Advice For New Teachers from CNN's Schools of Thought Blog

CNN's Schools of Thought Blog has a great post for new teachers by Rebecca Mieliwocki (@MrsMieliwocki on Twitter), a seventh grade English teacher in California who was chosen the 2012 National Teacher of the Year.  

I encourage you to check out the entire post, titled Advice to a New Teacher. Here area couple of my favorite points from the nine that she makes in the post:

"It’s all about the pencil. It took me far too long to realize this, so I’m telling it to you up front. New teachers often get trapped in a struggle with kids over supplies: where they are, why they didn’t bring them to class, losing them, borrowing them. It’s exhausting and it often keeps you from doing what you need to be doing. In our zeal to teach readiness and responsibility we mistakenly make having supplies a hill we choose to fight for and die on. Stubborn teachers do and kids suffer... I won’t let anything get between my kids’ learning and what I have to teach them each day. You shouldn’t either. I have incorporated that theory into every decision I make and you should, too."

"Have courage to teach boldy, with creativity, and beyond the test. Kids must learn, you must grab kids where they are and move them. They’ll come to you with a whole host of issues, whether they’re at grade level or not. Your job is to find out where they are, find out what they need and then give it to them. Move them. Any forward academic movement is a good thing. These are the results people are dying to see if we can achieve."