Follow-Up: Keep, Change, Start, Stop Fall 2015 Personal Reflection

Yesterday, I did a post called "Keep, Change, Start, Stop Fall 2015 Student Reflections where I allowed students to give me some feedback on my classes. Then I decided to do my own personal reflection.

I went ahead and wrote it out, but I have terrible handwriting.




Let me elaborate on a few.

• Interactive Notebooks/Foldables: This was something new that I started doing this year, and I can honestly say it has been a success!! I can't wait to improve on the notebooks, make more foldables, and see how the next classes enjoy them. Nonetheless, the INBs and foldables are here to stay.
• Being energetic and positive: I am definitely my own worst critic, but I think that one of my positives is that I try to be positive and energetic in the classroom 
• Bathroom passes: I know that we are all human and nature calls, but I feel that sometimes kids take advantage of that. I used to do two passes a week, but sometimes kids do have issues, which I won't elaborate about here. I think that going back to two passes a week will help my sanity as well as help on any issues with that. I will also reiterate the point many times that I will not recreate class time, and what they miss is their responsibility to make up. 
• Trashketball Rules/Games: My kids generally enjoy playing Trashketball, which I will write about in a future post. However, I think that I need to spice up my games and routines with that. I also need to make a list of definite rules for Trashketball, because I feel like I sometimes make some of them up depending on the situation. 
• Calling on students/Asking for volunteers: I need to get out of this habit, but I sometimes rely too much on volunteers. To fix the problem, I am going to let students write their names on popsicle sticks, and I will use these to group and cold-call. 
• Holding kids more accountable for mastering the standards: I feel like kids pass my class but they do not learn anything, and I absolutely detest this. I have decided to list the standards on my assessments. I am also going to introduce my lessons with the standards at the beginning. 
• Letting kids go to the board: I have two whiteboards in my room, but the main one isn't a whiteboard, but a shower panel board that has issues with being able to be erased. I think that I might use the backboard more next semester, but using the front one is somewhat difficult because I know that I will probably never get another one because of massive budget cuts. 
• More Projects: Thanks to the great resource that is the MTBoS, I plan on doing more projects. I feel that projects have 
• Helping students so much on quizzes/tests: I must get out of this habit because I feel that students need to experience productive struggle, and I feel that tests are the time where they need to shine. I just have issues with students not retaining information from day to say, so I think that is where I need to hold students more accountable. Does anyone have solutions to this issue? 
• Being so easy on students: I try to set high expectations, but some students do not meet my expectations. I need to hold kids more accountable once again. I like the quote I read on Twitter that stated "It's pretty satisfying and magical when you figure it out, so I don't want to steal that from you by telling you." It was a quote during the session by Kate Nowak at the NCTM Conference in Nashville last month. I need to use this quote more often in my classes. 
• Giving to many warnings: I definitely need to "Lay the smackdown". So, my goal is to only give one warning. Then I will take it from there. For a 26 year old teacher, I don't think that my management is horrible, but it needs improvement. I sometimes feel like I will hurt students' feelings, but at other times, I don't feel that way. I need to be able to do it in a way that states my point without raising my voice and sounding harsh. 

Okay, whew, lots to digest! Hope this inspires you to go into the next semester.