The Teach Joyfully Podcast

Whether you're going to be teaching online or preparing for next year in the classroom, teaching students your expectations is important in creating a smooth running classroom and students who know the boundaries and expectations. That doesn't change no matter where you teach. Your students will be happier and so will you!

Using read alouds is a simple strategy to help you teach all the important norms in your classroom and begin to develop a positive culture. Picture books are an engaging and fun way to open the conversation about expectations.

This episode might be short, but it deals with an important piece to starting your school year.

Sounds impossible, right?! It's completely possible with Outschool.

Have you heard about it? Well on this week's episode, I take a minute to talk you though this teaching option.

Teaching with Outschool is REAL. I know many teachers who have moved to this platform and have had great success generating an income and having fun doing it.

Did you know 40% of teachers leave education in the first 5 years of entering the classroom. Why? Well… teaching is HARD! The To Do lists are endless, the time crunch all day is real and you are asked to do more every year. The bathroom breaks are almost non-existent some days, and the kids are what make it all worth it. In fact, you'd do just about anything for your students and often do even at your own expense. Which means by the middle of the year, you're often surviving, not thriving.

I have a simple strategy to help you avoid that mistake. Here's a simple strategy to help you have the right words to say in the moment with no regrets later.

Has classroom management ever worn you out? Nearly every day? For a good part of the year?

Today is all about helping those students who struggle with their behavior nearly every single day. Now, let me just set the stage for you for a minute. If you've ever spent for an entire school year struggling to help a student [or students] regulate their emotions [and therefore their behavior], you're on a first name basis overwhelm and exhaustion. Well, this episode will help you begin to change that.

As you know I'm committed to helping teachers simplify and streamline in ways that save time, create engagement, are cost effective and make sense in the day to day of real teaching in the elementary classroom. So, today's episode is all about 3 tools I think every teacher needs, especially in our current, ever changing school environment.

While teaching at a workshop this last weekend, I realized what a disservice is being done to teachers who still don't know what kind of teaching they'll be doing in the fall. The uncertainty of not knowing what the school model will be is stressful and exhausting. Teachers are planners. We want to be prepared. However, it feels impossible to be prepared when we don't know what we are preparing for.

Well, I'm here to tell you being prepared is something you can start to do now even if you don't know what the fall will look like. We simply have to have a plan for what to change for each teaching model. So here goes...

Michelle Dunham and I talk about how to simply create a culture of readers and book lovers in your classroom by what you read, how you pair books and the conversations you start with your students. The steps are truly simple. Like anything new, it's not always easy at first, but the more you prep and practice the easier it becomes. It all starts with a love of books, a few paired books and the heart of a teacher.

Eliminating racism is a daunting task. No big, important goal is achieved in a day. While we can't eliminate racism today, we can start or restart our efforts. If we all make a simple 1% change each month in what we do, think, say or in supporting organizations that work to end racism, it will add up to big wins.

Figuring out where to start can be overwhelming, but as teachers, we have an easy place to start - our classroom libraries.

Helping students become committed readers is a daunting task, at best. And while there isn't a straight path for each student to follow, there is a method that actually works. Now's the time to start planning changes to your program for the coming year to keep the reading and learning going no matter what school looks like next year.