New and Future Educators' Blog

By Lisa Dennis

• Preparation is key to successful Parent Teacher Conferences

  11/19/2009 3:24:49 PM

  Parent Teacher Conferences can be an intimidating experience for many new and future teachers as concerned parents who, with their son's or daughter’s best interest at heart, can sometimes put teachers on the defensive.
  
  In some of the best case scenarios, parents come to hear you heap praise on their offspring, smiling and nodding as you relate anecdotes to affirm their student’s brilliance. Other conferences involve willing parents who seek guidance on how to better help you help their children. But other meetings and circumstances can be downright intimidating.
  
  A few weeks ago, I experienced a conference night like never before. With three honors classes, one college preparatory class, and my first Advanced Placement class, I had a line of parents for three solid hours! While each conference was productive, the evening’s toll on my voice was certainly less than ideal for class the next day.
  
  No matter your school’s organization ...

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• Do your students think Google has always been a verb?

  11/9/2009 3:37:08 PM

  A few years ago, one of my graduate school professors shared an interesting list with my Curriculum Development Class. The Mindset List, created annually by Wisconsin’s own Beloit College, provides readers with a list of truths. Truths that can be used by college and K-12 educators alike to better understand the students entering our classrooms.
  
  For example, the college graduates of 2003, which included yours truly, grew up in a world where John Lennon had always been dead and more than half of our lives had been spent with the Simpsons on television.
  
  College graduates this past spring grew up in a world where photographs have always been processed in an hour or less and the Energizer bunny has forever been going… and going, and going.
  
  And some of the students that I have had the pleasure of teaching, students who will graduate college in 2013, have never had ...

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• A classroom battle ... with germs

  10/7/2009 1:23:47 PM

  I fought a hard battle this week. A hard, exhausting, slightly disgusting battle. A battle that proves that the smallest visitors to our classrooms don’t care that you have a college degree. I fought germs this week, and I lost.
  
  With the advent of the H1N1 virus in schools across the state, many of us can relate to a surge in both district-issued hand sanitizer and instructional videos demonstrating how to cough into the bent of our elbow. Students are encouraged to immediately tell a staff member if symptoms such as fever or sore throat crop up.
  
  So imagine my delight last Friday night as I gargled salt water and took my temperature every 20 minutes. No fever, but a fantastically stuffed up nose and sinus pressure to boot. Thankfully, no flu here. Instead, the first cold of the school year had arrived. Lovely.
  
  It stands to reason that with careful ...

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• The importance of knowing your students' names

  9/22/2009 4:44:53 PM

  The start of a new school year whispers promises of growth, achievement, and understanding. The time of year when new and veteran teachers alike wave goodbye to summer and embrace the opportunity to help our children learn lessons that will carry them beyond our classroom walls and into the world.
  
  It is also the time of year when these possibilities can seem overwhelming – especially to the rookies in our midst. My advice? Short-term goals.
  
  Take for example, my own latest anxiety: Names.
  
  Four days in and I am barely remembering to take attendance, much less identify my students by name. As a special bonus we encounter challenges like six kids in one class with the same name or a shy non-English speaker with a name no American born tongue can pronounce.
  
  In the business world, forgotten names can equate to missed opportunity. In the world of education, forgotten names ...

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