Angela Watson's Truth for Teachers

Latest Episodes:

EP104 When experienced teachers are suddenly deemed ineffective: How to adapt or exit gracefully Sep 03, 2017

Show notes

I receive emails on almost a daily basis from veteran teachers who are completely overwhelmed at how the job they signed up for 20, 30, or 40 years ago is nothing like the job they are being required to do today. I want to amplify the voices of teachers who are experiencing this, let them know they're not alone, and talk about what can be done.

My hope is that this is episode will be useful to you even if you're NOT facing this situation yourself, because every teacher works with at least one colleague who is in a similar place. You might actually be feeling frustrated with these teachers, believing that they are not pulling their weight and aren't changing with the times. So I hope this episode will strengthen the relationships between you and your colleagues as well.

If you ARE that teacher--someone who changed children's lives year after year and are suddenly finding the expectations on you to be exhausting and impossible to meet, I want you to know these 9 things shared in today's episode.

To share this with other teachers (or get a printable PDF), go to:

http://thecornerstoneforteachers.com/truth-for-teachers-podcast/ineffective/

EP103 Five total participation techniques to make every student an active learner Aug 27, 2017

Show notes

In this episode I'm talking with Persida Himmele about how teachers can provide access to higher-order thinking opportunities for all students. We'll go through 5 specific examples which you can use in your classroom today. Learn why calling on students should be the last thing you do to find out what kids know, and how total participation techniques are a simple way to engage all students equitably.

Click here to access the free resources and printables we discuss:

http://thecornerstoneforteachers.com/truth-for-teachers-podcast/total-participation-techniques/

EP102 How to get student buy-in for your class cell phone policy (Jim's coaching call) Aug 20, 2017

Show notes

Listen in on a coaching call I conducted with a graduate of the 40 Hour Teacher Workweek Club. His name is Jim, and he's entering his 4th year of teaching. Jim works on a grades 7-12 campus and is a high school geometry and 7th grade honors math teacher.

The questions that Jim submitted to me were mostly about getting student buy-in with room arrangement and routines/procedures. But the part that I wanted to share with you here on the podcast is where we do a deep dive into getting student buy-in with a cell phone policy.

Like most teachers, Jim already has most of the solution inside of him, and it's just a matter of helping him uncover the different parts of that solutions and put them together. Notice how each of his responses to me is like a clue which leads us to the next piece of the puzzle, until we have the whole thing assembled. It's a really fun process to participate in and I think it will be fun for you to listen to, also.

What we're doing in this conversation is partially about ironing out the details of the cell phone policy, about partially about figuring out which areas of the classroom to give kids ownership of, and where we need to provide more leadership and modeling.

The value of this episode is in helping you ask YOURSELF the right questions, because honest self-reflection is what's going to get you to the right result.

EP101 Your classroom does not have to be Pinterest-worthy: Stay reflective on the WHY & avoid comparison Aug 13, 2017

Show notes

This is the time of year when classroom set-up photos are everywhere. Each photo we see has more clever ideas and adorable decorations than the last. These images are inspiring and creative and so much fun to look through…but they can also be incredibly anxiety-producing.

How do we each stay focused on our OWN vision for our OWN classroom and not get sucked into comparing ourselves to others? Listen in as I share how I've grappled with this issue over the years.

Click here to read or share the transcript and audio, or participate in the discussion:

http://thecornerstoneforteachers.com/truth-for-teachers-podcast/avoid-comparison/

EP100 What if my students don't like me and we don't connect? Overcoming the back-to-school teacher jitters Aug 06, 2017

Show notes

The first day jitters are real, and most teachers have butterflies the night before. I think it's okay to embrace that a little bit: give yourself a set amount of time to do some productive worrying. But the best advice I can give is for you to shift your thinking to a different line of questions. When you get stuck on your own insecurities, focus less on believing in yourself and more on believing in your kids. That's what will empower you to transform lives. Listen in on this episode as I share how to change your thinking.

S5EP15 Season 5 Wrap Up: Use your summer to tackle time-wasting practices and rethink what's necessary May 14, 2017

Show notes

The episode you're about to hear is a free coaching call I conducted with a graduate of the 40 Hour Teacher Workweek Club. It's a combination of instructional coaching and life coaching all sort of rolled into one, where I'm answering teachers' specific questions about productivity and balance and managing it all.

This particular call is a teacher named Claire who teaches special education. She works with kids in grades K-6 and actually splits her time between 2 schools, so she's at one school with one group of kids in the morning and another in the afternoon.

Claire's initial question is about how to use her summer to get ahead for fall when she doesn't know the needs of the students in her classroom. Her caseload can change a lot from year to year and that makes it difficult to plan ahead. So we talk through some systems she and any teacher can create during the summer that will make the following school year easier to manage. We talk about getting digital files organized, getting procedures in place, and so on.

I then challenge Claire to figure out 2-3 of her biggest time-wasters and use her summer to figure out a better way. It's very hard to find the time and mental bandwidth to take a step back during the school year and analyze systems, so summer is really perfect for that. And when she told me what her biggest time suck is, when she talked about collecting data on student progress and grading their writing, she had a really big aha moment that I think is going to resonate with you in a powerful way, too.

Claire and I dug really deeply into how to analyze if something really has to be done, if the things we perceive as mandated are in fact requirements, and analyze teaching practices through the lens of whether they're actually effective for kids rather than if they're the way they've always been done, and they way everyone else does them. I love that moment in our conversation and I can't wait to share it with you.

At the end of the call, I mention a free on-demand video series I've created to help you plan out how to use your summer. You can sign up for that here:

http://thecornerstoneforteachers.com/secrets

S5EP14 How to respond to rude, disrespectful student attitudes (with Robyn Jackson) May 07, 2017

Show notes

Today we're going to talk about the little things students do that are rude, disrespectful, or just annoying. The things that don't necessarily warrant some kind of consequence, but that you don't want to let slide every time. How should a teacher respond to eye rolling, teeth sucking, muttering under the breath, and so on? What do we do about bad attitudes?

I don't want to settle for trite rehashed info, so I reached out to Robyn Jackson because I knew she could take this conversation to a deeper level. Robyn was a National Board Certified English teachers in Maryland, just outside of Washington DC, and has since been and administrator, adjunct professor, consultant, and speaker. She's been championing equity, access, and rigor for over 15 years.

Robyn is seriously one of my favorite experts in the education space, because she has a deeper understanding of human behavior and motivation than anyone else I know, and she always keeps it real. I've had the pleasure of seeing her speak in person a few times just hang on her every word--there's so much good info there. She has this lovely way of uncovering the root problem and also sort of calling you out on your own mess instead of allowing blame-shifting.

Grab a notepad when you listen to this one, because you're going to want to take notes!

Want to give your feedback on Season 5 of the podcast?

Let me know what you liked and what you want changed here!

S5EP13 The simplest way to stop feeling overwhelmed and overscheduled Apr 30, 2017

Show notes

I want to use this episode to dive more deeply into a topic that I've touched on quite a few times, which is problem of overwhelm. Overwhelm is a huge issue for just about everyone, but particularly for teachers.

I want to help you understand an important contributing factor that a lot of people underestimate or just don't give much thought to. Once you understand what's creating or worsening your feeling of being overwhelmed, the solution because clear, simple, and pretty straight forward.

Listen in as I share how you can avoid overscheduling yourself, and create more margin in your life through building in buffer time.

Want to give your feedback on Season 5 of the podcast?

Let me know what you liked and what you want changed here!

S5EP12 How to find balance with social media and still be a connected educator (April's coaching call) Apr 23, 2017

Show notes

The episode you're about to hear is a free coaching call I conducted with a graduate of the 40 Hour Teacher Workweek Club. It's a combination of instructional coaching and life coaching all sort of rolled into one, where I'm answering teacher's specific questions about productivity and balance and managing it all.

This particular call is with a 5th grade teacher named April. April's challenge right now is with trying to find balance and intentionality during times of year that are super demanding, such as parent conference week.

As we get into the conversation, we dig deeper into her social media habits, and exploring how her desire to learn from and connect with our educators is sometimes swallowing up more time than she intends, and interfering with her ability to get a good nights sleep and stay in balance.

You'll hear me mention a free intentional connectivity challenge, and if that's something you're interested in joining, you can sign up here and join us!

S5EP11 Hacking project-based learning: tips for management, assessment, & more from Ross Cooper & Erin Murphy Apr 16, 2017

Show notes

For many teachers, PBL is a very different way of facilitating learning, where kids are identifying a real-world problem and developing its solution. It's an incredibly powerful, effective, and cross-curricular way for kids to learn. But it's not always simple to plan, and manage, and assess, so we're going to talk about some practical teaching strategies.

We're also going to look at how to address some of the pitfalls that students face. PBL is incredibly rigorous, or should be, and we all know that kids aren't always excited about rigor and working hard--they can't just pass a test at the end of the unit and be done. With PBL, kids show what they learn as they journey through the unit, interact with its lessons, collaborate with each other, and assess themselves and each other. It's pretty complex stuff. It's a tough juxtaposition with the "fill in the bubble" standardized testing mentality that most are expected to juggle simultaneously.

I have two guests on the show today to help us explore these issues--they are the co-authors of the new book Hacking Project Based Learning: 10 Easy Steps to PBL and Inquiry in the Classroom. You'll hear from Erin Murphy, who is an assistant principal and certified literacy specialist in the East Penn School District in Pennsylvania, and Ross Cooper, who is the Supervisor of Instructional Practice K-12 in the Salisbury Township School District in Allentown, Pennsylvania.

Erin and Ross are passionate about inquiry-based learning and have supported countless teachers in implementing it, through not only their school-based work but also through the PD and workshops they conduct. I'm really excited to have them here to help us move past the jargon and buzzwords, and talk about the realities on doing PBL with kids.

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