Jessie - The First-Year Teacher's Survival Guide (2nd ed)

By: Julia Thompson

Summary:

An American author, Julia Thompson, who has been a public teacher for more than 25 years, wrote this book. She has taught a variety of courses such as geography, home economics, mathematics, English, history, physical education and special education.  She also has taught students from different culture backgrounds and ages ranging from Grade Seven to adults. Julia also runs new teacher and classroom management workshops nationally and internationally. Julia explains that every new teacher encounters with challenges in teaching that be incredibly exhausting and defeating but can be satisfying especially the days when they’re able to engage every student in the class.

In this book, it splits into seventeen sections that are geared towards new teachers but also useful for experienced teachers for classes from Kindergarten to Grade Twelve, and for all subjects.

Sections:

1. Get a Good Start in Your New Vocation

2. Develop Your Professional Expertise

3. Become a Valuable Team Player

4. Organize Your Way to a Great Beginning

5. Have a Fantastic First Day

6. Connect with Your Students

7. Design Effective Lessons

8. Deliver Effective Instruction

9. Evaluate Your Students’ Progress

10. Motivate Your Students to Succeed

11. Help Your Students Become Successful Learners

12. Make the Most of Your Instructional Time

13. Help Struggling Readers Find Success

14. Manage Your Classroom Through Early Intervention

15. Handle Behavior Problem Effectively

16. Manage Diversity in Your Classroom

17. Troubleshoot Twenty Common Problems

These sections are also split into smaller sub-sections, which makes easy navigation. Throughout the book, Julia provides worksheets, check lists and reflection questions that are easy for the teachers to print off.

As it’s a big book and I cannot cover every aspect of it. Therefore, the following list gives you a bit of an idea of what is included in the book. The strategies or sheets to print off that I found useful and what we don’t learn in university classes are displayed in the pictures.

Worksheets/check lists such as:

·      Character traits you have as a teacher

·      Strengths you have as a teacher and what you need to work on

·      Policies and procedures you need to know

·      How observers will evaluate you

·      Things to do before the term begins

·      Things to consider before rearranging your classroom

·      Strengths you have to prevent behavior problems

·      Classroom management techniques to avoid

·      Student inventory for high school students to know more of their background

·      Planning a course overview

·      Format for a Unit Plan

·      List of words that you can use to encourage critical thinking

·      Setting and achieving goals sheet for the students to fill out on their own

·      List of study skills for students to find out how well they study

     

Tips on how to:

• Avoid ruining your career
• Manage time effectively
• Organize your classroom (furniture, materials, storage, supply, file cabinet, including if you’re sharing a classroom with another teacher or teaching in a portable classroom
• Get to know and work with your colleagues (including difficult people)
• Prepare for an evaluation from the school board
• Work with parents/guardians
• Present in a open house
• Create a classroom web page and seating chart
• Overcome first day jitters and essential points of what to do on the first day
• Get to know your students and learn their students’ name quickly
• Handle student crushes
• Use “I” messages
• Make daily plans and what to include in the lesson plans
• Prevent common planning problems
• Tap into the students’ prior knowledge
• Prepare the lessons for the substitute teacher when you are away
• Use body language to motivate the students
• Look for signs that the student(s) are not engaged
• Improve your oral presentations
• Meet the needs of students with different learning styles  
• Engage and control class discussions
• Give verbal instructions effectively
• Use class time to review
• Make effective short answer, multiple choice, essay questions for tests
• Teach students the strategies to be successful on tests
• Grade tests along with on how to make comments that encourages the students to correct their errors
• Use other assessments such as portfolio, journal logs, etc. and manage the grade book
• Handle the situation when a student challenges the grade
• Hand the situation when a student asks, “Why do we have to learn this?”
• Use group work and games effectively in the classroom 
• Teach students study skills, take notes, be good listeners, speaking in front of class, improve their writing skills, manage their stress and plan projects
• Encourage students to do homework
• Design activities to start class and activities for students who finish their work early
• Handle interruptions and what to do when students request to leave early
• Improve reading skills and activities during reading assignments
• Promote on-task behaviors, create a safe environment, let your students know you care and effectively monitor the class
• Handle a difficult class or student (behavior problems)
• Deal with issues such as substance abuse, fights, etc.
• Modify lessons for gifted, special needs, underachievers and at-risk students
• Handle students’ use of cell phones in class

 

 

 

 Critique:

          As you can see, there is a wide variety of information in this book. It provides many tips, check lists, reflection questions and questions to ask the students along with website links to find out more information for all kinds of topics that relates to the teacher’s daily life at the school. Some of these tips and questions are so useful that I would’ve never thought of it myself. In some topics, it also provides tips of what not to do in addition to what to do especially with discipline.

I found this book interesting and excellent for new teachers. It explained some things that we don’t learn at university such as how to work with colleagues, things to do before the term begins, planning a course overview, present in a open house, setting up a class web page, etc.   

The book seems bombarding with all the information because it is 422 pages long and very detailed in many sections. Although, I like the way the sections are divided up, provides print outs/check lists for the students and teachers. I think it’s a good book to read before teachers start their career to get some of the ideas and strategies in their minds before planning especially the fact that this book can be used for all ages and all subjects. It also covers pretty much all aspects of the teacher’s job such as discipline, working with colleagues and parents, what to do when certain problems arise, organize the classroom, technology, lesson planning, time management, assessment, etc.

This book supports many theories that we have learned throughout the course, Psychology Of Learning & Instruction, such as planning lessons to meet the needs the students with a variety of learning styles including gifted and special needs students. We also discussed throughout the course about how to keep the students engaged, motivated and make a better learning environment. I think Julia makes a lot of good points related to this. It also provides useful and fun strategies/activities to use in the classroom, which is what we have discussed in different aspects of the course throughout the term such as how to take your students outside of the classroom in different subject areas and how to help at-risk students or students with special needs to be successful in your classroom. The topic of working with parents is related to the presentation about helicopter parents.

The author also touches on how to use praise effectively based on intrinsic motivation, not extrinsic motivation. Some strategies are against some of the articles we read for the class such as Kohn’s but she makes good points that we have to be careful how to use praise that it does not influence the students to be less interested in their own learning and be more dependent on the rewards. She also discussed how students are more likely to learn when they find it interesting, more enthusiastic when the students have some say in the classroom, and more likely to succeed if they feel well known and cared about which is similar to Alfie Kohn’s article called, 10 obvious truths and the chapter readings, fostering a sense of togetherness and building community in the classroom.

I rate this book 9/10 for two reasons; the book is not something to quickly skim through and, since the book is American, it does not provide strategies especially for assessment that relates to the Manitoba Education curriculum.

The book covered a few topics relating to the course but regardless of this, it’s a useful book for teachers to read during the summer to ease the stress before school starts and also keep it handy during school year. I found that a lot of these strategies could be implemented in any grades and subject courses. I definitely will be using the checklists, worksheets and reflection questions when I start planning for my first teaching job and help me avoid the burnout during my teaching career.

Reference

Thompson, J. G. (2007). The First-Year Teacher's Survival Guide (2nd ed.). San Francisco, CA, USA: Jossey-Bass.