Letters to a New Teacher

by Burke, Jim

• ISBN13: 9780325009230
• ISBN10: 0325009236
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2006-01-13
• Publisher: Heinemann

Summary

Every new teacher needs a mentor, someone smart, experienced, compassionate, and reliable to give advice, share strategies, and lend a supportive ear. What if every new English teacher could have one the nation's most-recognized master teachers as their mentor? Now they can. Letters to a New Teacheris the chance of a professional lifetime, an opportunity to read the letters and emails Jim Burke exchanged with novice teacher Joy Krajicekletters in which Jim opens his practice, his mind, and his heart to guide Joy through her first year in the classroom. Jim fields the whole gamut of questionsfrom typical classroom-management matters to challenging instructional situations to sensitive topics like the boundaries of student-teacher relationships. His answers open the classroom experience up for novices to understand how to organize their space and time, how to plan instruction yet maintain flexibility, how to communicate effectively with the two-hundred personalities they encounter each day, and how to maintain professionalism under pressure.

Table of Contents

Foreword	xv
Acknowledgments	xix
Introduction: Living the Questions	1	(3)
FALL SEMESTER
AUGUST
1. Managing a Class of Thirty-Five	4	(5)
Talking
Human needs
Empathy
Suggested actions
2. Creating a Teaching Unit	9	(4)
Teaching is a creative act
Think of curriculum as a conversation
Suggested actions
Judith Langer's Six Traits of Effective Literacy Instruction
Teaching is juggling
Maintain personal and professional balance
Begin each class effectively
SEPTEMBER
3. Handling Pressure	13	(6)
Seek out a few mentors
Learn to use your fears to improve
Consider teaching as a vocation
Sec yourself as a character in the lives of your students
Suggested actions
Define yourself as a teacher by continuing to question
Plan ahead: Provide job security for next year
Interlude 1 A Difficult Student	19	(18)
4. Challenging All Students and Meeting Their Challenges	21	(8)
"I wish I didn't have this one girl in my class."
Seek first to understand and then to be understood by your students
Recognize that some classes are more difficult than others
Learn more about how people learn
Anticipate change in your students—and yourself
5. Knowing That You Make a Difference	29	(8)
Mentoring troubled students
Teaching as problem solving
The blessings of failure
The first grading period
High expectations
Let the students do the work
The Four Cs of Academic Success
The importance of reflecting on the work of teaching
OCTOBER
6. Approaches to Teaching Writing	37	(9)
Trusting in the process
Continuum of performance
Writing as a craft
Advice from the masters
Advice from the students
The importance of writing about meaningful topics
The apprenticeship model
Students as authors
Revising ourselves
Interlude 2 Getting Discouraged...	46	(8)
7. Engaging Students and Competing for Their Attention	48	(6)
Teaching is good but hard work
Improvement through revision
What master teachers do
Becoming a resilient teacher
The courage to teach
Doing what makes a difference
NOVEMBER
8. Poetry for Teachers and Students	54	(7)
The importance of personal reading during the year
Be an interesting person and an example to your students
Making time to read
Benefits of poetry
Teach different types of texts
Seek opportunities for personal and professional renewal
Orientation • disorientation • new orientation
Reflect on work and life
A letter to the young teacher I was
Interlude 3 Absences and Substitutes	61	(10)
9. What Works and Why?	64	(7)
Reflect on instructional successes—and failures
Effective instructional techniques
Instructional challenges
Academic habits of mind
Collaborate with colleagues
The end of the semester—and the importance of starting over fresh
10. Different Types of Teacher Personalities	71	(7)
Honor your mentors
Teachers need to feel successful, too
We negotiate our identities
Different types of teachers
Be their teacher, not their friend
Teaching styles
Teachers as leaders
What constitutes good teaching?
A teacher's ethos
11. Professional Reading	78	(6)
Professional reading: How, when, and why
Write yourself
Reflect on your relationship with students
DECEMBER
12. Harnessing Self-Doubt	84	(6)
Be truthful to yourself
Take risks
Take students seriously
Be a mentor and guide to your students
SPRING SEMESTER
JANUARY
13. Learning the Most from Each Semester's Experiences	90	(6)
Reflect on past successes and failures
Listen to and learn from criticism
Be a reflective teacher
Revise your instruction
Find your voice as a teacher
14. Managing Your Time	96	(7)
Beginning a new semester
Interruptions to class time
Improving instructional efficiency and effectiveness
Teaching by design
Organizing lesson plans, handouts, and materials
Tools for teachers
FEBRUARY
Interlude 4 Working to Improve	103	(7)
15. The Teacher's Power	110	(4)
The relationship between teachers and students
Students need mentors
Helping students find their own voice
Interlude 5 Sexual Abuse	114	(1)
16. Boundaries	115	(6)
Some teachers are wrongfully accused; some teachers cross boundaries
The trust of students—and parents
The power of the teacher
A sample email exchange between a teacher and a student
MARCH
17. The Teacher's Role During a Classroom Crisis	121	(4)
Teachers must address students' different needs
Maintain purpose and control of the class
Our work involves more than the academic curriculum
Help students understand themselves and the world around them
18. Student Suicide	125	(6)
Take students' claims seriously
Understand teen depression and the teenage brain
Consult counselors
Show you care and will help
Watch over all your students
School can be an alienating place for students
Connect to kids by seeing and saying hi to them
19. Teacher/Parent Relationships	131	(15)
Being a parent: What it's like
What parents want most
Communicate to avoid or resolve conflict
Maintain a professional distance
Seek administrative support if necessary
Questioning the professional integrity of teachers
Interlude 6 Juggling the Demands of Teaching and Living	146	(1)
20. Open House	147	(5)
What Open House is like
What parents want to know and hear
How Open House differs from Back to School Night
Activities and strategies to consider
Go out for a nice dinner with colleagues before Open House
APRIL
Interlude 7 Applying for a New Teaching Job	152	(2)
Interlude 8 Testing Season	154	(3)
21. End-of-Year Challenges and Expectations	157	(6)
Reaching for a satisfying end of the year for all
Each end is only a beginning
Overcoming challenges in the last months
Confronting the fear of losing the job you love
Turn to colleagues for support and guidance
Consider the year a long story that takes time to unfold
MAY
22. Doing It All, Especially with a Family	163	(10)
Enduring challenges
Use the Teacher's Daybook for personal and professional balance
Find and sustain the energy to teach
Reflect now on what you can do better next year
Make plans to meet your personal and professional needs
Do what matters most and makes a difference
Join the great conversation
Honor and learn from the master teachers
JUNE
Dear Joy: A Final Letter	173	(2)
Dear Jim: A Final Letter	175	(2)
Notes	177	(5)
Appendices
Classroom Management	182	(5)
Action Planner	187	(1)
The Four Cs of Academic Success	188