Last June, as her middle school students were worrying about final exams and looking forward to three months free of lessons and tests, Dorleen Kauffman was already thinking about the next school year. She was making lists of things that had gone well over the previous nine months and things she felt she needed to rework for the following year. She also surveyed her students to find out which activities they had enjoyed throughout the year. Spending so much time on preparation so far in advance might seem overzealous, since Kauffman, an 8th grade Spanish teacher at Ernie Davis Middle School in Elmira, N.Y., has been teaching for 29 years. But far from satisfied with the skills that she's honed over almost three decades of teaching, she says she's always trying to think of ways she can improve her instruction.
"In June, instead of just wrapping up, I'm thinking of the next year based on the needs I had this year. I'm continually reassessing my teaching strategies and motivational techniques."
No matter how much or how little experience a teacher has in the classroom, getting ready for a new school year takes a lot of work. Whether it's reviewing subject matter or perfecting classroom manner, a teacher's preparation for the school year starts long before back-to-school sales sweep stores. For veteran teachers, the task is demanding; for new teachers, it can be downright intimidating.
First-Year Insecurities
Recalling her first days as a new teacherin an unfamiliar school, Kahn Smith, a 5th grade teacher at Deer Park Elementary School in Centreville, Va., says that it was hard not "being a part of the already established group. You're coming in as the new kid on the block," while the other teachers "have already established a rapport with each other. You're not sure how you're going to fit in." She adds that new teachers also need to "get to know the building itself" to ensure they can find their way to the office, the cafeteria, and especially their own classroom during the first days of school.
Nancy Ramsey, who teaches Reading Recovery and art at Bailey's Elementary School in Falls Church, Va., adds that not having past years to reflect on makes preparing for a first year of teaching challenging. "You just don't know what to expect. You can't think, 'Well, a lot of them are going to know this, and a lot of them are going to need to be taught these three things.' It's hard."
New teachers may find consolation in the fact that there are some things no first-year teacher can be expected to know before she actually spends some time in charge of a classroom. Delores Enriquez, a 1st grade teacher at Bailey's, notes that there are a lot of subtle skills a teacher must master that aren't easily noticeable, even after observing an experienced teacher, as in a student-teaching situation. For example, "if you're trying to get the class under control, you need to change your tone of voice because the students need to hear the difference. I had a great supervising teacher during my internship who pointed these things out to me," Enriquez says.
Most educators agree that pairing a "green" teacher with a mentor is one of the best ways to prepare that teacher for the responsibility of a whole classroom. "It's critical for new teachers to have a relationship with an experienced teacher in their field who can help them not be so overwhelmed at the beginning," Kauffman says.
Keeping it Relevant
Before the year begins, all teachers, whether novice or veteran, should take time to contemplate their practices to ensure that their curriculum is current and their instruction effective. Providing intellectual growth for perhaps 100 or more students is a tall order, however, and preparing for that experience for the first time can be nerve-racking.
"A concern for me starting out was knowing that I was going to be responsible for 25–30 students [at a time] and making sure I would cover the materials I was supposed to and to try to meet every child's need, or at least come very close to it," Smith says.
"When you begin teaching, just becoming familiar with the curriculum is a big challenge," says Kauffman. "There's a lot that's unknown. You're not familiar with assessments. You're not sure what your objectives should be. You're not sure how much to teach in one lesson."
Enriquez agrees that knowing how much material to squeeze into a lesson takes a while to figure out. "During my internship, I saw experienced teachers working, and everything was just flowing, but I found it very hard to pace my own lessons. Now, I'm better."
Although educators with more experience might have more confidence in their ability to teach their subjects, that doesn't mean they spend any less time readying themselves for the new year, as Kauffman's June preparation illustrates.
"You would think having taught the same grade for five or six years it would be a piece of cake," says Smith. "But you tend to develop more activities. Each year you want to enhance what you've already done. You try not to do the same thing each year; you want to try something else with a different set of children."
Individual Students, Individual Needs
Besides refining lesson outlines and instructional methods, teachers can prepare to some extent for the specific students who will be in their classroom once they receive class lists for the year. Ramsey gives an example: "Last year, I knew I was going to have some particularly tough kids, so before the year began I reviewed things like behavioral and classroom management and how to build a classroom community," Ramsey says. "I had read this material before, but I wanted to review it and think about what I might want to do this year that I had been able to let slide other years because it wasn't as necessary."
Because educators who have been at a school for a while are likely to be at least slightly familiar with students before they get them in class, veteran teachers have an undeniable advantage over fresh faculty.
Smith says she pays attention to the 4th graders in her school, some of whom she knows she will have in class the following year. "It helps to see how they're interacting with another adult before you get them," she says.
Ramsey agrees that teachers have a bit of a handicap when they first begin teaching at a new school. "You don't know your class at all before you begin the year—you never had a student's older brother, for example."
But there are things new teachers can do to learn about their students before the year begins. Enriquez says that in her school, "if there's anything you need to know about a particular child, the prior teacher will make a point of getting together with you." Once the year begins, she says, "you can tell that teacher, 'This is happening. Is this something that's a carryover from last year, or is this something new?'" As a result, the new teacher can deal with problems more effectively.
Kahn Smith purchases a yearbook before the start of the year so she can familiarize herself with her students' faces and names as soon as she gets her class list. Smith says, "They feel I really care about them when I learn their names prior to the start of the year. I want them to feel that I want to get to know them, because I do."
Preparing for the different learning styles that a mixture of students will bring to any classroom is also a good idea. Teachers can prepare themselves by brushing up on instructional techniques and having extra teaching tools on hand.
"You have to be ready for the times when you look into their eyes and they're glassing over," says Enriquez. "If they're not understanding a concept, you have to be able to switch to something else, whether it's manipulatives, or puppets, or flannel board characters. They're going to need different versions of the same concept so that they can see it, they can feel it, and they can touch it. You're trying to hit as many of those intelligences as you can, so that the child can find whatever her niche is and grab on to that."
Even older students, like Kauffman's 8th graders, "really need things to be alive and colorful." Throughout the summer, and throughout the year, Kauffman has a blank videotape at the ready to tape anything she thinks will make Spanish more fun for her students, like the Spanish version of Good Morning America or music videos on Spanish MTV.
But no teacher can complete an assessment of the ability range in his classroom until the year begins. "When you meet your children and you find out what their specific abilities are, then you have to adjust everything," Enriquez says.
Ramsey agrees, adding that "you never know what the students will be capable of until you get them in the classroom."
In addition, Smith cautions against relying solely on impressions of students gleaned from previous teachers' comments and insignificant interactions with students in the hallway. Although it's a good idea to observe younger students that you might have the next year, Smith says, "I try not to get any preconceived ideas as to how they're going to be with me because of course the chemistry is going to be different, and they're going to grow over the summer."
Taking Their Own Time
No matter what kind of preparation teachers are working on, it's a sure bet they're doing a large percentage of it off the clock. Smith says she comes into her classroom for a few hours every day in some of the weeks leading up to the official preparation week before school begins.
Enriquez says it's incredible how much of her own time she spends preparing for her classes. "People say, 'It's only 1st grade.' But it takes so much planning. You're doing a lot of hands-on things, and you need to have lots of materials ready because they're going to be writing and painting and cutting things out." She adds that the amount of personal time she spends planning is greater because she has to prepare lessons to use as fallbacks in case her primary lessons don't go over well.
Though most teachers will need to use some of their own time to prepare for their classes, Enriquez cautions that it can go too far, and teachers need to accept that they won't have time to do everything they want to. "It can get away from you. The planning is not hard, it's just time-consuming. There's always going to be stuff you feel you didn't have time to do."
Ready or Not!
Most educators agree that no teacher, new or experienced, will be completely prepared on the first day of school for what the next nine months will bring. Enriquez says that no matter how much planning is done beforehand, "what's interesting is that when the time comes, it totally depends on the children, what you're going to do with them. I don't think I've ever done a lesson exactly the same, even though I might think it went really well last time. They're not the same children. For example, last year we read Hattie and the Fox, and we did a kind of dramatization of it. The kids were so excited to read aloud the common phrases and the responses the animals made. This year, the students' reaction was totally different. They read the lines, but they just weren't enthralled by it. And yet there are other books that I have to scotch tape the pages together from month to month because they're worn so thin."
Perhaps it's the things no teacher can prepare for, whether he has been at it for 2 years or 20, that help keep the classroom stimulating and make it all worthwhile. Late last May, Smith was surprised by an invitation to the high school graduation of a student she had taught as a 3rd grader in Georgia years before. "It touched my heart in a special way to know that a child I taught almost 10 years ago still thought enough of me to invite me to his graduation," she says. "I would not change it for the world. I love teaching."
