Day 1: A New Start

Instead of writing up a lot of nonsense about the structure of the first day, I figured I would go back to this post that I wrote last year and make a couple comments about things that changed so that I will be more prepared for Day 1 in 2017. So here we go...

• The morning started off with students all going from the gym into the auditorium so that the assistant principal could go over some of the rules, lunch menu, and to tell the 6th grade students that all 8th graders turn into monsters on Fridays. That lasted about 45 minutes.
• We dismissed by homeroom. Not every student knew who their homeroom teacher was. It helps to have lists of homeroom students. 
• The first thing I did with the students once the flight landed in the classroom was have them say my name. My name has ten letters. It is hard to say. Sure. End. Er. Now it isn't hard to say. 
• The locks were the first problem of the day. I tried showing a YouTube video this year. It did not do much for them or for me though. Never again. The only way to get through Lockapolooza is to have students try and fail. Give them feedback. Then have them try and fail better. Give them feedback. Then have them try and succeed. I think somewhere in my teaching journey I heard something about this process at a professional development seminar. 
• The classes themselves are kind of boring. Kids sitting. Me standing. I tried to do whole brain teaching, but kids were kind of dead. I think they were tired. I think they were scared. I think in a month I'm going to want some of them to be tired and scared again. 
• I changed the homework this year. In addition to having the forms signed, I asked students to log into their X2 and change their passwords. Habit forming! I also added bring supplies if you have not already. 

Regrets: When I give the schedules, I should really put in the labels for each class. The Day 1 Block 1 needs to be labeled A, the Day 1 Block 2 needs to be labeled B, etc. I missed this crucial direction this year.

Link of the Day: Greng jai is the feeling of being reluctant to accept another's offer of help because it is a burden on them. This article looks at ten other emotions you did not know you had thanks to the discoveries of neuroscience and of Tiffany Watt Smith from the University of London.