Teaching in the Primary Grades

Some of the best advice I got as a new teacher was to make sure that I had a positive contact with each student's parent during the first few weeks of the school year. Every year that I have taught I have tried to follow this advice and it has made a huge difference in my classroom community!

I tried to take my positive parent communication a step further by have a positive contact with each students parent, each month. Did I make this goal ever month? Of course not! However, I was able to reach out to most parents at least every other month.

I cannot stress enough what a huge positive change I saw in my classroom community I increased my positive contacts with parents. I noticed a change in my teaching because I was actively looking for positive aspects of each student that I could write home about. I began to see more positive behavior and positive character traits in my classroom because I was looking for them!

I saw a change in my students each time I sent a note home. They were excited to share their successes with their parents. They were excited that I had noticed a positive act they didn't think anyone saw. This change was the most dramatic in my students who struggled academically or socially. In their minds, school was a place where they could not succeed. Each time I shared a success they had at school that day with their parents, it helped the students begin to shift their view on school.

Tips for Implementing Positive Parent Communication in Your Classroom:

1. Keep it simple!-You have enough to do as it is. A simple note, email or short phone call is fine. If you have pick-up or drop-off duty you can also use this time share a positive experience in-person.

2. Keep track!- I printed off a class list and used it to keep track to the dates I had a positive communication with each parent. Writing down my communications made it easy to check if I had missed someone.

3. Have a set time for positive parent communication each week.- Schedule out just five or ten minutes each week to write out a few notes or emails. If you get in the habit of using the same block of time each week you will be more consistent with your parent communication.

4. Focus on the whole child.- Remember you should not be only communicating about academic achievements! Development of positive character traits, and positive behavior should also be communicated to parents.

What are your ideas for using positive parent communication in the classroom? Chime-in in the comments below.

Hello everyone!

ARE YOU REAAADDDY!!!

It is Finally here!

Today I am linking with Laura from Where the Magic Happens, Krista from Teaching Momster, and Lisa from PAWsitively Teaching! I have joined forces once again with my bloggy friends to bring you the best, most amazing giveaway on this Labor Day weekend!
All of us have been thinking about good ways in which to treat our readers and followers. We thought hard, and I mean it! Really, really hard… and decided that we can treat you to our best ideas to work smarter rather than harder… at school and home!
I know what it takes to be a great teacher, the stress, the time, the energy… I could go on and on! I also know that we crave time to ourselves and our families.

So here I go!

I have never met a teacher who only works an 8 hour day. Teachers are constantly working long hours to give the best education possible to their students. I spent long hours after school working on my classroom, grading and writing lesson plans. It came to the point when I felt guilty for not working at home because I felt like I was letting my students down! As I began to realize that I was consistently giving up my precious evenings and weekends to work on my classroom I began to evaluate the effectiveness of the time I was spending; I was wondering if all of the sacrifices I was making were benefiting my students. As I started to question if the time I was spending was effective, I began to be less willing to spend hours and hours of my time working after school was out on activities that were not even benefiting my students. So, I made a goal to work at home as little as possible. I was not always able to completely avoid working at home but by implementing the tip below I was able to greatly cut down on the time I was spending working at home.

Plan Your Planning Time!!!!

How many times have you got to the end of your planning time and realized you prepared for a craft your class is doing in 3 weeks but forgot to make copies of tomorrow's morning work? I found that I was not prioritizing my planning time, which meant that I was having to complete urgent tasks at home so they would be ready for school the next day. I began keeping a sticky note pad on my desk that I would use to write down tasks as I thought of them during the day. Then, when ever I had a few minutes of planning time, I would go through the next day in my head, checking that I had all of the supplies for the lessons ready. After I was ready for the next day of school I would go through my list and rewrite it in order of priority. Then every time I had a spare minute I would work on the highest priority task. This has cut down on time I had to spend working at home because I would always complete the most time sensitive tasks first-If a task did not need to be completed for a few days there was no reason I needed to spend my evening working on it!

Everyone needs to unwind after a long day teaching! My number one tip for unwinding is to do it! Make sure your schedule a firm "cut off" time each night. When your cut off time arrives your work is done! Put it away and enjoy some you time. Watch a TV show, read a book for fun, do a craft, or snuggle with a significant other. Even if you only have time to schedule 30 minutes to unwind each night it will do wonders for your well being,

When I am making my weekly copies, I always make sure to copy a few extra activities for those random times when we finish an activity early but aren't ready to start the next lesson. So that I don't have to spend precious planning time tracking down these activities I created Monthly No Prep Packets. These packets review the first grade common core and every sheet included requires no preparation to use in your classroom, just print and go! You can view my Monthly No Prep Packets here. Below is a preview of my August/ September Back to School Packet.