All year, I grade students' work. It's time for me to accept their evaluation of my teaching skills. I have used the Form to the right to allow students to evaluate my teaching since 2014, getting a total of 337 pieces of student feedback. I read them all carefully, and adjust my curriculum and methodology accordingly for the following year. 

Possibly the most important day of the school year is the first day. Most teachers tell students what to expect of their class. The problem is, teachers are inherently biased about their own class. They can only view it from the perspective of a teacher, and they're the only teacher in the classroom. That's a very limited perspective. I've found that the best way to share what a student should expect from me as a teacher is to ask the students what to expect from me as a teacher.   

Just to get us in the mood for the field trip, we always do a little creative writing activity that I like to call "three-dice descriptions." It's a fun way to practice writing within character restraints, which is important in a day of Twitter, text messages, and emails as the primary forms of communication. Recently, we've used Peardeck-enhanced Slides presentations to do these activities, so some of the functionality will not be visible in the link to the right. 

We always devote a day of ELA to sharing the rules for our Darien Lake field trip. We don't spend the day because there are a lot of rules, we spend a day because what matters most is understanding the history of student behavior, and why the few rules we have exist. In all my years of teaching, we've only had a few kids break any field trip rules, and I think that's because we take a day to make sure we all understand both the letter, and intent of them.