As I was stapling today (and I think I used an entire box), I was thinking about how quiet it was in my classroom and how it wouldn’t be for much longer. There is something about a new school year. Unsharpened pencils. Freshly waxed floors. Stacks of clean white notebook paper. Rosters with names of kids you have yet to meet. Exciting!
This year one of my plans is to encourage my students to set goals for themselves. So, I figure if I am going to expect them to set goals, why not set my own?
Here are my top ten goals for this year.
1. I will remember to allow students to struggle. I won’t come to the rescue when they are in the meaty part of learning!
2. I will make sure the feeback I give students is specific. I will refrain from saying “Wow!” or “Awesome!” repetedly and instead say things like “I especially like the way you did (insert task), and think that you might improve your writing by (insert suggestion).
3. I will make my lessons about the essential question and not the technology. Teaching is not PowerPoint. It’s not a Word Document. It’s not navigating a text book.
4. I will blog more. To blog is to reflect, to reflect is to make connections, and to make connections is to learn. I always have more to learn!
5. I will skip my morning Coke Zero for breakfast. It’s time. There, I type it. Now I will feel to guilty to drink one on Monday morning.
6. I will slow down. No, not in my car, in my lessons. I recognize that there are a million topics I want to cover… but what is that saying, “Go deeper with curriculum, not wider.”?
7. I will recognize the independence of each of my students. Just like snowflakes, no two kids are alike.
8. I will keep my desk drawers organized and clean.*
9. I will learn more about my students hobbies and try to bring their interests into the classroom even more. If life is about finding your passion, then kids need the chance to find theirs.
10. I will remember that real learning can be loud, messy, chaotic, fun, invigorating, exciting, exhausting, and embrace it!
*Note: Um… about the desk drawers, at least until the end of September.
What about you? Do you have goals for the new school year?
