Establishing classroom rules is extremely important. However, what’s even more important is consistently enforcing consequences for rule breaking. These consequences, of course, should be meted out with kindness and confidence. This will help ensure that everyone learns in a classroom that is calm and controlled.
Lesson Planning
Understanding how lesson plans work is the first step to creating interesting and exciting ones for students. Teacher-training programs provide multiple models of lesson planning. Perhaps the most popular and “in vogue” technique is Jay McTighe and Grant Wiggins’ Understanding by Design. In their fundamental book, McTighe and Wiggins explain how to create lesson plans that match the skills and knowledge essential to the unit. They include templates to help new teachers organize their material in a succinct and structured fashion.
Plan Ahead
Often, new teachers are not given a lot of advance notice about their curricula. The more notice teachers get, however, the more time they have to prepare lessons that are engaging and informative. The general rule of thumb for teachers is that they should plan one unit in advance (units can range from one week to two months).
Veteran Teachers as Mentors
With lesson planning and classroom management, veteran teachers who act (and are paid) as mentors for new teachers are the key piece of the puzzle. A recent article in The Washington Postpointed out that the main difference between teachers whose first year “makes” or “breaks” them was the presence of mentors. With experienced teachers observing and being observed by first-year teachers, giving advice, and lending a hand, teachers’ performances were rated as significantly higher. Parents, students, and teachers all felt that the year was an overwhelming success.