Motivating and engaging students is challenging. Edward Deci, one of the premier researchers and authorities on intrinsic motivation, wrote: “The proper question is not, how can people motivate others, but rather, how can people create the conditions within which others will motivate themselves?” When we are trying to motivate students—often unsuccessfully—the energy is coming from…
Fixed and Growth Mindsets
Our mindset impacts on our effectiveness and ultimately our success according to acclaimed researcher Dr Carol Dweck. Through her research Dweck discovered that people have different mindsets about their talents and abilities and that these mindsets make a big difference. Some people believe that their talents and abilities are fixed traits – they have a…
Real World Classroom Management
Good classroom management is essential. Here are some ideas for you to reflect on how you manage behaviour from US Principal, Lisa Brumfield on The Principal’s Desk. Be succinct in your instructions. Most students can follow two-step directions at best. With this in mind, limit multiple requests. For example, if you say…“ I need all…
Effective Parent-Teacher Meetings
Parent-teacher meetings can be a stressful time as they often add to our existing workloads. Not only do they usually occur before or after a busy day of teaching, many teachers feel uncomfortable dealing with parents. Changing formats and modes brought about by COVID may be adding to the stress. Planning and preparation are essential…
The Competence-Confidence Loop
To feel satisfied and happy in our work in schools, we need to feel both competent AND confident. If these are unbalanced, we can become doubtful, frustrated, unmotivated and could end up mentally and emotionally drained. Being too confident without competence is delusional. However, people who are competent but don’t have confidence, are filled with…
Voice the forgotten tool of the trade
Have you found yourself continuously clearing your throat or sounding hoarse and croaky? You may be damaging your tool of the trade as nodules could be forming on your vocal folds. You could easily do damage that could cause you to have to consider a career change. The teaching profession has the highest numbers when…
Five tips for Managing Technostress
When I started teaching, I found it surprisingly difficult to use technology in my lessons, and I was the tech guy. I found this situation stressful because:- – The tech was unreliable and didn’t work as planned – I wasn’t that good at using the tech as a learning tool I developed imposter syndrome as…
Who Would Be A Teacher? Special edition
Celebrated in more than 100 countries world-wide, World Teachers’ Day was established by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) in 1994 to recognise the role of teachers in society. In Australia and New Zealand it is celebrated on the last Friday in October. Who Would Be A Teacher? Teaching can be…
Managing Student Anxiety Before It Becomes A Problem
Research shows that childhood anxiety left unmanaged will almost certainly re-emerge, highlighting the importance of early detection and management. Teachers, as first responders, play an important role by minimising the impact of stressful moments before they lead to full-blown anxiety. Recognise anxiety triggers Recognising the events that trigger anxiety is the first step to helping…
Setting goals that aren’t SMART
Rare is the person who hasn’t heard about SMART goals – most of us have learnt the theory and many of us have probably experienced some success with them! To revise, the acronym stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Timely. The intent of using the acronym is to help you focus your efforts and…