Becoming a 'Together Teacher': Organizational Tips for Educators

Bryan Toporek:
Good evening, folks, and thanks again for joining us for today’s free live chat, Becoming a “Together Teacher": Organizational Tips for Educators.

We’ll be getting underway in just a few minutes. In the meantime, please keep submitting your questions below!

Maia Heyck-Merlin:
Indeed, I do see strong “together” skills as instrumental to teaching success.

The main reasons are:
1. Meeting the needs of your students
2. Your credibility as an educator--with families and students--will you call back?
3. Your participation as a colleague--will you get your shared lesson plans in?
4. Your sanity! Teaching is so darn demanding that unless you have a plan for breaks, the work is relentless.

Maia Heyck-Merlin:
Hi Barb, Thanks for kicking us off with the super question. I would just start with three ways:

1. Create a Weekly Worksheet. This tool will create a precise plan for how you will use before/after school time, preps, lunch (if you have it), etc. Free templates are available on my website at www.thetogetherteacher.com

2. Pause to plan. Take an hour each week to clean up the week behind you and look ahead to what is coming up.

3. Consolidate your calendars. Take all of the calendars that your school or district distributes, pick ONE calendar tool (such as Google or paper-based) and enter in all deadlines for the year.

Maia Heyck-Merlin:
Hi Mr. White! Oh, yes, the paper storm! I’ve observed super together teachers do a few things:

-have a clear collection point for their students to deliver the papers, such as a vertical file on your desk or table

-process those files at the end of the school day religiously and either 1) grade them or 2) take them home to grade

-distribute them back to students via student mailboxes (crates for secondary students, traditional mailboxes for younger kids)--or have a student helper distribute them!

Maia Heyck-Merlin:
Ruth, I have seen teachers use a few different systems--and sometimes they mix and match systems.

1. Google (Calendar and Task feature)
2. Outlook (Calendar and Task feature)
3. Evernote (free and awesome!)
4. Other apps, such as Toodledo or Reminders

The trick here is to see what feels comfortable to you. If you are just getting into the habit of being “together,” I usually recommend you start off with paper systems and integrate technology later.

Maia Heyck-Merlin:
Elizabeth, this is one of my favorite topics. Having been on both the teacher and administrator side of things, a few thoughts:

- Create a quiet work space for your teachers. There are often too many interruptions in a typical teacher’s lounge, people in and out, noise of copiers. For teachers to truly get work done at school, they need quiet!

- PLCs could supply healthy snacks in refrigerators for teachers.

- Administrators can ensure there is a clear, common calendar, and that email is minimized.

Maia Heyck-Merlin:
Anthony, great question. I’m a huge fan of to-do lists (Upcoming To-Do List, per my book) because often times, there are things that don’t go on our calendars because they don’t have “hard” deadlines, such as “re-organize classroom library.” This to-do needs a place to live so it is not lost. Once a week, I advise teachers look at their Upcoming To-Do lists and then slot things into actual slots of time.

If your organize your to-do list correctly, it is what I call “strategic procrastination"--in the very best sense.

Maia Heyck-Merlin:
Alicia, as the daughter of an art teacher (and I got roped into organizing her supplies!), this is a super question.

In general, we all need the same baseline set of skills: prioritization, planning, efficiency, organization, and strong execution. . . . However. . .

Maia Heyck-Merlin:
There are a few positions that I have seen require an EXTRA boost of organization, namely:

1. teachers who deal with supplies (art, science, PE, music)
2. mobile teachers who teach from carts!
3. special educators who have a huge amount of paperwork

Maia Heyck-Merlin:
Ruth, super question. There are a few ways to show your leaders you are organized:

1. commitment to meeting deadlines
2. proactive planning to achieve goals (such as making project plans for field trips)
3. leading organized meetings or committees

Maia Heyck-Merlin:
Smith, some of this depends on the age of your students, but here is what I have seen work.

- Ensure the folder has two pockets labeled “Bring Back to School” and “Stay at Home.” We show a model of this in our CBS interview (posted on our blog at www.thetogetherteacher.com).

- Number your students and ensure that number is on your folder. Have one student collect everything in a crate in the morning to check and see if eveyrthing is there.

- Train your students’ families on your system. We have a few great letters home to parent samples on our blog.

Maia Heyck-Merlin:
Tracy, oh, yes--paper! Many of us are drowning in it. First things first:

1. Recycle anything you can. Be brutal. Spend a few hours just tossing stuff.

2. Determine what you absolutely have to keep that you don’t have a soft file of somewhere.

3. Invest in or use your school’s copier as a scanner and turn as much as you can to PDFs to save on your computer or in the cloud.

After that, with the very minimal amount of paper you have left, create binders or file folders (takes less time than hole-punching) with clear labels.

Maia Heyck-Merlin:
Anthony, Thought Catchers are places to “catch your thoughts” for later. Too often, we scrawl field trip ideas, summer reading list brainstorms, and ideas for the next staff meeting on whatever piece of paper we have in front of us--or just leave it in our brains.

If we take the time to organize those thoughts in ways that we can easily refer back to later, it saves so much time. . .

Maia Heyck-Merlin:
Anthony, the simplest way to organize your thoughts is to create Thought Catchers (free templates available at www.thetogetherteacher.com). Thought Catchers are nothing more than boxes with:

- colleague names--to record brainstorms for colleagues
- team or department names--to record thoughts for meetings
- future ideas--to gather ideas for the future

Then, we are often pushed back to review the thoughts through a meeting with someone or a memo we have to write--and they are all in one place for us! This sure beats having the scraps of paper scattered around!

Maia Heyck-Merlin:
Mr. White, I just helped a teacher with 13 years worth of supplies--so I get this!

1. Start by getting rid of anything you don’t need (I always say this!). Be BRUTAL!
2. Ensure you have clear labels for every portion of your closet.
3. Train a student to help you put things away.
4. Keep a box outside the closet of “things to reshelve” so you are not tempted to stuff things in

Maia Heyck-Merlin:
Anthony, so in the case of area of expertise, I’m not talking about student routines, but rather routines for YOU! Given the fast-paced and unpredictable nature of teachers’ lives, I recommend:

- picking time to batch process routine weekly items, e.g. when do you copy all papers, when do you grade, plan

- setting clear morning and afternoon routines for what you do when you arrive and depart each day

- picking one time per week to plan for the next week

We have a blog post going live next week that shows a photograph of a teacher’s posted morning/afternoon routines. She says it completely minimized stress and added efficiency.

Maia Heyck-Merlin:
Bob, this is definitely a tough situation, and I hope you have cart--or some large tote bags or backpacks.

- Ensure you have a clear method of transport (see above!)
- Invest in duplicates of key items to stay stored in the various classrooms hidden away
-Have a student helper get you prepped to move around

I just interviewed a teacher in San Jose who teaches math from a cafeteria stage, and photos of her systems are posted on 9/21 (Friday) on our blog.

Maia Heyck-Merlin:
Hi Ruth, we all have our own images (and nightmares!) of being unorganized. For many of us, it looks like . . .

- being late (gulp) never returning student work
- making copies at the last minute
- turning around to fumble at your desk for supplies in the middle of teaching
- having to rewrite last year’s lesson plans because you didn’t save yours to just improve
- having items fall on your head when you open the supply closet. . .

Whether it is stuff, time, or papers, there are many ways to be unorganized. Our book tries to hit on all aspects of organization, but you can implement one thing at a time!

Maia Heyck-Merlin:
Anthony, I’m glad you asked. I often say getting “together” is sort of like getting “healthy.” If you tried to go to the gym seven days per week, eliminate all fat, etc., you would never follow-through.

I recommend going bit-by-bit and tackling whichever aspect you need most first, whether it is paper management, classroom organization, email control, or time management, and then making a six month plan. The journey of “togetherness” can take over a year--and we all need tune-ups now and again. We have some samples in the conclusion of the book, and many teachers read one chapter per month as part of PD / self-study.

Anthony Rebora:
That’s all the time we have tonight folks. Thanks for joining us. I thought it was a great conversation--very helpful I hope. Thanks to Maia Heyck-Merlin for participating and providing such thoughtful answers (at such a fast clip). Please check out her work: http://www.thetogetherteacher.com/

Also note that we’ll have a transcript of this chat available on our site.. Just go to Education Week Teacher: http://www.edweek.org/tm. And please let you colleagues know. Good night.

Bryan Toporek:
Folks, thanks again for joining us this evening for our free live chat, Becoming a “Together Teacher": Organizational Tips for Educators. A special thanks to our featured guest Maia and our moderator Anthony for fielding so many questions throughout the hour.

We’ll have a transcript of today’s chat posted at this same link within the hour. Thanks, and have a great rest of the night!