The Teacher's Guide Podcast

Alex Collins is currently in his second year teaching high school in Cairns. He teaches a variety of subjects including HPE, Maths, Geography, History & English. This episode we discuss:- Remembering why we teach: for the students- Creating engaging lessons- Building professional relationships with students- Teaching multiple subject areas in High School- Classroom Management- Tips for reporting/marking Here is a link to the Bill Rogers classroom management vid...

Matt Jensen has a background in teaching Drama, English & more recently – drone technology! He’s currently working as an education officer – digital technologies with Brisbane Catholic education. This episode we discuss:- Using explicit direct instruction teaching pedagogies- Teaching multiple subject areas in High School- Essential Skills for Classroom Management- Debriefing & mentoring- Adapting to the learning styles of students in each classroom Here is a l...

Why do you teach? Or for aspiring teachers, why do you want to teach?The 'Why We Teach' series interviews 8 passionate Australian teachers about why they love their job, and how they overcome some of the pressures of the teaching profession. Today's episode is a conversation with high school music teacher Megan Field. Megan shares her journey of joining a foundation school as a music teacher, to then teaching subjects such as English, Maths, Science, Drama and Religion. He...

Why do you teach? Or for aspiring teachers, why do you want to teach?The 'Why We Teach' series interviews 8 passionate Australian teachers about why they love their job, and how they overcome some of the pressures of the teaching profession. Today's episode is a conversation with Gold Coast based primary teacher Karen Caswell. Karen shares with us her most successful lessons & units of work, what she loves about teaching, some of the challenges she's faced, and what keeps h...

Why do you teach? Or for aspiring teachers, why do you want to teach?The 'Why We Teach' series interviews 8 passionate Australian teachers about why they love their job, and how they overcome some of the pressures of the teaching profession. Today's episode is a conversation with Brisbane based high school teacher & pastoral leader Steph Langley. Here are 5 of my takeaways from Steph's sharing: 1. Sometimes teachers need to drop the urgent to focus on the important;2. ...

Dr Stephen Brown shares with us how we as teachers can build our leadership skills at all stages of our teaching career . Some of the questions Dr Stephen encourages us to ask ourselves are:1. How curious was I today?2. How many real questions did I ask?3. Who & what is helping me to become a better leader and teacher?4. Who did I reach out to today?5. How did I show up as the best version of myself for my students today?6. Was I prepared & focussed?7. Before I start each day, what wa...

As teachers we have so many tools at our disposal to help us create engaging learning environments for our students. One of those tools is data. This episode explores: - Why teachers should be interested in student data- Data for wellbeing- Data for teaching & learning- How to source data through formative tasksThis episode guest is Dr Selena Fisk. Selena is a data coach, author of two books and the principal consultant for Aasha for schools.She was a recipient of the 2019 The Australian ...

The four year university degree that many of us completed did a great job of teaching us the theory we need to know as teachers. But what about the practical, day-to-day parts of teaching?In this episode Sally Williams (teacher, author & education consultant) and I speak about 5 elements of the teaching role that we weren't necessarily taught at Uni. We discuss: 1. Your classroom2. Planning3. Students4. Parents5. ColleaguesSince beginning her teaching career, Sally always f...

What are the secrets to a successful first year as a teacher?Alisha from Rainbow Sky Creations joins us on the podcast this week to give us 5 of her best tips. In short, here are her 5 tips: 1. Get organised – know where everything in your classroom will be stored. Worksheets. Resources. Make a place for everything. 2. Routine & expectations. Practice these and remind your students again and again. 3. Find time in your week to plan t...

A few weeks ago I attended an online conference about visible learning and other teaching strategies. I particularly enjoyed a presentation by American based Educator Douglas Fisher. Along with Nancy Frey, Douglas has done research about many aspects of teaching, but what caught my attention was this idea of Collective teacher efficacy & credibility among colleagues & students. On this scale, there are 4 types of teachers There’s the teacher we’ll call the ‘amplifier...