is the episode you're going to want to dive into today! In today's episode we cover 3 ways you can maximize your time in school to create more harmony between work and life. 

• Curate more self-awareness
• Prioritization
• Set firm boundaries

I give you a process you can take in order to make each of these things happen. These are the processes I give my clients when they struggle with managing their time.

Get The Teacher Playbook today!

Get my free workshop on the key elements to help you thrive in the classroom

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This is the episode I wish I had access to when I was first starting out. These are must-have essentials for classroom teachers. In this episode, I give you physical must-haves, tech must-haves, and teaching must haves. Each of the resources I provide, I've personally used for my own classroom.

Join me at The Everything ECE Summit

Get my free workshop on the key elements to help you thrive in the classroom

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If you are currently dealing with burnout because of struggles in the classroom but have no clue how to make things better, this episode is for you. I wholeheartedly believe that the key to helping you when things aren't working the way you'd like, is to ask yourself the hard questions and take the time to reflect. In today's podcast episode, I give you reflective questions you can ask yourself both as a veteran teacher and a new teacher. 

Join me for a free workshop on Sunday

Join me at The Everything ECE Summit

Get my free workshop on the key elements to a thriving classroom

Support the show

If you're looking for ways to take back your time rather than constantly working, this is the place for you. Teaching can feel extraordinarily overwhelming and stressful given the workload. It can consume our lives if we let it. In today's episode, I dive into 3 tools I used to help me leave work at work, no guilt. 

As I mentioned in the episode, I've definitely discussed these tools but I strongly believe that if you take the tools and implement them, it can help you to change the way you approach teaching and take back your time. 

Apply for Teaching Transformed (1:1 coaching)

Join me at The Everything ECE Summit

Get my free workshop on the key elements of a thriving classroom

Support the show