Some Sad School Stories

There are forty students enrolled in my third hour class.  Thirty showed up today: one had been suspended, nine others were truant. 

For the previous two classes, their homework—as explained at the beginning and end of each class and posted on the board—was to get a copy of a novel from a list I’d given them, and merely to bring it in to class today.  The list included authors such as Mark Twain and Ray Bradbury (and, for that matter, J.K. Rowling and Stephenie Meyer) among two dozen others, the only other requirement being that the book they choose be at least 250 pages long.  I told them that our school librarian had a copy of the list and could help them find a book.  Obviously, they had a few hundred books to choose from.

Out of the thirty students in class today, only ten had a book.  A few others probably had a book but left it at home.  However, the vast majority of the unprepared twenty clearly hadn’t put forth any effort at all, hadn’t bothered to write down or remember the assignment, and had lost or thrown away my handout list.  They didn’t even care enough to try to do it.  Keep in mind that the assignment was merely to have a copy of the book with them.  That was it. 

And only one-fourth of the kids in that class will get credit for it. 

Is this a remedial class?  Far from it. 

Conservative Media’s Ironic Misunderstanding of “School Indoctrination”

A perceptive colleague alerted me to this story out of Chicago, where the mother of a boy investigated in that awful student beating recently told reporters that schools should be responsible for monitoring students outside of school hours. 

This perfectly illustrates something I’ve seen constantly in my years of teaching.  We conservatives worry that schools are brainwashing our kids with government propaganda, just as the mainstream media does, and though there are certainly programs and policies that clearly emanate from the left, this concern is essentially baseless. 

If the government’s effectively indoctrinating our kids, then where are the hordes of glassy-eyed teenage zombies chanting, “I love Big Brother?” 

No, our children are strongly resistant to any attempt to exert authority over them or persuade them to accept ideas in school…to a fault!

The irony here is that while conservative media gets itself into a tizzy about schools usurping too much authority over American children…that’s precisely what too many parents want us to do!

I’ve written plenty of stories on here about clueless parents who expect teachers to raise their kids.  It’s an epidemic.  These lazy, incompetent losers make teachers’ lives miserable.  Teachers spend a large percentage of their parent conferences trying to convince parents to do the work that a lot of conservatives are afraid we’re actively trying to steal away from them!

Schools taking over the job of parents?  Trust me, not a legitimate concern.  Now, the fuzzy teaching methods employed in too many classrooms–that’s a real problem to keep your eye on.

Balloon Boy’s Airhead Parents

I can’t add much to the country’s comments and complaints about the poor 6-year-old Colorado boy who may or may not have “accidentally” spurred an emergency.  I just want to add one important thing that I haven’t heard anybody else say yet.

Why the heck are these parents pimping out all of their kids on every news show they can get on?  Their scared little boy was on Larry King last night and on the Today show this morning, where he threw up.  This kid is clearly terrified.  Nevermind what kind of parents would have put this kid in the situation where he might have floated off in an experimental balloon in the first place–what kind of parents celebrate their joy at finding him safe and sound by immediately shuttling him around to every TV camera they can find?  Where’s their concern about his emotional welfare? 

In fact, doesn’t that make it seem more likely it was a hoax?

Journals For Little Kids

Eight years ago I had the idea to sit my little kids down each week and talk to them about whatever was on their mind.  I would type what they said as they spoke, and that would be their journal.  It’s been a huge success.  I’ve started with each kid when they are two and can communicate in cogent sentences.  As the oldest two got to be about seven or eight years old, they started keeping their own journals, but these first, early journals have been priceless. 

Not many people can say they have journals going back to when they were two years old. 

My younger daughter loves it so much that she asks to write in her journal almost constantly.  She just turned five and already has 29 single spaced pages written. 

As they get older, sometimes the kids will ask why they should keep journals, and then I just pull up these files and we look up whatever they wrote around this time of year throughout their lives.  Two days ago, my oldest son went back and looked up his thoughts about a Jimmy Neutron costume he wore five years ago. 

It’s because of these journals that I know what my oldest daughter, now 12, was thinking about on Saturday, October 20, 2001, when we started doing this: “Today I don’t feel good.  My tummy hurts.  I love to go swimming.  I love my Ellie.”

Job 1:5 On Parenting

Job 1:1 says that Job “was perfect and upright.”  Perhaps part of that is due to his exemplary parenting as shown in Job1:4-5: “And his sons went and feasted in their houses, every one his day; and sent and called for their three sisters to eat and to drink with them.  And it was so, when the days of their feasting were gone about, that Job sent and sanctified them, and rose up early in the morning, and offered burnt offerings according to the number of them all: for Job said, It may be that my sons have sinned, and cursed God in their hearts.  Thus did Job continually.”

I see six aspects of Job as a father that are worthy of emulation here:

1. He “sanctified” his children, which probably means he performed priesthood ordinances directly for them.
2. He “rose up early in the morning,” showing his commitment to sacrifice his comfort and serve his children seriously.  This appears to be a formulaic commandment to disciples to prepare them and for them to show their devotion to the Lord in the scriptures (see fo example Exodus 8:20 and 1 Samuel 29:10). 
3. He offered burnt offerings for them, another example of his gospel-oriented labor for them.
4. He offered those sacrifices for all of them–there were no favorites and no empty chairs. 
5. Job said that he did these things because they might have sinned.  This was preventive maintenance.  No matter what their actual spiritual status may have been, Job wrestled spiritually for them as much as he could so that they might have all the4 blessings they might receive, for when they might need it. 
6. And Job did these things “continually.”  He didn’t let discouragement get to him, he didn’t let his own trials slow him down, and he never, ever gave up.

When I find verses of scripture that I really like, I’ve started looking them up on BYU’s excellent “Scriptural Index to the Latter-day Prophets,” where they show each instance of every verse of scripture being quoted in official teachings by church leaders, from Joseph Smith and other 19th century leaders in the Journal of Discourses, to more recent leaders in General Conference.  Strangely, Job 1:5 seems to have never been referenced in a major teaching setting. 

I hope that other parents will see counsel and comfort in this verse in the future.

Another Bad Parent Story

Here’s another one I just dug out of my journal, to add to the others I’ve collected.  From Monday, May 10, 2004:

Last Thursday, a mother called me at work to ask for advice about getting her teenage son in line.  After listening to her litany of complaints about all the awful things he’d done, I started explaining that she seemed to have given up her authoritative role and needed to take it back.  Ironically, she cut me off to suggest that I talk to her roommate instead, because the roommate spends more time with her kids than she does.  I told her no, and that it was her priority to teach him immediately that she was in charge.  She sounded disappointed.

Notice what all three of my posts have been about today.  Gee, I wonder what’s on my mind?

Octomom vs. John and Kate vs. the Duggar Family

Three large, real-life families have been in the news this year.  Nadya Suleman gave birth to octuplets, bringing her total brood to fourteen; the stars of John & Kate + 8 had their image tarnished when John was caught out over night with another woman, bringing to light their feuding over Kate’s domineering attitude and John’s dissatisfaction with the media’s intrusion into their life; and the Duggar family of Arkansas released a book about their family’s history and life, following the birth of their 18th child in December. 

There was a story in the newspaper last week about Nadya “Octomom” Suleman, where she admitted that she had “made mistakes,” though she didn’t specify what exactly one of those mistakes might have been.  Was it having all of these children with a man to whom she’s never been married?  (We have her word on it that all 14 kids have the same father.)  Was it having these kids with a man who is in fact already married…to someone else?  Was it having fourteen children when she herself has no steady source of income? 

At any rate, she has recently agreed to star in a reality TV show.  I’m sure that’ll do her kids some good.  (sarcasm alert!) 

I certainly do not condone any of the acts of violence against her that have been reported, but neither will I shrink from condemning the “lifestyle choices” of anyone if those choices are demonstrably harmful to children.  Her vague admission of “mistakes” reminds me of a clip I saw from the Dr. Phil show once where the family of Ozzy Osbourne went on to simultaneously make teary confessions of their tragic failures as a family, and denounce anyone who dared to criticize them for their tragic failures as a family.  It’s all about integrity, isn’t it, Sharon?

Speaking of reality TV, I’ve never seen an episode of John & Kate + 8, but apparently the attraction for viewers isn’t seeing a large, young, dynamic family in action so much as it is to watch the fireworks between mismatched John and Kate.  Whether or not they break up, if their high-profile and volatile home environment continues, one must wonder how it will affect the children.  For the better, perhaps?  No doubt.  Hollywood has a long history of turning out well adjusted children from dysfunctional celebrity parents.  (another sarcasm alert!)

That leaves us with the Duggar family,

How To Raise Up A Family To The Lord

I just saw that Gene R. Cook’s Raising Up a Family To the Lord must be out of print: Amazon.com only has marketplace copies, Barnes and Noble doesn’t list it at all, and even Deseret Book’s Web site only offers an audio tape and a couple of translations. 

That’s too bad, because it is far and away the best book about parenting that I’ve ever read.  Cook, a general authority in the LDS Church, wrote the most specific, organized, detailed, inspiring, and practical family guide ever set down on paper.  What most especially impresses me is that he published this book two years before the church’s famous Proclamation on the Family.  Talk about prophetic!  Actually, Elder Cook’s book is the best manual for implementing and living the Proclamation that anyone could ever ask for.  That’s why it’s so tragic that it seems to have fallen by the wayside.  It should be in every home.  Couples should study it regularly.  I’d love to see it become popular, or even come back into print. 

As it is, some of those used copies at Amazon are going for as low as three dollars.  It’s worth a million times that. 

I used my notes below as the text for a lesson once when I was elders quorun president, and got a few laughs because the notes are so long.  Yes, Elder Cook covers all his bases, and does so in exacting detail.  But don’t get the idea that these notes are exhaustive–they don’t convey the wonderful spirit of his dozens of personal stories that carry the testimony of his principles into our hearts.  Not much of what he writes could be considered “commandments,” anyway: mostly ideas for us to adapt and use in our own circumstances. 

Still, any family, of any faith or none at all, would benefit greatly by working these ideas into their home life over time.  I’ll say that the more any family resembles the ideal outlined by Elder Cook, the more happy and healthy they’ll be. 

Please forgive the inconsistent spacing in my notes:

 

Raising Up A Family To The Lord

by Gene R. Cook

 

* See outline of basic priorities on pp. 13-16.

 

I. Most important things: instill habits of personal prayer and scripture study in children by modeling them

as a family; also, convey spiritual values to children through daily living in the home.

          A. Do not rely on church programs to mold children– they merely support the home.

          B. Involve children in home teaching responsibilities; expose them to faithful models (“second

witnesses”) in church.

                    1. “Family duties” to encourage include:

                              a. Weekly family home evening.

                             b. Family and individual prayers twice daily

                             c. Bless food at each meal.

                             d. Make time for family activities.

                             e. Family scripture study

                             f. Have mealtime discussions

                             g. Discuss gospel while working together.

                             h. Use special holidays and occasions to teach the gospel

                              i. Teach tithing and offerings by example.

                              j. Teach the gospel through bedtime stories.

                             k. Hold private interviews.

          C. Teach children these doctrines BEFORE they turn eight:

                    1. Repentance

                    2. Faith in Christ

                    3. Baptism

                    4. Gift of the Holy Ghost

                    5. Pray and “walk uprightly before the Lord”

                    6. Observe the Sabbath Day

                   7. Labor in faithfulness and not be idle or greedy

                   8. Seek for the riches of eternity

 

II. Teach Your Family By The Spirit

          A. Pray with children as soon as there is trouble

          B. How to invite the spirit:

                   

“First Comes Love, Then Comes Marriage…”

A recent post I read has impressed upon me that cohabitation and/or actively chosen single motherhood may well be the most critical threat facing families and society at large. 

Ann Coulter devoted a devastating chapter to it in her most recent book, but Joanne Jacobs has linked to a new study that finds cohabitation and voluntary single parenthood so prevalent that it is now very much the norm.  Her report reminded me of this incredible essay in City Journal–part of a theme that they focused on for a while–that details the many problems of our generation’s heedlessly hedonistic lack of values. 

I knew a guy who lived with a woman for a few years, having a couple of kids with her.  After a while, he started calling her his wife, though they refused to actually get married.  When he decided to leave her for another woman, that concept of hypothetical matrimony must have gone out the window.  Now he calls the new woman, to whom he also has not gotten married, his wife. 

Multiply that to a large scale and you see the environment in which the next generation will grow up.

Five Things Parents Need To Know Before Getting Divorced

Divorce is a sensitive subject.  Those of us who have been through it might be reluctant to discuss its lingering problems, because it might lead to an impossible ”what if?” game: “What if I hadn’t gotten divorced?  Would I have more or less stress today?  Could things have been worked out?  Would my children be better or worse off now?”  There’s just no way to know for sure, and especially for those of us who have moved on to new marriages and more children, such debating can only cause unproductive pain. 

What’s done is done, and we need to go forward making the best lives we can for all of our families, but for those who might be in a troubled marriage and are contemplating divorce, I want to share a few things from my experience that it might help you to know.  At the very least, these are things that you will have to deal with if you do get divorced, and it’s better to know in advance what you’re getting into.  Frankly, if these thoughts give some couples pause for second thoughts, the world might be a little bit better off.

1.  If you get divorced, your ability to raise your children the way you want to will be severely reduced. 

Birthday Letters

I woke up early yesterday because I was so excited.  It was just about all I could think about all day long.  After nine years, the day was finally here.

When my two older children were still little, I had been trying to think of something special to do for them as they’d be growing up, something to help them know me and my love for them better, something permanent and unique.  I hit upon the idea of writing each of them a letter on every birthday and sealing it up, then giving it to them several years later, starting on their 12th birthdays, when I figured they’d be old enough to appreciate it and starting that stage of life when special attention would be very helpful. 

The letters would contain stories of what my children were like as I was then writing, as well as advice, hopes, observations, and my witness of Jesus Christ.   A few times, when I’ve felt so prompted, I’ve written extra letters, or even letters meant for multiple children.  In recent years, I’ve started including copies of stories, poems, essays, or sermons that I want them to read.  I’ve continued writing these letters for every child on every birthday and dating the envelopes about ten years in the future (twelve for my younger children, who’ve obviously been getting letters written since they were born). 

And yesterday my oldest daughter turned twelve.

Scripture Study With Young Children

For years, my wife and I have had regular Book of Mormon study with our older children, but as our younger children have grown, we’ve tried different ways to do scripture study just with them.  Last year, we finally struck upon a method that works very well.  Though they’re each a year older now, they were two and three when we started.

We base our study on the Church’s Old Testament Stories picture book (which can be ordered on the Distribution Center site here).  For the “chapter” we’ll do on a certain day, one of us starts by reading a couple of verses from the KJV that are related to the story, then the other parent “fleshes out” that introduction by reading the whole picture story with the kids.  We trade roles each day: I’ll read the actual scripture verses and she’ll read the story one day, the next day we switch.  During the reading and/or after, we try to point out the spiritual lesson in the story.

We close with a Primary song and prayer.  The whole process takes only about five minutes a day, and we’re finding that it’s a productive way to begin family scripture study with the very young.  After we finish Old Testament Stories, we’ll move on to New Testament Stories, then Book of Mormon Stories, etc.

Huston’s History of the World

I read William J. Bennett’s Book of Virtues to my children once.  Well, by “once,” I mean for a year and a half, but it was worth it.  As we read, I was intrigued by how much I was learning: I started the project to help my children develop character with good literature, but I had no idea that this collection could form the rudiments of a decent liberal education. 

Bennett’s anthology presents an assortment of world literature that ranges deep and wide, giving us the greatest hits of history better than any of the college texts with which I’ve worked, and it plainly shows how morally didactic the classics are.  I read something that referred to this book as an arrogant attempt to indoctrinate people with right-wing beliefs.  Really?  Where does Bennett twist a text to mean anything other than that for which it was clearly intended?  Which of the virtues in here are peculiar to conservatives?  Honesty?  Patriotism?  Faith?  (Now, now, no cheap shots.  Although, I would defy any socialist liberal to write a similar book that made such extensive use of classics to promote, say, the social and governmental experiments that their philosophy favors.)

As I read The Book of Virtues, I saw so many wonderful works that I’d never read or even heard of before (The Athenian Oath, the story of Cincinnatus, the funeral oration of Pericles, Roosevelt’s speech on “The Strenuous Life,” etc.) that painted such a glorious picture of our civilizational heritage, that I wanted to organize them into a timeline for use in instructing my children (I had also just read The Well-Trained Mind and loved it, hence my list’s preponderance of important texts).  Bennett’s thematic chapters were appropriate for his purpose, but I wanted a way to use the text for a more academic setting.

As I made a list putting my favorite items in chronological order, I rounded it out with other historical events I deemed worthy for my children to study, including major historical events narrated in the scriptures.  I also added some family events, such as the birthdays of my wife and I, and our children, though I deleted those from the copy below.  For your entertainment and edification, here it is.  (If I ever have a ton of time to kill, I’d reformat this with links to all these texts online.)  References to page numbers in italics are to Bennett’s Book of Virtues; underlined references are to scripture:

 

Ancient World

 

5,000,000,000 BC Earth formed Moses 2, Abraham 4

64,000,000 BC Dinosaurs extinct

9000 BC Ice Age ends

2925 BC Egypt—Menes, first king of the 1st Egyptian Dynasty, Memphis

2570 BC Egypt—Great Pyramid of Cheops

2500 BC Egypt—Sphinx built to guard Great Pyramid

2300 BC Ur—Abraham Genesis 11-25, Book of Abraham

2000 BC Sumeria—Epic of Gilgamesh, the world’s oldest story

1780 BC Babylonian text, Code of Hammurabi, world’s first written law

1500 BC England—Stonehenge completed after hundreds of years of building and use

1410 BC Egypt—Joseph interprets dreams (for Pharaoh Thutmose IV?) Genesis 40-41

1325 BC Egypt—Tutankhamen (King Tut)

1290-1224 BC Egypt—Ramses II, see Shelley’s “Ozymandias,” page 68.

Bad Parent Stories

After my most popular letter to the editor appeared last year, a letter venting frustration about the lack of rigorous, involved parenting in Southern Nevada and the subsequent failure of students to achieve, I wanted to compile a book of bad parent stories for teachers to enjoy.  I planned to collect anecdotes about the clueless, the neglectful, and the flat out moronic.  As we tend to say around here, the apple doesn’t fall far from the idiot tree. 

I put queries and invitations on several places online, but never got a string response.  I’m still interested in doing the book, though.  In fact, if anyone sees this and wants to share a “bad parent” story, please let me know. 

Here are six of my favorites:

1. A couple of years ago, a high school counselor I knew had
an irate father come into his office at the beginning of a
school day. The father announced that his daughter had
come to school with inappropriate thong underwear on, and
demanded to know what the counselor was going to do about
it. The counselor was momentarily stunned, but replied
that there was really nothing that the school could do.
Fuming, the father left. He never explained how he knew
what kind of underwear his daughter was wearing, and we
never asked.

2. My first time teaching summer school, I sent a girl to
the office for a clear dress code violation: her shirt had
strings for shoulder straps and a neckline that plunged
halfway to her waist. As soon as the school day ended, the
girl came striding into my room with a smug smirk on her
face, and her mother storming in beside her. The mother
demanded to know why I was looking at her daughter’s
chest. I stammered, then told her that she had to discuss
this with an administrator first. Since then, I’ve had
trouble enforcing dress codes.

3. In one parent conference, a mother was presented with
evidence that her son had skipped every one of his classes
for two weeks.

“Could these records be wrong?” she asked.

After a pause, during which the teachers gave each other
confused looks, I asked, “You mean, did all six of us
mistakenly mark your son absent? Every day? For two
weeks?”

She didn’t miss a beat. “It could happen.”

50 Things New Teachers Need To Know

[Update: Please be sure to also check out 50 MORE Things New Teachers Need To Know.]

 

Now that August is here, I’m thinking about the imminent start of the new school year.  For years I’ve watched new teachers start their first year with no clue about how to manage all that gets thrown at them, and I’ve wanted to have something to give them, samizdat style, that lets them in on what really matters, what really works, and what they should studiously ignore.  This list represents a first draft effort at some of those ideas.

Minor disclaimer: I’m a high school English teacher in Las Vegas.  Therefore, my advice is specifically shaped by that background.  To the degree that your experience differs from mine, take these suggestions with a grain of salt.  For instance, a new third grade teacher in Vermont may not find this very helpful at all.  Still, there should be a few ideas in here that anybody could adapt to their use.

 

1. Sit your desk in the front of the room, not the back: the thinking that students will act more maturely if they don’t know if you’re looking at them is wrong–they couldn’t care less.  Also, make sure there is enough room by the back wall for you to walk around behind them if you need to.  Letting students sit up against the back wall, with no other access than from coming down an aisle, is asking for trouble.  “Creative” seating arrangements, except in rare circumstances like class discussions and debates, don’t work: just arrange them in ranks and files. 
2. As the year starts, you’ll be overwhelmed by the paperwork and routines your administrators demand.  Ask a couple of people who have been at your campus for a while what’s really important to them: most of that rigmarole is just your administrators doing what their bosses told them to do; they don’t care about it any more than you do.  Veterans at your school can tell you what you can safely ignore.  You have enough to worry about without jumping through hoops for the office.
3. Kids will complain all the time, about everything, and there’s not much you can do about it.  Learn to screen out the groans, the whining, the muttered complaints of “boring” and “sucks.”  Don’t take it personally, because they don’t mean it personally.  They’ve been trained by the media and their hormones to automatically hate everything at school.  Just go ahead with your lesson anyway.  They’ll be fine.
4. Every time you get a note or an email from a parent thanking you–or saying anything positive at all–print it out and save it in a file where you keep things like your teaching license, contract, and resume.  When somebody complains to your supervisor about how you do your job–which, if you’re doing it right, they will–providing copies of such recommendations might come in handy.
5. All “staff development” and “teacher in service” days exist to promote fads.  If you get to attend a really useful one every two years or so, count yourself lucky.  You might have to go through the motions of adopting some gimmick presented at one of these meetings, but don’t worry–everybody will forget about it soon enough and go back to normal.  Don’t feel bad about skipping some of these if you can get away with it so you can do something actually productive: planning rigorous lessons and editing papers.
6. I say “editing papers” because it’s more constructive than “grading papers.”  Written assignments should be graded like this: Read through them and mark the first five grammatical/mechanical errors.  Grade the paper based on that much: the style, voice, organization, and, of course, how far you got in the paper before you found five errors.  If five errors appeared within the first half page, make them do it over before you give it a grade. 
7. Resist the urge to try to edit every error in every paper: there just aren’t enough hours in the day.  For this reason, short assignments are better than long ones, most of the time.  They need drilling, not marathons. 
8. As much as possible, provide written directions for your assignments to students.  Oral directions alone are worthless, and just putting them on the board isn’t much better.  Students today seem to work best when they have individual copies of instructions, especially if they can keep them.  Also, you’ll be surprised by how many students will understand directions better if you simply explain them directly to them, one on one.  Even if you only repeat exactly what you just said to the whole class, some kids will “get it” better. 
9. No matter what you teach, read out loud to your class.  A lot.  Most students these days have so little positive experience with reading, and so little ability to realistically “hear” a story in their heads as they read, that this training is truly essential, at any age.  Even for teenagers, move around and use dramatic or silly voices as you read; again, such exaggeration models the kind of active screening of written words that they probably lack.  Your poorest readers will want to watch you instead of reading along.  I used to be a stickler about making them look at the pages of their book, but I’ve since come to think that this is counterproductive for them.
10. PC Myth #1: “Don’t worry about the smart kids.  They’ll take care of themselves.”  If I had a nickel for every time I heard this lie in college, I’d be able to supplement my income enough now to live like my friends in real estate did a few years ago.  The problem with this line, and a lot of other popular thinking like it, is that so many teachers subscribe to it now that the smart kids have almost nobody left rooting for them.  Their intelligence often gets wasted in our schools, with so few of us willing to challenge and expand it.  Please, do not ignore the smartest kids (even though they may be among your most annoying students). 
11. The last five minutes of every class should look like this: a quick review of that day’s content (either by calling on a few kids to answer simple questions about what was done that day, or quick written answers done on scratch paper and handed directly to you as they leave), a reminder about that day’s homework (you should also check at the door that they have this written down somewhere, preferably with a time set aside to work on it), and have them help you pick up the room by checking around their own areas for any garbage or materials that need to be put away.  When the bell rings, make a show of inspecting the room, then stand at the door and check their review work (if applicable) and homework reminders as they leave.  If it’s not satisfactory, send them back in to do it correctly.  They’ll learn quickly enough.
12. “Inspirational” posters are worthless.  Decorate your room with some artwork and some things that reflect your professional personality, but mostly with excellent student work. 
13. Make lots of referrals to counselors.  Best case scenario: students get useful advice.  Worst case: you can document an intervention that covers your liability if they get in real trouble.
14. If a student submits work that is illegible, incomplete, or that didn’t follow directions, don’t grade it.  Return it to the student and tell them that they have three days to correct/finish it and resubmit it to you, but emphasize that it’s “on them.”  You won’t remind them again, and if they fail to turn it in, they will get a zero.
15. Keep a file of IEP and 504 plans you’re given on students.  Highlight the things that you’re obligated to do.  Be sure that you implement them enough to justify compliance if the student still fails or if a parent complains.  This isn’t meant to be derogatory to those students or parents, but most of these accommodations, in my experience, are unnecessary and ultimately counterproductive.  Most of the useful ones are things that, as a good teacher, you do anyway.  However, some parents demand IEP’s and 504’s as ways of “insuring” that their children pass classes, and if they don’t, the parents will come for your head.  Since you can expect no sympathy from the staff at your school (these are, after all, legally binding documents) be ready to defend yourself.  If you can’t explain how you’ve complied with the requirements of a student’s accommodations, you’ll be hot water, and you don’t need that kind of grief.
16. PC Myth #2: “Students must be comfortable with their environment to learn.”  Horsefeathers!  Learning entails growth and change, which demands sweat.  You don’t need to purposely embarrass students, but you do need to hold them accountable to high standards.  This might take the form of pop quizzes, oral quizzes, or making them re-do poor assignments.  If students fail to turn in an assignment and the class is ready to move on to the next one, make the “slackers” do the first assignment before they’re allowed to progress. 
17. As soon as possible before school starts, ask the counselors for a student aide.  Every day, have him or her grade at least one set of papers, but make sure it’s something simple: questions from the textbook with concrete answers, or worksheets or quizzes.  Don’t give them writing assignments or anything especially creative to grade, or projects.  Don’t worry about “having one more kid to babysit;” a good student aide is priceless.  Be sure to get him or her something for Christmas and their birthday.
18. When possible, segregate boys and girls.  Separating students by grade level, race, income, etc. is pointless, but separating them by gender always gets academic results.  If the teacher next door teaches the same subject, consider collaborating on some lessons, and each of you takes all the students of one gender.  Sorry if this offends anyone, but it works.
19. If some 17-year-old boy enters your class of freshmen, do not sit him next to some 14-year-old girl.  Her father thanks you.
20. Every subject should require a lot of memorizing.  Not just names and dates, but entire poems and speeches, etc.  You’ll know it’s valuable because they’ll complain bitterly.  It’s when students are complacent that you should worry.
21. A quick turn-around time on returning graded work is a must.  If this means grading some assignments on completion (which is OK sometimes, if the nature of the assignment is such that simply doing it necessitates doing it right), so be it.  Some assignments can be graded on every other question, etc.  As I said before, keep writing assignments short.  If students get work back in a timely manner, they’re more likely to care about it.  If an assignment comes back after about two weeks and they don’t even remember it anymore, it’s worthless.  Only return assignments that a) they’ll need to study, or b) they put a lot of effort into (or should have).  Not all work is worth keeping track of.
22. Keep some blank greeting cards in your desk to scribble notes on for students who need cheering up or special congratulations, etc.  Get Thomas Kinkade covers if you can.
23. When studying a play as a class, do not assign parts and have them read out loud.  They’re terrible at it, and it will kill the play.  If your department doesn’t have audio performances of the play for them to listen to while they read along, your public library will.
24. Please, please, please don’t show a lot of videos.  Whenever you do, make sure there’s a graded assignment tied into it, even if it’s just listing ten facts from a documentary, or filling in a Venn diagram comparing a film to a novel.  No work = no accountability = no learning.  I can’t think of any good reason to devote more than three hours per quarter to videos. 
25. Avoid group work.  They’ll usually just copy or play around.  Or both.  People who insist that students need practice “cooperating” and “working with others” are wrong.  They already know how to manipulate such systems and blend in.  They need practice being focused and responsible.  If you do give group work, please make sure that each individual has a specific product or element of the whole for which to be responsible and graded on.
26. If you’re teaching punctuality, or if you simply want to lessen your load of papers to grade, don’t accept late work.  However, if your priority is educating students about the content of your field, then you must learn to deal with it.  Of course you’ll only accept it one day late, and for half credit, but even then you should be willing to make exceptions.  It’s not fair to you, I know, but if you cared about fair, you wouldn’t be a teacher.
27. PC Myth #3: “All students can learn.”  Well, maybe they can, but many won’t.  Everybody loves an underdog, and you’ve probably been inspired by some movie where a misfit teacher doesn’t give up on some slacker with a heart of gold until said slacker unleashes their amazing hidden talent and excels.  In the real world, we can’t afford to dwell on those who choose to fail.  In any given class, about 5%-15% of the students will be unreachable.  Don’t waste your time trying to “save” them.  Meanwhile, the majority of your students are getting C’s and D’s when they really should be getting A’s and B’s.  Those students, the fat middle part of the bell curve, should be your priority.  Teach them.
28. Administrators might insist that you have your lesson plans ready far in advance, which is pointless.  It’s too easy to look a month ahead and plan something so ambitious that it will never work.  Then, when that day comes, you’re stuck with a pipe dream that you can’t actually implement.  The best lesson plans are written two days in advance.  I suggest preparing some pages of generic lesson plans ready to show off at a moment’s notice so they’ll think you’re jumping through their hoops.  Life is just too fluid and unpredictable to plan further ahead than that and set details down in stone.  Be ready to adapt and improvise!
29. However, you should plan your year like this: before school starts, chart out which novels, units, projects, major objectives, etc. you want to hit each quarter.  As that quarter approaches, add detail to your chart by breaking it down into each of the nine weeks, and add more specific goals and assignments at this time to build toward the major ones you outlined before: this is where you pencil in the smaller assignments that eventually become daily lesson plans.  This will make your “two days ahead” planning much easier.
30. Have routines: every Friday morning is for independent reading, every other Tuesday is for literary response journals, Monday is for grading last week’s work in class and returning it, every Friday at the end of class is for notebook checks, the last two days of the first half of each quarter are for reviewing for unit tests, etc.  This will help big time with lesson planning.
31. Never let students be in your classroom when you’re not there.  Lock your door when you’re out.
32. Mentoring is the ultimate teaching.  Model the kind of adult you want your students to become: carry books around with you, don’t swear, discuss world events, etc. 
33. If a student is copying another student’s paper, take both papers and give them zeroes.  Do this even if the papers were for another class, and give them to that other teacher.  Further punishment than this is not productive.
34. Post on your board that you will not accept any kind of late work or even discuss grades during the last week of each quarter.  This will save your sanity.
35. Have a file set aside somewhere to put papers with no names on them, for students to look through when they wonder why they got a zero on something “they swear they turned in.”  Give them half credit when they find it in there.
36. Let them prepare an index card of notes to use on major exams.  This is about the only way to get them to study.
37. Fewer projects, more writing.  Projects don’t teach nearly as much as we’d like to think they do, and they need more practice writing, anyway.
38. Wake them up with a warning the first time they fall asleep.  Don’t yell or bang anything to do it, just nudge their shoulder with your knuckles. 
39. Cell phones and iPods are evil.  Period.  Get yourself a reputation as an inveterate hater of all electronic toys in the classroom.
40. Unless you’re reading out loud to them, there is never a good reason for you to be talking for more than five minutes at a time.  If they’re not working hard independently, they’re not learning.
41. PC Myth #4: “Students must be able to relate to content to understand or care about it.”  How condescending!  They’re not here to be pandered to, to have their warped, manufactured view of the world reinforced.  They’re here to expand their horizons.  That means intellectual humility borne of introspection brought on by exposure to challenging new ideas.  Shock and awe, baby.
42. Bloom’s taxonomy is useful for planning assignments, but the “multiple intelligences” theory is not.  Every student wants to be a “people-oriented communicator,” and thinks they are…but they aren’t.  This world revolves around numbers and written words, and the things that radiate from them, and to the degree that we diverge from that in our training of our students, we do them a disservice.
43. Keep a journal where you record funny moments in your class, memories of students who genuinely gained something from you, photos of themselves at dances that they give you, and anything else that’s positive.  It will save you when you’re ready to tear your hair out.
44. The perfect balance between professional and approachable behavior is impossible.  In general, lean towards more professional.  Assume that every student is out to get you; don’t give them anything to use against you.  This might appear extreme, but after your first few angry parents, you’ll learn to be cautious.
45. Most students will need very frequent grade updates to stay at all motivated.
46. Go into every parent conference armed with copies of updated grade reports, recent samples of the student’s work, and any disciplinary paperwork related to the student.  If they have an IEP or 504, bring it and be ready to explain how you’ve complied with it.
47. If you have a problem with a student, email their other teachers for advice: someone knows how to deal with him.  If the student is in ROTC or plays a sport, go to the officers or coaches.  They will get you results fast. 
48. Detention is rarely worth it.  If you do make a student come in, make them use the time to do homework for your class, or clean your room.
49. Collect homework as soon as the day starts.  Anyone who was “finishing” it after that gets half credit.
50. Never, ever, ever take any work home with you.