Teacher Life

Week 5.1: Interviewing – Between the Lines

If you are looking for your first teaching job, you have probably found lists of practice interview questions on the Internet, heard the advice of everyone from your college professor to your student teaching supervisor to your parents, and bought your perfect interview outfit. So we’re not going to talk about that.

We’re going to talk about personality, finding the “right fit,” and how to read between the lines in interviews. Do school administrators lie during interviews – yes, they do. But they don’t call it lying, they call it “putting the best face on the situation.” But it’s more like lying. So, first bit of advice that you may take or leave: Don’t be afraid to ask the hard questions.

If you have the nerve, don’t ask about salary, benefits, and moving expenses. As a teacher, quality of life in the classroom is way more important than that extra thousand dollars a year. (Yeah, teachers don’t make enough money. That’s a given.) So ask about the other members of the department who you will be working with, ask about the school’s record of teacher longevity, ask about the level of parental involvement in the school. You can ask about your department budget; but even better, ask about available funding for field trips, new technology, and new books. Ask about the school’s discipline policy (hey, you’re equally in trouble if they have one or if they don’t, but at least you know if you agree with whatever policy they do have.) Finally, try to get a vibe about experimentation – do you have the freedom to change how teaching is done in the classroom, and try new methods of teaching? Or are you restricted in curriculum, by policy, by parental expectations, and by the head teacher in your department? It’s worth knowing.

I could hear the despair when you read that sentence about an extra thousand dollars a year. Benefits and salary are important, especially if you have the spouse and kids. But finding the “right fit” job for you has nothing to do with money. Hopefully no one reading this became a teacher because you thought you’d be raking it in. Even before your first interview, you have developed strong reasons for how and why you want to teach. Keep that sense of purpose in your mind as you interview – finding the right fit is about understanding the students more than the administrator and policies. They are the people you will be trying to form working relationships with on a daily basis – so see if you can observe or teach a class as part of your interview. A few schools already do this, and it’s GREAT.

In typical “Miss Teacher” fashion, I have presented you with contradictory statements in this post. Money both matters and doesn’t matter, the personality of your administrator both matters and doesn’t matter. You’re a professional and should be able to work with any other adult professional, but that doesn’t change the simple fact that you will simply mesh better with some people than others. It is worth it to keep interviewing until you find those people. Administrators do lie, but keep looking until you find one you can work with and feel comfortable with – similar to previous posts about “mentors.”

I feel like a guru at this point, staring at you and saying in a deep, portentous tone, “KNOW Thyself.” Do that, but hey, the best thing to do is to go to multiple interviews and analyze them before making any decisions. Get out there! Good luck.

Extra resources: Please refer to paragraph 1 of this post.
Next week: What Do We Take Seriously?

Week 4.4: Mentors

Who do you consider to be your greatest mentor in life? How about your greatest mentor for your professional job? If you can name several people that you look up to, but cannot name someone who helps you professionally to become a better teacher, than that means you should be on the hunt for a mentor.

What we’re looking for in this post is the “Goldilocks” mentor. This is someone whose knowledge level is “just right” for mentoring. For example, we’ll take a Social Studies teacher in their 6th year of teaching. This teacher is experienced, has developed many classroom activities that consistently engage students, and has a demeanor that focuses on the classroom work rather than how the classroom is run (see last week’s post, Student Led Discipline). For this teacher to find an effective mentor, they will need to look for someone with neither too little or too much experience in the field of Social Studies teaching.

Too little, and the person won’t be able to relate to your work enough to suggest useful new things to try. Too much, and the person will likely be too “stuck” in their ways to recognize the changes you need to make to improve as a teacher.

One of my pet peeves is how difficult it is to find someone open to trading classroom ideas with me. I like to see teachers branching out of their subject matter, considering off-site learning experiences, experimenting with ways to teach new material, and generally getting away from textbooks and essays. Most importantly though, a mentor should be someone that you trust enough to bring your problems to. Education stops at the door if you rely on academic teaching approaches that do not connect with the students. It is impossible to improve as a teacher if you are not willing to admit your mistakes; even something as simple as, “I showed a bias when explaining that law and didn’t discuss the other side.”

So, when looking for a mentor, try to find one who is the least judgemental. I bet that when you thought of your greatest mentor in life, it has more to do with what kind of person the mentor is rather than what they do or what they have accomplished. Kindness is key. And I have just invalidated my analogy to Goldilocks because she is obviously an extremely judgemental person. Everything has to be just right!

So look for a balanced mentor, put those feelers out there, and find someone you can talk to professionally. Hopefully, the working relationship you develop will markedly improve how you teach, no matter what stage of experience you are at.

Have a good mentor story? Share by commenting or emailing teachingismadhard@gmail.com.

Resources:

http://www.aasa.org/content.aspx?id=10502

You don’t see many resources that advocate for experienced teachers still having a mentor, so check this out in the business world. Lifelong learners, remember! https://hbr.org/2015/04/ceos-need-mentors-too

Next week: Interviewing: Between the Lines

Week 4.2: Public, Private, or Other?

Week 4.2: Public, Private, or Other?

I absolutely love how many forms of K-12 education there are in the United States. Government education policies are operating in a “one size fits all” mentality, but teachers, parents, nonprofits, grant-makers, and students are operating in a “variety is the spice of life” mentality. While I don’t have the requisite knowledge to explain why education at the federal level is so disconnected from the teacher’s level; or why a school in one town is so differently run from the next school 20 miles away; I can explain a bit about the different types. This list is all in the hope that a teacher looking for a job will know what atmosphere they can expect.

All of these forms of education are student-centered, but we’ll begin with the most student-centered of all.

Home Schooling:

A controversial form of education if ever there was one. Pros: The student has all the personal attention they could ever want. The student can work at their own speed. Cons: The student has a more difficult time socializing and misses out on school-organized events, such as sports, clubs, and dances. The student may not experience the same routine of assignments, exams, and presentations that are meant to transition to college work.

Interviewing: For teachers, it isn’t a job option 🙂

Online School:

First it didn’t exist, then it wasn’t taken very seriously, then it was used by people in remote locations or by adults pursuing a college degree, now it is becoming a viable option for everyone. Unless you are a teacher using an online forum as part of your on-site class; or teaching one online course as a way of supplementing your income, I don’t recommend it, for only one reason: you don’t experience the human component of interacting with your students face-to-face. I write a blog, and assume that my words don’t always capture my meaning, no matter how hard I try. Think how much more difficult it would be with a 50 person online course!

Interviewing: Prepare a response about how you will best reach students via online discussion, about how you will deal with poorly-written or angrily-written posts, and about your familiarity with technology.

Private School:

Also known as “where the rich people go.” Parents who have the resources to pay tuition for 12 YEARS may choose to send their student to a private school. The pros are many: students receive more personal attention, students and parents are more likely to take part in extracurriculars, the school often hosts all-school learning or volunteer projects. The only con in this part of education is entitlement. It can be difficult working with, for lack of a better term, “spoiled” students, because they have a sense that the world revolves around them. For the most part however, you can simply ignore the designer labels and enjoy the “anything is possible” atmosphere.

Interviewing: Use all of your typical teacher preparation, and include some creative ideas for your classroom that include a method of opening your students’ minds to the world around them.

Charter School:

This is the one type of school that I have never personally worked in. From observing other teachers and schools, I can say that I am very intrigued by charter schools. In many ways, they seem to combine the best of public and private schools. Pros: smaller, student-centered, friendly environment. Cons: Lack of state support. A charter school may receive funding from the government, but may have restrictions on sport leagues, state music ensembles, and other participation in public school offerings. It is important to find the right balance of parental involvement in the classroom – some charter schools may feel too overloaded by individual ideas, whereas some seem exactly like a public school.

Interviewing: Do your research about the school. If the school offers extracurriculars, that is a good sign for the finances and capabilities of the school.

Public School:

The most accessible form of education, public school systems exist everywhere, including in small towns in Nebraska with a population of 300 and in Texas where the freshman class alone may be over 400 students. Public schools are the most closely-related to government policy, and are not funded by student tuition. Curriculum mapping is a constant project for the teacher, and writing lesson plans that reference state or federal requirements is common. Some are successful, some are not; some have metal detectors and fighting in the hallways, some do not. Generally, as a teacher you will have a mixture of everything: students who range from failing to straight-A grades, both a budget and fundraising, older policies that you want to change and newer policies that you want to change.

Interviewing: Do your research! For example, if the principal talks mainly about test scores, that tells you something about the school environment.

International School:

Also known as “where the rich expats go.” See “Private Schools” but also know that international schools can vary from any other US or IB school because of the lack of U.S. policy and curriculum. An international school can be the most experimental, exploratory place for teachers and students, and can be either amazing or horrifying. I do have some experience in teaching in an international school overseas, and I invite you to email me at teachingismadhard@gmail.com for more information about pursuing these positions.

When job searching, the teacher may have all the options in the world, or need to take the first job offered. I simply hope that as you develop your teacher personality, you will discover the forum that best suits you. There isn’t one “right” way to teach. There are thousands! Have fun experimenting!

I would love to hear from you on your experiences with different types of schools! Comment below or email teachingismadhard@gmail.com!

Next week: Student-Led Discipline

Week 4.1: Masters Degree – Worth It?

Week 4.1: Masters Degree – Worth It?

Teachers choose to earn advanced degrees for so many different reasons today, and there are many different pathways to get you there. Some of those pathways:

Online college courses
Online certificate programs
Combined online course with a once-a-week in person meeting
Summer programs where a graduate degree is earned in 3-4 consecutive summers of course-taking
A year-long sabbatical granted from your job to earn a degree, before returning to the same job
Full-time graduate degrees at a university, usually with a teaching assistant position at the university

And these are some of the reasons teachers pursue these pathways:

To earn a higher salary
To earn highly-qualified status, and therefore be more likely to be hired
To become a principal or administrator
To become a teacher of a different discipline
To renew a teaching certificate through college credit
For a break from teaching!
Moving to a new home, and taking the extra time to pursue a graduate degree

Everything on these lists is beneficial. The only con is cost – you can rack up a lot of student debt pursuing a full-time degree without a teaching assistantship or scholarship; or spend a good chunk of your salary taking part-time classes. Masters degrees in education can help you reflect on your teaching career so far, can help you develop new ideas and perspective, and can help you go deeper into your discipline and the state of education in the country. In terms of academic publishing, working with college professors and other members of your career, and becoming an administrator, there is no better pathway than a full-time degree. In fact, the best programs will allow you to keep one foot in the public school and the other foot in the academic world of college.

But, let’s argue the other side.

Essentially, there are two versions of a Masters degree. The part-time version, with online courses or one course at a time, is not engaging. You will still be focusing more on your teaching duties rather than the coursework, and there is only so much that can be learned through an online course without in-school observation and discussion. You are unlikely to make lasting relationships with other educators and college professors. Are you the kind of teacher who will take enough focused time to learn something of value through this method?

The full-time degree is extremely fun. You will experience an amazing mixture of college student life and adult relationships with other working professionals and professors. If your goal is to become a college professor, this is the best start. However, you will likely need to quit your job, move, uproot your spouse or family if you have one, and spend lots of money without a salary coming in. Sometimes you are starting over in a new state. By the time you are done with your 1-2 year degree; you may have to apply for a teaching certificate in a new state, you may have lost a few old connections or references, and most dangerous of all, your mind will be completely different – you won’t see the teaching career in the some way, and you may have fallen out of practice. Are you the kind of teacher who will remember everything you learned without regressing to college student mentality?

If I play the cynic, I could tell you that the reason there are so many articles about the benefits of Masters degrees is because colleges want you to pay them more money. I could tell you that teachers feel like they have to earn an advanced degree in order to be hired and make enough money to live on (ironic). Finally, I could say that academia has lost touch with the reality of teaching, and that many of the teaching methods you study will not be relevant to your classroom.

But I’m not a cynic, and my 2-year, full-time Masters degree was one of the best times of my life. So I will give you the most informative advice I have, which is this:

Research the available graduate programs to an obsessive point before making your decision. Find the most flexible, hands-on, partnering-with-local-schools program that you can. Substitute teach while pursuing your degree, in order to not lose real-world perspective. A Masters is nowhere near as hard or mentally draining as a full-time teaching job; so take advantage of your “learning vacation” to be involved in the college, the community, the government, everything that you can do, now that you are an adult professional. Basically what I’m saying is, don’t waste your time!

We really don’t live in a world anymore where people become college professors based on life experience. (No really – graduate degrees didn’t hold nearly as much importance 40 years ago. Several of my undergraduate professors never earned a doctorate.) Since that world is gone, make the most of your “required” Masters, and don’t forget that life experience is still the best way to become a better teacher.

Have fun studying! Some graduate degree resources are below. And next week: Public, Private, Charter, or Other?

More resources about advanced degrees:

https://teach.com/how-to-become-a-teacher/get-educated/benefits-masters-in-education/

Week 3.4: The Power of Reflection

Week 3.4: The Power of Reflection

It is time to celebrate the end of the first three months of this blog, Teaching is Mad Hard. Luckily, the title still applies. But we’re going to celebrate by reflecting, not on the last three months, but on the power of reflection!

I still remember being a teacher aid in high school, spending a class period making copies, organizing files, or whatever else for my favorite high school teacher. I happily blame him now for being the inspiration behind my own career choice – oh, if I had only known! Anyway, one day I went in the teacher’s office to put something away, and he looked up from his computer and said, “You know, everything we do is about perspective.” I had NO IDEA what he was talking about, or why he was talking about it. It was a completely out-of-the-blue statement. He was apparently having that kind of day.

But now I get it.

I get that a teacher can choose to be positive or negative. I get that you never really know what a person means through an email. I get that every action you make depends on how you see yourself, how you see other people, and how you see your job. And finally, I get that hindsight is 20/20.

Everything we do is about perspective!

Through reflection, teachers can develop their perspective. That is why there are so many resources and teacher development classes that talk about videotaping yourself, as we mentioned in last week’s post, and keeping a teacher diary. In fact, some of most valuable advice I have received came from a college teacher who encouraged the use of a journal. Basically, you just write a little bit about teaching every week in your journal. The benefit to keeping a job diary is a bit different than when you kept your first diary at age 12 or so. Because instead of talking about the middle school Valentine’s Day Dance, now you’re thinking about other ways to handle parent situations in the future. Or maybe you’re still talking about the dance, and how nasty it is to see eighth graders kissing. Thank goodness you’re mature now!

The perspective that journal reflection provides is a time-warping, honest kind of reflection. How many times growing up did you tell yourself that you were going to remember what it is like to be in middle school? And how much have you forgotten? Or, thinking relevantly, how many times have you told yourself that you were going to try a new technique in class, and then were too busy to do it? Reflection can lead to useful change in the classroom; and perspective makes you a better teacher whether you are knowingly changing or not.

So, good luck digging through all of your experiences up to now. Remember, everything we do is about perspective. But just know that if you say that to your students, they won’t really understand you until they become teachers.

Share your tips about reflection by commenting below or emailing teachingismadhard@gmail.com.

Why no extra resources this week? Because, your years of experience are the best reflection resources out there!

Next week: Interviewing!

Week 3.1: Blowing off Steam & Teacher Dropouts

Happy New Year all! Back to school with all our goals for the spring semester. May they last at least one month…

To start the New Year, we’re getting a leg-up on how we’re all going to feel in March. Blowing off steam! This is a tricky subject, and one of the posts taking me the longest to write. How do teachers let off steam caused by work issues? If we go out and drink with our fellow teacher friends, might not a parent see us and decide we are too irresponsible to teach their kid? If we bottle up frustration, we risk leaving the profession through sheer unhappiness. If we have hobbies, all well and good, but building a model sailboat doesn’t really help us deal with our job.

I’ve tried many things – tequila Thursday with friends, movie marathons with junk food, driving to the next town over every weekend to hang out where I was unlikely to run into students and parents, etc. The only thing that really keeps me clear-headed is exercise; something I’m pretty bad at remembering to do. But for some reason, running, hiking, or doing any kind of solitary exercise helps me stay centered. So, first of all, you can look for the activity that keeps you clear-headed – and I can tell you that venting with fellow teachers is not that thing.

Second of all, I have to bring up an old story. The story of when I was talking to a first-year teacher a while ago and we bonded over how we are “teacher zombies” during the week and on the weekend we remember that we are living, vibrant, people with great personalities. The mental switch from “teacher self” to “myself” can be extreme. So, I suggest that each week, you find a way to bring who you are into your classroom. Share a story from your college days, share one book that you enjoyed, plan a lesson around something you remember from growing up – anything to combine your disparate selves. In the long run, it will help you remember who you were, who you are, and who your students are, something that we forget is so important when demonstrating that we are on the students’ side.

Besides bringing your unique personality into your classroom, I think the best thing is to change the game completely – don’t even use words like “stress” or “letting off steam” or “it was a tough week and I need a DRINK.” All of these phrases only emphasize the problem and keep you living in your stress for longer than you need to. So on Friday afternoon, right before you leave, I recommend doing three weirdly psychological things:

Make a quick list of things to deal with next week. (5 minutes on this, max.)
Read CNN headlines for 2 minutes and remember how good you have it.
Name three things that went well in your classroom this week and make a note to thank your students for them on Monday morning.

Now proceed to your weekend, stress-free! Or thereabouts.

I would like to propose that the extremely high number of teachers who leave the profession in the first five years all encounter something they are not expecting in their first teaching jobs. They are trying to resolve their disparate selves – they are trying to develop a teacher personality while remembering their favorite teachers, while dealing with parents who only see how young they are, and while realizing that staying enthusiastic while surrounded by teenagers is just plain hard work and involves an element of acting. There is no room to have a “bad day” in teaching, because it is work that is up-close and personal every day, for much longer than 8 hours a day. There are plenty of stressful jobs out there, but most of them depend on you, rather than you and 25 teenagers.

The sources below offer a few more ideas explaining teacher-dropout rates, as well as giving the dropout statistics. Have your own idea, based on the new teachers you have observed or your own experience? Have you discovered an effective way to blow off steam? Please share by leaving a comment or emailing teachingismadhard@gmail.com. We would love to learn from your experience!

Interesting Reading:

NCES: https://nces.ed.gov/pubsearch/pubsinfo.asp?pubid=2015337

http://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2014/07/18/332343240/the-teacher-dropout-crisis

https://www.theguardian.com/teacher-network/2015/jan/27/workload-new-teachers-work-life-balance

http://www.teachhub.com/professional-development-why-do-teachers-quit

Next week, those VIP’s are back: it’s VIP’s: Very Involved Parents, part 2.

Week 2.1: Introducing Me

I am a teacher (obviously). I don’t consider myself a particularly old teacher, although the first year of teaching counts as 10 years of experience in my opinion! In my career so far, I have taught Grades 5-12, taught multiple subjects, and taught in both public and private schools. I have also taught overseas in an American international school.

Now, you can see my main purpose in writing this blog on the “What’s It All About” page, accessed by the links at the top right of your screen. But personally, I write this blog as a way to reflect, to consolidate and learn from my experiences, and to not forget the way that a teacher develops throughout their career. So basically, this blog is therapy (Fish are friends, not food).

I also write this blog because I want to be your Dear Abby, should you ever need one. Send teachingismadhard@gmail.com an anonymous email without specifics about where you teach, and I will respond with empathy, suggestions, or resources. Email a blog post about a teaching issue that is important to you, and I will share it. Write your own blog, and I will share the link and like your page. Teaching is MAD hard, but everyone has the power to reach students in a profound way, and I am here to help in any way that I can. Put your frustration out there where it will do some good – by helping another teacher not get into the same situation you found yourself in.

I have felt sad and alone at many times in my teaching, and if you simply need a fellow teacher’s recognition for what you are trying to do, I am here for that too.

So use this blog as your own, and use the information in any way you like!

Next week, we’ll start a very involved two-parter: VIP’s: Very Involved Parents!

Extra resources? It may be that the only extra resources you need this week are your amazing coworkers. Or your diary. Or your therapist.

Week 4: Being an Island, Staying Connected

Week 4: Being an Island, Staying Connected

I make a commitment to be as honest as possible in each of these posts – I really do believe that half-truths in teaching cause as much trouble as lies. Honesty is the same thing as integrity, and both those things make life simpler and more valuable.

The current political climate is bad for integrity. (If anyone is reading this 5 years later, or something, Trump was just elected.) People are angry, sad, confused, and they will be that way off and on for a long time. This leads to an extremely divisive society, and for some teachers who have felt this way at work, you know how much of your soul can be sucked away by that kind of climate. So it is as good a time as any to talk about not being an island.

Unlike classroom discipline tips, the advice to stay connected to other people in order to not get buried in work is prevalent. So what can I add to the party? Perhaps just a comment on leaving work at work. Early in my teaching years I was the kind of teacher who thought every activity outside of work had to be in some way connected to work, meaning that I spent most evenings at school competitions and events or volunteering for school clubs and community events. This approach does help a new teacher get to know the community they have chosen to join, and may help stave off miscommunication with parents down the road. However, for any teacher, too much time at “work” will make you go crazy (you may find yourself at your computer, typing the same sentence over and over, until you crack and stagger out into a snowstorm…you know what I mean?)

I recently met with a friend who just began their first year of teaching – they have joined the noble ranks of the teaching profession. This means that we were able to have a moment of telepathic understanding about teacher life. The moment was this: that you can easily be an overwhelmed zombie during the week, and on the weekend, you remember that you are an interesting person with a great personality and lots of friends. Where does that person go during the school week?

So, leave work at work. Do not live, eat, and breathe your job. The proof that this is important comes from teachers who are leaving the profession because they feel as though they can’t keep up – one is linked below in the extra resources. Staying connected to yourself is as important as connecting with friends, co-workers, and the community. And when John Donne said that “no man is an island” I do not think he meant only that everyone needs help, or that it is impossible to hide from society. I think he also meant that no man is an island inside – everyone is multi-faceted. Think about the fact that Mr. Donne was born in 1572 – math teachers, how long has staying connected been an issue?

The other main point about staying connected regards how connected you are. Sadly, going out with fellow teachers on Friday night to drink and vent is not as helpful as we would like! You still wake up on Saturday with the same problems as last week. Here’s the hard part – opening up and getting help with your teaching; letting others know you are serious about improving. And why is this tough? See Week 2: Learning to Trust.

In a nutshell (or in a coconut shell carried here by a European or African swallow):

Remember who you are outside of your job.
Connect with others as honestly as you do socially.

Next week! I’ll introduce myself a bit more! In the meantime, share your tips about what works for you in order to stay connected to others and yourself!

Connect with these amazing sources:

What can you do in order to balance your life and learn from this teacher’s experience?http://www.independent.co.uk/news/education/schools/a-teacher-speaks-out-im-effectively-being-forced-out-of-a-career-that-i-wanted-to-love-9695706.html

Need to smile right now? Check out Bored Teacher: https://boredteachers.com/blogs/the-faculty-room

Your local library! Singles or couples groups! Gyms! Pottery classes! Community music! Nonprofit volunteering!

Week 1: Take the “Student” Out of Student Teacher

We begin with a POP QUIZ!

What is the main difference between a student teacher and a teacher?

a. Maturity

b. Accountability

c. Salary

d. Responsibility

Duh, the answer is b. Accountability. (You may have been tempted to go for c. Salary, but don’t forget some student teachers have part-time jobs, so they can keep paying their rent in the semester before getting that “real” job.) As soon as you book that gig and have spent a week over the summer (or three weeks, if you’re precocious) decorating your classroom, you are suddenly flooded with confidence. You are a real adult now, and you are in charge of what happens in YOUR classroom. Heaven help you.

Student teaching is hugely important. You get to experience the schedule of a teacher, which is highly regulated; and you get to observe how they work with students in the classroom. If you’re lucky, you may even get to teach an entire unit of instruction and be present at staff meetings and parent-teacher conferences. It is the first time that you are acting as an adult, every day, away from the supervision of your professors. Congratulations!

Student teaching is also not an accurate representation of teaching. For one thing, not being the only adult in the classroom means that there is always someone there to step in if things get CRAZY. (Examples of crazy: the technology isn’t working, three students can not stop talking about the school dance, and another student just spilled the orange juice that they were trying to sneak a drink of.) Imagine Mad-Eye Moody saying “ACCOUNTABILITY” in the same tone of voice as “CONSTANT VIGILANCE.”

Also, some supervising teachers meet the requirements of the college student teaching semester, and the rest of the time, treat the student teacher as a glorified teacher aide. They don’t mean to, but they have a very good reason: It’s because the teacher only has a certain amount of time to make sure their classroom is prepared for the next test, the next performance, or the next state-mandated unit. It’s because the students will not see you as a “real” teacher yet, so they will treat your lessons with less seriousness – for you, it is serious business, but for them, it is a holiday from regular class time. This could also mean that the students will treat you BETTER than your students will treat you when you are the official teacher. Strange, but true – student teaching can give you “false” confidence.

Which brings us to two major recommendations about the student teacher to teacher transition:

Confidence. See yourself as a mature adult, and believe that what you have to give the students is important. Practice your teacher persona immediately, rather than “babysitting” and making friends with every student. Think about how your student teaching experience is more than your last passing grade before graduation. This is so difficult to do – but it will help you transform the student perspective to the teacher perspective.
Communication. Ask your mentor teacher deeper questions – dig for the real story about their job, their classroom budget, the school community, parental involvement in the classroom, and more. Ask them to explain how teaching in their first years was different from what they expected. Compare the amount of time you spend on your lesson plans with how much time your mentor teacher spends on theirs. Don’t be afraid to ask them anything – and ask them if you can stay in contact with them after your semester is over! I guarantee, the answer will be yes.

Next week’s post, “Learning to Trust,” will branch out on the topic of not being afraid to communicate, with some examples from the classroom of yours truly. In the meantime, if you want more, empathize and ask questions on the discussion page! Also, here are three articles about the student teacher to teacher transition:

“6 Lessons I Learned as a Student Teacher” by Heather Sinclair Wood, CNN: http://schoolsofthought.blogs.cnn.com/2013/06/17/from-career-to-classroom-6-things-i-learned-as-a-student-teacher/

“What Advice Would You Give a Student Teacher?” by Jennifer Gonzalez: http://www.cultofpedagogy.com/student-teaching/

Available with access to ERIC or 2 weeks free on deepdyve.com: “Jumping in: trust and communication in mentoring student teachers” by Randi Nevins Stanulis and Dee Russell

Image from this interesting blog: http://trampleasure.net/lee/index.php/865

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