321 Learn!

Introduce yourself to parents and students

New Teacher Introductions to Parents

Back to School Night

First Day of School activities

10 Things to Remember for the First Day of School

How to Get Ready for the First Day of School

First week of lesson plans

Making a Curriculum Map

Lesson Planning Mistakes for New Teachers to Avoid

Prepare the classroom

Preparing for the First Day of School Important for New Teachers

Preparing Your Classroom For the Start of School

Prepare a routine

Teacher’s To Do List for Friday

Organization and Time Management for Teachers

Determine classroom management plan

Classroom Management Tools for New Teachers

Five Common Classroom Management Myths

Prepare Classroom Library

Books for a New Teacher’s Classroom Library

Creating a Classroom Library

Purchase necessary supplies

Necessary Supplies for the New Classroom Teacher

Make a Word Wall

The Basics of a Word Wall

How to Make an Interactive Word Wall

Tags: back to school, Classroom Management, Lesson Planning, Parents, student discipline

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Becoming a teacher is becoming more and more difficult as the economy struggles to rebound. Teachers are still being let go and wages continue to not only be frozen but to be cut with furlough days. Still, many dream of making a difference in the life of a child and indeed good, dedicated teachers are more necessary now than ever.

Here are some tips on how to become a teacher, from preparation to accepting a position in a school:

First, in preparation, a teacher candidate needs three things:

A professional portfolio

Character Reference Letters

A Professional Resume

Once these are prepared, then it is time to apply for open positions. It is vital to keep the job search organized because teacher candidates are likely to need to send in many applications. Here are some helpful tips.

Organizing Your Job Search

Once the prospective teacher has secured an interview, it is time to prepare to wow the administrative staff who will be conducting the interview. Preparation is important at this stage as well.

Interview Help for Teachers

Interview Questions for Teachers

Once you have received your first job offer, accepted a position and signed the necessary paperwork, your job is not finished yet. Until you are tenured, you will be the first to go when budgets are squeezed and cuts must be made. Find how how to keep your position.

How to be the Best Teacher Candidate to Get or Keep a Position

Not enough info? Find out more!!

Getting a Job as a Teacher

Tags: back to school, furlough days, Public School System

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Children are taught how to identify the letters of the alphabet in preschool – and they then move onto the sounds of the letters which transitions into learning to read. Sometimes the preschool curriculum does not cover each letter individually or a teacher or parent might want more ideas on how to teach a letter. Here is a collection of articles – one per letter, that gives a variety of ideas on how to teach that individual letter of the alphabet to preschool age children.

Collection of articles on teaching the Alphabet!

How to teach each of the Letters of the Alphabet, including snack and craft ideas:

A

B

C

D

E

F
G

H

I

J
K
L

M

N
O
P
Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

Review of all the Letters

Have any more great ideas? Share with us!

Tags: Parents, preschool, Teach reading

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I was going to title this the homeschool debate, then realized it’s not about homeschooling, its about public schools. The alternative is not just homeschooling, but private schools too. Homeschooling gets a bad rap for pulling kid out of the public school system, but people say they don’t have the money for private schooling and leave it at that. In reality, parents who choose to homeschool are the same as parents who choose the private schools. In the end, it’s the public schools they are avoiding.

There is a lot of debate about how to improve the public school system. In fact, public school teachers are often offended when kids are pulled – only when pulled for homeschooling though, ironically. It is a well known fact in the public school system that a private school student will be ahead of all public school students. Homeschool kids on the other hand? They are rebels who aren’t being educated, or have parents who think they can do a better job than a certified teacher.

Well actually, some parents can do better than a certified teacher – if a teacher at a private school can do better (based on test scores) than a teacher at a public school, why can’t a parent do better? I think it’s not a matter of who does a better job, it’s a matter of parents taking control of their child’s education. Some parents choose to educate at home, some choose to lobby for better public schools and some parents choose to pay for private school.

Why should we criticize any parent for being involved enough in their child’s education to make a tough decision? Homeschooling is not an easy choice, just ask one of the thousands of homeschoolers who give up their time each and every day to ensure their children have a good education. Private school is not an easy choice, just as the thousands of parents who give up their hard earned money to pay 15,000-20,000 or more a year on top of taxes for public schools. Public school is the easy answer, unless you want a good education for your child, then it is a hard choice too – just ask the few parents who put the time and effort into working with teachers and schools and spending the time working with their child to ensure a good education.

The parent who sends a child to the public school system blindly, expecting a well educated child after high school graduation with no effort on their part, is the parent who should be criticized.

In the end, a good education is the goal, and reaching the goal is difficult no matter which path you choose to take. So public school teachers, back off of homeschool families, the effort of a good education for an individual child takes time and effort and money on the part of the parent, regardless of the direction they steer.

Looking for more information on homeschooling? Check out My Homeschool Guide

Tags: Parents, Public School System

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It is coming up on teacher appreciation week again this year. Learning A-Z.com is bringing back their teacher appreciation free week as well! Check it out:

To thank the world’s teachers during Teacher Appreciation Week from May 3-7, we’re opening up all
six of our PreK-6 Learning A-Z websites — for free. Sites include Reading A-Z, Raz-Kids, Writing
 A-Z, Science A-Z, Vocabulary A-Z, and Reading-Tutors. Nearly 50,000 teachers took advantage of
our Open House last year and pre-registration for this year is now open. Just go to
 http://www.learninga-z.com/openhouse — and then pass it on to your friends and colleagues!

Tags: Teacher Appreciation Week

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