Ah, October. It’s fitting that my dad, a social studies teach for 30 years, is retiring this month. He once told me that October is the longest month of the year for teachers and it is SO true.
Whether you start in August or September, the first few weeks of the school year are what I like to call the “honeymoon period.” You’re energized from summer, the kids are excited to be back in school (even if it’s remote!), and things are going well. When October rolls around, school is old news, your first real break from the school year is weeks and weeks away, and the initial excitement has worn off.
October is the time to lock down routines and procedures, revisit curriculum plans, and devote some solid weekend time to yourself!
Hang in there,
Julia
IN THIS NEWSLETTER
FROM THE BLOG
AMAZON MUST-HAVE’S
PLANNING WORKBOOK
FROM THE BLOG
Example Warm-Ups: Programming Fall 2020
You may know, I love a good 5-minute warm-up to start each class. I’ve ALWAYS used these in my Algebra 1 classes, but when I heard we’d be entirely remote again this fall, I thought it’d be good to do warm-ups in all of my classes and it’s totally paid off.
“COLBAORATORY” – CODING WITH GOOGLE
In my Programming exposé post, I described how coding went from being one of the scariest things to teach to one of the funnest. I also mentioned that this year I’m using Google’s interactive Python notebook, Colaboratory, as the coding environment for my students. If you’re familiar with Python programming, it’s Google’s version of Jupyter…
AMAZON MUST-HAVE’S
The new year is bringing many anticipated and unanticipated new challenges… It’s hard to spit out a coherent sentence on Zoom, much less plan lessons weeks in advance.
Luckily, earlier this summer I created the PERFECT resource to help me – and YOU – plan and stay organized this year. Grab your copy of my ’20-’21 Teacher Planning Workbook today!
Julia Ziac 