This September, I will embark on my 20th year of teaching. 20th!!! As large as that number seems, I can guarantee that my time in the classroom has gone by in the blink of an eye! To this day, I still remember receiving THE phone call to say that I have a classroom waiting for me… and what a feeling that was! I was just out of university and willing to move up to the Great Canadian North in order to begin the profession that I had been dreaming about for years! Ohhh… if only I could go back and give my new teaching self some time tested advice. At the beginning of my career, I was the tender age of 22 and thought that my years as a student, university courses, and teaching practicums, were enough to make me the world’s best teacher right out of the gate. Yes, hindsight is 20/20 so I am sharing some of the biggest mistakes I made so that you will be able to recognize them and avoid some serious tears and frustrations.
If you have landed on this page because you have been offered your first teaching job, CONGRATULATIONS! Consider yourself LUCKY! Not only have you entered the most amazing profession in the whole world, in my humble opinion, BUT, you have also stumbled across the top 5 mistakes that I have made along the way. Yes, mistakes… and some of them were doozies!!! By keeping these mistakes of mine in mind, I am hoping that I can save you a lot of frustration and heartache throughout the educational/ professional path you have embarked upon. Even if you do make these mistakes, or already have if you have some experience in the classroom, the one thing I want you to take away from this post is that everything will be okay. You will come out a better teacher and person for going through it!
Mistake #1. Expecting Perfection
When I started my new teaching career, I wanted to impress EVERYONE — my principal, the students, the students’ parents, my colleagues… everyone! I wanted to prove that they hired me because I was the best of the best! I wanted to be the teacher that older students wished they had had and the teacher that younger students wanted to be placed with. I spent hours upon hours making resources for my class, buying decorations, using my time planning, preparing, and correcting. I would look around and see what more seasoned and experienced teachers were doing in their classes and try to replicate their awesomeness and outdo them. Add on social media sites such as Pinterest, Instagram, and Facebook, and the competition to be the best becomes a new teacher’s nightmare.
My need to be the perfect teacher was flawed right from the start and completely unrealistic. I did not have the experience, expertise, and financial resources to be at the same level as someone who had several years, and in some cases several decades, of teaching under his or her belt. I still had to work out my own timing, teaching style, and discipline procedures (among a million other things!). I had no business comparing my beginning with someone else’s middle or near-end of career. My time would have been better spent observing experienced teachers and asking them more questions, bouncing ideas off of them, and looking to them for advice when the going got tough.
Mistake #2. Treating All Students the Same Way
I was one of those students who loved school and did well at it. I didn’t really need to put in a lot of effort when it came to math, language arts, or even physics. I studied and got by without having to bust my brain too hard in order to pass. I never really gave a second thought to my fellow classmates in regards to their marks and how well they did. It wasn’t an issue for me. I became a teacher partly because I had such a positive educational experience growing up.
Flash forward to my first teaching job. I had not prepared myself for the various levels of motivation and learning abilities that would be present in my classroom. I walked in expecting to be firm yet fair… and that I would treat all students the same way. WOAH! Was I ever misguided on that. I had no idea how to motivate a child who hated school. I didn’t know what to do, other than get angry, at a child who didn’t do her homework. I found myself gravitating to the students who were getting concepts easily and happily and in turn, started treating all students like the ones who were adapting well because it was just easier for me. What a disaster to those who weren’t in that group and what I disservice I did to those outside of that box. It was around the first report card time that I found out that cookie-cutter classroom management is a recipe for disaster.
It took some time but I have learned that being fair does not mean giving everybody the same thing but giving people what they need in order to be successful. Each student that enters you classroom has a different story and a different reason for coming to school each and every day. Some will need extra help with math while others will need extra help with reading. Some will need Base 10 blocks while others can do the equation in their head. Some will need you to be a supportive ear while others will need to be hugged. Once you learn how to “read” each of your students and truly understand what they need, it will be one of the most powerful tools in your teaching repertoire.
Mistake #3. Saying Yes All the Time
As a new teacher, you might feel compelled to say yes to every proposed activity, extra-curricular, and committee that comes your way. I’m here to tell you that it is perfectly okay to say NO! Your first few years in the teaching profession are very busy and take a considerable amount of time to adjust to. If you are obliged to be on certain committees than make sure you choose the one(s) that allow you to work on things you are passionate about and do not occupy too much of your time — both inside and outside of school hours. The best thing you can do for you and your students is to gain confidence in yourself and the best way to do that is to put your energy, focus, and time into your teaching practices. Once you feel ready, you will be able to branch out and try other things offered in your school. And if you aren’t ready to take on more, don’t worry about it! As time goes on, I promise you will begin to feel ready to take on other responsibilities. Remember, it is always better to excel at one thing than to a sub-par job at a lot of things.
Mistake #4. Not Having A Solid Discipline Plan
When I was a new teacher, I was so overwhelmed with everything that needed to be ready for my students’ arrival that I paid very little attention to what needed to be ready once the “honeymoon period” was over. You see, a new group of students come to you and for the first week or two, you will see them in their very best light. It is only after they start to become comfortable with you that some, not all, will begin to test your limits in regards to what they can and can’t get away with. It is a hard thing to take when you are a new teacher and you suddenly feel like your classroom is spinning out of control. There were so many times during my first year that I cried, told myself I couldn’t handle being a teacher, and even contemplated quitting… all because I was having a very hard time controlling the negative behaviours of some students in my classroom.
My advice to you is to do your homework. Search the internet, read books, and ask experienced teachers what works for them when it comes to a classroom behaviour plan. You might find hints and tips from a variety of sources that you can intertwine to make a behaviour plan that works best for you. What types of positive behaviour do you expect to be demonstrated in your room? What happens when negative behaviour is displayed? Are you using tangible rewards or are you more of a pat on the back type of person? How are you going to present the behaviour plan to your students? These are just some of the practical questions you need to ask and be able to answer before your new students walk through your door.
If there is one thing I have learned when it comes to implementing a discipline plan, whatever you choose, make sure it is consistent and is followed through with. Students can identify an empty threat and once they do, it will become more and more difficult to maintain your discipline plan throughout the year.
#5. Confusing Discipline with Punishment
I was totally misguided when it came to discipline during my first few years of teaching. For some reason, I thought that raising my voice and making students “scared” of me would be the key to running a well behaved class. Looking back, I am totally embarrassed that I actually believed that was a suitable way of gaining control of my class. What I didn’t realize then was that I was looking for ways to punish my students for their misbehaviour instead of providing a safe and effective way of using discipline to try and stop the behaviour from happening again. What I learned too late was that punishing my students only led to hurt feelings and resentment on their parts, and anger and frustration on my part. That certainly doesn’t sound like a recipe for a successful classroom, does it?
Just as adults have laws to follow in society, our students have rules that they need to follow in our classrooms. You will have a child who will misbehave for some reason or another and you will have to refer back to your discipline plan for an appropriate course of action. When this happens, please do so with your discipline plan in mind and not your raw emotions that might creep up. Your job is not to punish a child for his or her wrongdoing but to give an appropriate consequence with the intention that the student will learn from his/ her mistakes and that the behaviour will not happen again. This is easier said than done, especially if the student was disrespectful towards you. But remember… you might not know what this child lives on a daily basis and school should not be a place where he or she feels belittled or threatened by a teacher. How you choose to navigate situations like this could very well be a pivotal experience in your students’ lives. Make it a positive one.
Trust me… you are going to make a million and one mistakes throughout your teaching career. You are going to spend nights tossing and turning about decisions you have made, choices you have taken, and children you have encountered throughout your years as a teacher. Just keep in mind that you are doing this out of your love for your profession, and most importantly, for the love of your students.
Own those mistakes, learn from them, don’t make them again, and move on.
Have a great day!
Tomc says
Real good. I’m retired and found “open education” fit me. Newbys are rarely told the many discipline methods that work with consistent application. Most go with the ancien, “start out tough” deal. It works , but presents an initial teacher as a “threat” to kids. This is not necessary.