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We're Baaaaaack!
31 Plays3 years ago
After a little time off, there are many hot topics out there. School safety, hiring, morale, and so much more! Listen and follow along as you will benefit from engaging with the hosts as they discuss different ideas and viewpoints on all educational topics as they provide their insight and “perspective” in hopes of having a greater understanding of their profession. Join administrator Robert Hinchliffe and teacher Abigail Peterson as they examine different educational topics from various points of view. Take the challenge of looking at a topic from another side and see if your opinion may change. In the end, no matter what side you are on, it’s all about perspective. What’s yours?
In this episode, the hosts discuss:
- What experiences should a student-teacher have prior to holding a position?
- Is there a way to change college coursework that will prepare students better?
- Can student teachers complete different types of practicums prior to being in the classroom?
- Will things ever change?
Connect with Abbie and Robert
Instagram: www.instagram.com/ItsAllAboutPerspective2021
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Its-All-About-Perspective-102961565105781
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ItsAllAboutPer2
Abbie on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kindergarten_chaos/’
Robert on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pryncypalwithay/
Robert on Twitter: https://twitter.com/RobertHCCS
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Transcript
Return of Hosts and Reflection on Past Year
00:00:17
Speaker
Hello everyone and surprise! We are back! It is Abigail Peterson from Kindergarten Chaos and
00:00:25
Speaker
I'm Robert Hinchliffe from Tyrone Thompson Elementary School. It's good to be back. We took a year off, but perseverance. And wasn't last year a crazy year? It was. It could have been a good year to actually like have a have something to talk about, but I would probably just been extremely negative with all kinds of stuff. So maybe it was a good thing. There was just so many changes. I think if things were constantly changing for our district,
00:00:52
Speaker
Everyone started the year with wearing masks and there was a lot of rules and restrictions and they were always changing and we had the red light system thing that you guys, staff had to abide by. So there were so many things and I know you and I talked even though we weren't doing podcasting, we would email, not email, we would text back and forth and you would say it's just crazy and the right hand doesn't know what the left hand's doing.
Adapting and Discarding Ineffective School Measures
00:01:21
Speaker
It was just a crazy time. And I think across the board that was for everybody. Yeah, I think it was everywhere. I mean, everybody's trying to figure it out and survive, except for, you know, certain states that didn't even pay attention to it, which, you know, that's their choice. But, um, it was just a crazy time. One week would be one thing and the next week would be other. And it was just, uh, up and down, but hopefully this year is a little bit more smooth. There was a lot of, I feel like learning curves because they found out that some things that they
00:01:51
Speaker
precautionary measures that were put into place, they found out didn't actually work. So I feel like last year was a lot of trial and error and they've decided that in doing some of the things last year, it didn't work. So they're going to maybe X those out for this year.
00:02:06
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, well, I mean, nobody's ever lived through a pandemic or had school in a pandemic. So it was, it was trial and error and that's, that's fine. Let's, let's, hopefully we have learned and don't go backwards. That's really the main, the main concern at the moment.
Addressing Learning Loss and Behavioral Challenges
00:02:21
Speaker
I think some of the research, the more recent research that I have read has been the big elephant in the room that we've all been talking about for the last two and a half years, but has been the learning loss that has happened and occurred.
00:02:35
Speaker
So how do you feel like you're going to address that with your staff and your students? This will only be their second year of being in person at your brand new school. Well, I don't know. I don't know really that I pointed out specifically because I think we just expect everyone to teach what walks in their door regardless. So you can say learning loss if you want or
00:03:04
Speaker
I guess just to be a little more blunt, you know, like Thompson is in the suburbs of Vegas and having worked at Smith with you where we were at, the students came in low in some cases. So out here is really no different for us. You know, they're coming in a little bit lower than they usually would maybe. So I don't really see it as learning loss. I just see it as you teach them where they're at in terms of their academic levels. The more challenging thing last year was behaviors.
00:03:32
Speaker
We had to do a lot with that and just stamina, kids had no stamina at all. But this year, I think they're back to where they'll have stamina and they understand the school. So now we can teach them better in terms of academics. I think a lot of schools
00:03:49
Speaker
the learning gaps might have been exacerbated by being off for so long. So if a kid was a grade level behind and now they're two grade levels behind, and you have a class full of those types of students, that gets pretty difficult. But I think, again, everybody, you just have to teach what walks in your room and do the best you can. And admin, you've got to support that.
00:04:12
Speaker
So it's interesting, I think we're kind of dealing with two different issues here. I was speaking more of learning loss from the distance learning aspect and not only the end of 2020 and 20 to 21, but last year from 21 to 22. But also you kind of alluded to the fact of the new security measures that are going on due to
00:04:36
Speaker
mass shootings. So what has been put in place or what are your thoughts on that?
Debate on School Security Measures
00:04:47
Speaker
It's going to be an unpopular opinion. That's okay. It's my perspective. Really, the only thing I've seen is basically one point of entry
00:04:59
Speaker
Um, which we already do at Thompson, you know, everybody comes through the front, but I think the problem, if you go to that overarching school, the overarching problem is that they seem to think the people above us in many cases, I feel like think one size fits all.
00:05:14
Speaker
At Smith is an outdoor school, kind of. In the morning, we opened all the doors and the kids came in the side. So we had 26 points of entry. If you were going to try to have all 500 students come through the front, they might possibly get in the building into the classrooms in about a half an hour if you hustle. So how practical is that? I don't know. But again, I think it comes back to
00:05:42
Speaker
You have to just do the best you can. If a student put something in their backpack, then they've made that decision. You're not going to check every backpack. There's nothing you can do about it. You can have one point of entry or have the teacher at the door and see if they look nervous or see if they look a little different. But my unpopular opinion is that you can never be 100% sure
00:06:05
Speaker
without metal detectors. And even then, in today's age, I'm not entirely sure you can be sure that you don't have a weapon on campus, you just can't. So it's a little bit of false sense of security. And I know that people aren't gonna like that. But it's true. If you think about it, you know, do you check every backpack that walks in your door, Abby? No, no, no. And I think it's
00:06:26
Speaker
Interesting to note that you and I both were a part of that one year at our school, where it came in on campus, a gun came in in a student's backpack. I believe it was fourth grade. And that student never said anything. It came from another student. And so there was no nervousness. The teacher didn't suspect anything. It actually came from gossip of another student.
00:06:53
Speaker
And I don't mean gossip lately, I'm just saying like the other it was kind of talked about and somebody spoke up. So, but no, I haven't checked every backpack. Yeah, it's just, you know, it's just the fact that people have to face that.
00:07:11
Speaker
There's really no way to ensure 100% security in a school. It's not T-Mobile. You're not walking through male detectors having people look through your backpacks. You're just not. And you're never going to have that. You want to go to clear backpacks? Fine. Kids are smart. They'll figure something out. Are you going to pat every kid down?
00:07:32
Speaker
You know, it's, it's just, I said many times in life, you can't legislate morality. So you're going to have to, we all have to count on the vast majority of the students just behaving and not doing things and parents locking up their guns and things of that nature. Um, and again, it's just, it's a slap of reality, but from my point standpoint, um, we count on kids to be good and not do stupid things. And unfortunately sometimes kids do stupid things.
00:08:01
Speaker
Let's talk about something that we talked a lot about actually in season one, but we are really seeing the effects of
Teacher Shortages and District Responses
00:08:12
Speaker
it. And it is, they call it the great exodus. It's happening not just in education, but in other careers as well. What are you seeing as a principal?
00:08:24
Speaker
From my standpoint, we're definitely short teachers and it's countrywide, it's not just Vegas. People can pick on Vegas and oh, this and that, whatever you want, but it's countrywide. I think it's finally just caught up to us with the fact that educators aren't respected in a lot of ways and today's youth,
00:08:50
Speaker
Honestly, don't want to go into a profession where they can't get rich fast. They can't get any glory. Teaching is a different profession. You have to want to do it. You're not going to be rich. You're not going to be famous. So I think that society contributes to it. As far as us, we're down two teachers, two aides.
00:09:13
Speaker
And that's just us, and we can survive without them. But some schools, if you have 20 plus vacancies right now, I don't know how you're gonna open. I don't. Right, and what do you think, what is the district's
00:09:26
Speaker
What is the district saying about that for a school that has a lot of vacancies? Okay, so we've talked about this as well, but here I am. I'm a licensed teacher and I would like to sub on my own, you know, on my own time.
00:09:48
Speaker
I have to go back to the process. I even reached out to you and said, gee, is there a way for me to get in? And you said, absolutely not. And it is ridiculous. It's ridiculous. How, how are you going to feel? But yet then you have Arizona who's like, anybody who's breathing can come and be a teacher. So it just makes no sense to me, you know, on, there, there has to be some common sense and that seems to be lacking.
00:10:16
Speaker
I agree with you. I think I get frustrated because I think I like I've suggested ways for the districts to do things and maybe they talked about it. Maybe they didn't. But
00:10:31
Speaker
I feel like there, there's just no pro activity with it. And here we are. And now we're, you know, for example, you know, I've said many times, you know, I, um, I like Dr. Jara as a person. He's been to Smith many times when we were there. Um, I get frustrated with things like, um, and again, I don't know all the ins and outs of bargaining. So to be fair, I don't understand all that, but why are we announcing pay raises for new teachers in June?
00:11:00
Speaker
when most of them are looking for jobs in January. Again, I don't know all the behind the scenes stuff, but they're all hired in June. There is nobody. So even if you think that's an interesting thing, too, that we can delve into a little bit is this whole.
00:11:17
Speaker
new teacher salary. So we went from like 41, 42,000 to 50,000 starting. So we're talking about Clark County School District here in Las Vegas, Nevada. And now I always remind people that we have one school district that services over 300,000 students, 90 square miles.
00:11:36
Speaker
uh you know services multiple places including mesquite and overton and um you know it Henderson everywhere so we are unlike a lot of big cities where they have multiple districts we have one district and i just think it's really interesting that they made this change and yet there's going to be some second or third year teacher that's making less
00:12:03
Speaker
than beginning teachers. Yeah, I think that's another thing that has pushed people away. And then you throw in the news. If you are Google searching right now, is Las Vegas a good place to teach? I don't know what you're going to see. You might see a story about Colorado High School or Desert Oasis. There's a lot of bad pub out there about Vegas. I love Vegas. I think it's great.
00:12:32
Speaker
There's how much positive press is out there about teaching in Las Vegas? That's the thing. So if you're a kid from Washington, where I grew up, and you are not into the glitz and glamour in the nightlife, maybe you like more historical type things. So you're choosing between Albuquerque and Vegas. In Albuquerque, you make 60 grand, and here you're making 50.
00:12:58
Speaker
I'm going to choose Albuquerque because when you're young, you just want a job and, you know, you're going to move anyway. I just think there's so many facets to it. Um, but I don't, I don't know what the fix
Impact of Living Costs on Teacher Retention
00:13:09
Speaker
is. Um, and everything, another point of this going to it, everything pays more. So you can go work at target, like $24 an hour now. Well, if you talk about support staff and you go work at Panda express, I think you start at 14. Um,
00:13:26
Speaker
What's Chick-fil-A? I mean, I know it's it's it is insane and I think what you hit the nail on the head
00:13:35
Speaker
Basically, we don't know what the answer is. I do think that it's a step in the right direction. I think definitely we have to offer more. We know inflation. Everybody is feeling inflation or gas prices. If you also know anything about Las Vegas, I mean, our rent is exorbitantly high. It's one of the highest in the country. Our housing skyrocketed in terms of purchasing a house.
00:14:06
Speaker
We have to incentivize people, but we also have to incentivize the people who are still here. And I know they threw some bread crumbs a little bit.
00:14:19
Speaker
I mean, the sense that I was getting from teachers was like, they felt like it was a slap in the face. They felt like, you're just giving us a little bit. And then it wasn't coming on time. Some people didn't show up. And it just was a lot of hassle. We've talked about this before, but our insurance is a wreck. And so what can we do?
Supporting Teachers with Resources and Leadership
00:14:42
Speaker
What can you offer your teachers?
00:14:47
Speaker
I get, I'm different as you know, or anybody's listening to this, I'm different. So it's my job to give you whatever you need to teach. But I also know that sometimes people come to, like when we were a Smith and a teacher came to school and there was a box of paper outside her door. She was like, I get a box of paper. I'm like, yeah, you get one every semester. I've never gotten paper before. So again, my job is to make sure you have what you need to teach. Right now we have money.
00:15:16
Speaker
We don't have people. When you have people, you don't have money. It kind of goes in opposite direction. We have money.
00:15:24
Speaker
You know, at Thompson, if you ask for it, there's a 99% chance I will get it or find it. And that's just my way. I have to make sure that you're happy. Richard Branson said, if you take care of your people, they will take care of the people. Something like that. And that's just kind of my philosophy. Give them what they need and get out of the way. But not every principal is like that. I know one principal lost almost all of his staff. You know, and I don't know.
00:15:52
Speaker
My fear is what kind of people are we putting into leadership positions? They might be great people, but are they ready? You have to adapt to the times, I think. Right now, if you are old school and you are by the book mean, people are going to leave, especially in Vegas, you can go anywhere you want. I mean, we have two openings and we're in the suburbs and two years old. So people who have not adapted and take that hard line approach are going to lose the people that don't like the hard line approach.
00:16:22
Speaker
Um, if you have people lined up outside your door, well, then yeah, you can do that. But right now, like you said, anybody with a heartbeat, um, is kind of the option, especially in support staff. It's just one of those things where you have to take care of your people or they're going to leave. And even then you're going to lose them. I mean,
00:16:40
Speaker
And that probably looks different for every school. I always equate everything to elementary because that's what I taught. That's what you're exposed to. So, you know, in high school that I'm sure looks different as well as middle school. I'm interested to hear your wife's journey because she is moving to middle school. And so she's been in primary education for years.
00:17:05
Speaker
And so I think it's going to be interesting. I'd love to have her on as a guest to see what the changes are going to middle school. I've heard there's definite differences and I've always heard teachers that have moved from elementary to middle school saying they'll never go back. So I can't wait to hear Christy's question. We'll get her off for sure. I think she was just ready for a change. We talked about that last season. Sometimes you just need a change and she was ready for that. And again,
00:17:35
Speaker
Um, I think there's some factors at school that pushed her out, um, or definitely made the decision easier. And you have to decide as leaders sometimes, you know, am I able to lose this person over this or because of that? And you know, you make those gambles. Um, and if that's, if that's your hill to die on, then that's what it is. And it has to be respected. Everybody has a different hill. Um, and that's in, and in today's world, I think.
00:18:03
Speaker
It's really easy for people to jump ship and go find a different one. Right. Well, let's talk about something positive. You are doing something different this school year. And so, you know, we always, we tend to kind of, you know, talk about problems and situations and we don't always have the answers. We don't always have solutions. And so I know sometimes that can be depressing and feel defeating, but
00:18:31
Speaker
I, you know, kind of my mantra is never let anyone still you're happy. And sometimes you can sometimes people do, but I choose to kind of reframe my mind and kind of have that growth mindset, okay, of, you know,
00:18:46
Speaker
It might not be going exactly my way, but what can I see the positive in? And some call that toxic positivity, but I personally do not like to live in negativity. I just can't. I don't like it. It brings me down. If you want to talk about mental health, living in that negativity, I can only control. I remember something that you used to tell us when we were in the classroom and I've shared this in PD recently.
00:19:15
Speaker
you can only control what goes on in your classroom. You can't control what goes on beyond your classroom doors. And so I think of that in terms of myself and think about, I can't control other people's feelings and thoughts and perspectives. I can only control my own. So what are you doing this year to build positivity and to try to build your staff's positivity?
Promoting Positivity in Education Environment
00:19:42
Speaker
Um, I think you're referring to my Twitter, Instagram. I just, I don't know why, but one day I just thought I'm going to post a hundred positives this year on Twitter and Instagram. And I don't know why I decided to do it, but I can get, I can get very negative and cynical towards district items towards school items. I will tend to be much more positive.
00:20:08
Speaker
So I just thought, no, I'm just going to try to post positives and see if anybody will.
00:20:14
Speaker
follow me and take the challenge to try to just shed some positive light on education. It's so easy to post negative stuff. I could do it all day long. And we know from media that bad news sells. Bad news sells people, you know, but there is a trend and there are even Instagram accounts, you know, tell me something good of positivity and people do appreciate that. And I think that for those of us that want to
00:20:44
Speaker
We're not ignoring the fact that negative things happen and that there's bad things going on and that there's situations beyond our control that make us unhappy. That, okay, let's kind of swing the camera over here and let's choose to spotlight on something that is good. Yeah, it's going to be interesting. So I don't, again, I don't know why I decided to do it, but I did. I'm looking now, the first one I posted, um,
00:21:08
Speaker
basically about it. And I showed the school and said, you know, Marcus and Darren are custodians, did a great job all summer, and took the challenge and got 149 likes, which for me is a lot. So then the next day, I do positive number two, about upgrading the building, and I got 24. The next time, positive number three, I'm down to 21.
00:21:32
Speaker
Pause them or four, I'm down to 12. Pause them or five, I'm down to 10. So it's gonna be fascinating to see if- Well, you can chalk some of that up to the algorithm. Yeah, but it's gonna be fascinating to see what people like or what they don't.
00:21:49
Speaker
But again, they have to agree on it too. And like the last one I posted about how the facility, the grounds people always seem to have the school nice before the year. That might not be someone else's, um, you know, perspective. They might always be fighting with them. I don't know, but you know, I know those guys are out in the 113 degree heat. That's a positive thing. Let's post it. So I just took that and then, um, we're going to, you know, we have morale booster set up. We have,
00:22:19
Speaker
Um, you know, our lounge is pretty sweet for, for, uh, staff. Um, we're going to have, we're going to kick off with fun things. I just think it's such a hard job that you just have to try to stay positive with it and go now. Let's be honest. You all have a colleague that you're never going to get to change. They are the posse of poison as Ron Clark would call them. Um, you know, they're just that person. And I don't want to say I haven't worked with them or haven't had them.
00:22:49
Speaker
Um, but you know, you can just, you just focus on the runners and focus on trying to stay positive in this environment and just helping people. And I think that's going to overcome a lot of adversity as we go on. I think also, if we can just get adults grownups.
00:23:10
Speaker
Well, but we've talked about this, you know, adults, you know, adults do everything that they tell the kids not to do, or vice versa, you know, adults tell kids to do everything that they don't do. Like, you know, if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say it. But yet adults don't do that. So we'll see. But yeah, if you can get adults, it's interesting, though, you're into this. We're going to start out this year with
00:23:31
Speaker
This year is all about relationships for us. That's, that's, that's our mantra. Um, and the staff knows that because last year was difficult in the fact that, you know, being in our first real year, people's personalities were starting to come out and they didn't necessarily go along with other people. And by, by March and April, it was getting a little tense. So this year, basically we're going to talk about Enneagrams.
Understanding Staff Personalities with Enneagrams
00:23:57
Speaker
and try to get people to understand, okay, this is how you need to approach an eight. This is how you need to approach a two. This is how you need to deal with a five, because we're all different people. I'm a two. I don't like conflict. I want to buy off. Are you gonna do a cheat sheet? Yeah, I don't have it all planned out. That sounds a little bit confusing, to be honest. I'm gonna give people stuff to look like. But if you go, it's interesting though, because what I found is,
00:24:27
Speaker
you know, as a two who lives with an eight. It is a challenge. I understand. I understand the Enneagram. I understand the way people operate. It's just remembering who's who. You know what I mean? Like you walk up to somebody who maybe teaches for me that teaches fifth grade that I normally maybe not
00:24:48
Speaker
Maybe I don't act with and then I'm like, I don't, I mean, it sounds, I would definitely need a cheat sheet. Like what number are they again? Yeah, we have that. We have a staff info sheet and everybody took the Enneagram test. Um, but I'm hoping that, you know, when you learn more about how that, it was actually eyeopening cause there's one member on staff that I've really.
00:25:07
Speaker
got to know and learn who she is. And that has helped me kind of understand I have to do this or have to do that. And so hopefully, you know, there's so many strong personalities at my school, so many strong personalities. And if there's a problem. Why do you think that? Because I have my own opinion on that.
00:25:29
Speaker
Um, my opinion is, is I give them so much autonomy and, um, responsibility that they're opinionated and they want to do things well, and they want to do them their way. Um, because they have so much power and they know they can share it, it emboldens them to do so. Um, that's my opinion. What is the majority of your staff? What any gram ones and twos.
00:25:53
Speaker
Really? Yeah. Wow. That surprises me. Right. Because they are strong personalities. But there's, you know, there's nine eights, I think on their ace, the one I associate with being very strong. Yes. In certain ways. But again, I think we can tell it like it is black and white, no empathy for the other side. This is the way it is. I'm going to come and talk to you if there's a problem.
00:26:21
Speaker
Ones don't want to talk to you if there's a problem, right, right? We want nothing to do with you We just put our heads in the stand and do our thing But again, we have to understand as a one or two the eight is coming to fix the problem Not to attack you and aids you have to understand we don't want you to come and talk to us We just want to be happy and let it go So again, I think if people will understand that and who you are
00:26:48
Speaker
You know, I'm going to guess you're probably an eight. I'm an eight. Yes. Because Abby, I have, I have, um, I have a wing of a seven. Um, but that's who you are. You, there's something you're here. It is here. It is very direct. I like to take control of problems and situations. And I like to be, I like to know the plan. I like to address it. I don't like anything to be, um,
00:27:14
Speaker
At any time, I just need to know. I just need to know. I'm surprised because I would think that a lot of your staff would be eight just because that tends to be a trait of not all runners, but some runners.
Building School Culture Through Relationships
00:27:29
Speaker
Just that personality is like go getters, problem solvers, fix it, make it work.
00:27:37
Speaker
That's interesting to me that you say that most of them are ones and twos. Yeah, I just you know, so we're gonna we're gonna approach it again, it's all about relationships. And if you understand better who they are, or who your kids are, who the parents are, that will help you move things forward. Because what I've what I've learned, and I wish more people understood this is that without a relationship with someone, you're not going to get anywhere with them.
00:28:01
Speaker
You're just not like one thing at one point I try to make with teachers in kindergarten or pre K, you know, as you have to deal with them for one year, I got to deal with them for six years. Right. So I'm going to give a little bit here.
00:28:15
Speaker
So down the line, things go better. And that's just me having relationships with people and having to know people. You know, the people like you are a hard line. These are the rules. This is the way it is. That's hard. The rule is the rule is the rule.
00:28:32
Speaker
But I think my hope is that just by us coming together and actually getting to know each other and how we are will help us with any problems going forward. And that might alleviate some tension and make people more happy as well.
00:28:48
Speaker
So I know you like to do themes every year. So is that your theme? Is relationships your theme? Or what is your, do you have a theme? I'll give it, we have one. I'll give it to you next week. I can't give it to you this week. Cause someone might hear this before, before we do a reveal, but we have one. Every year we have a theme two years ago as a wild card, be the wild card. Last year it was be relentless. And then this year it has something to do with relationships. So that's, that's what I'm going to say.
00:29:16
Speaker
And I got next year already planned out, of course. But this is my this is my
Strategic Planning for Teacher Support
00:29:21
Speaker
thing, though. I like it. It gives you a rallying point to next week, we'll talk about this. But maybe I can get to someone now by if we post this, don't waste their time the first day with housekeeping, handbooks,
00:29:40
Speaker
stuff that they don't want to do. I agree, but let's talk about empathy and you want to talk about looking at the other side. Right now you have a staff that, how many very first year teachers do you have on your staff this year? Very first year, this is your very first year. No teaching experience. You have four. One. Okay, so one. She was a staff last year.
00:30:05
Speaker
Yes. So think of this side, Robert. You're going to have schools that have brand new first teachers and those schools that lost a majority of their staff for whatever reason, maybe they have a huge inflection of newer teachers. So how do you, now let's think about this, how do you do housekeeping?
00:30:31
Speaker
Now, here's why I say that, because you might say, well, give them something to read. Then that all of a sudden, then now this email or this pamphlet or this whatever, now falls upon me to take my own time
00:30:48
Speaker
and read it. And so how do you, it's not an issue for you, but it's gonna be an issue for some schools where if, what do you always say? You can't consequent somebody that didn't know the expectation. And if they don't know the expectation because you never said what it was, you were like, well, I don't believe in that. How do you find that happy medium? Well, I give you credit because, thanks for pushback. I don't have a problem with that.
00:31:13
Speaker
If you're writing a staff, well, here's my thing. If you have a school full of brand new teachers, number one, they start tomorrow. So you have a whole week before your other staff comes back to do that stuff. So if whatever it might be, where do you, I can't even think of something.
00:31:29
Speaker
Well, that's a good point. No, that's a good point. It's a great point because if you have brand new teachers that are going to need to know all of the little things, then they do. They have a week that you can break things down for them. It goes to my thing. One of the things I always say right now is don't slow the high kids down in your classroom.
00:31:52
Speaker
I don't want to slow down the teachers that have been there for two years and already know everything. But if I make the whole staff sit through an hour meeting on a handbook and where you're going to do this and where you're going to do that, I'm slowing the high kids down. So would this be a solution? Would be to say, because this is where my mindset goes, is OK.
00:32:13
Speaker
Those of you that feel confident and don't have any issues and are just gonna take it as it comes, you're dismissed. Those that feel like they need specific directions and instructions and need to ask a million questions, you stay. And then you might have five teachers stay.
00:32:32
Speaker
and provide them the information you need because you're always going to have those people. I've heard it in our previous school where they were like, well, how was I supposed to know? I didn't know. There was no direction given. And then there's people that are like, I don't need direction. If I have a problem, I'll text them or I'll have a but.
00:32:53
Speaker
we did have a we did have an issue with uh well where was that in the handbook right and so you run this risk of i just feel i should not have to put in a handbook or impress upon you how to act as a professional i should not have to take time telling you uh show up at 8 10 you can leave at 3 20
00:33:19
Speaker
your lunch is from, I don't think I should have to spend time on that. You can read and if it's important to you, you'll find the answer. And then also one thing I think that people do a really bad job of, many people, is they don't make people rely on their grade level colleagues. You always said, if you walk in my door, I will help you. Great, go in there and ask her, what do I do?
00:33:40
Speaker
You can't, again, I just feel like at eight o'clock on August 3rd, if I go over boring stuff, I'm killing their enthusiasm for the year. Give them a list of things. So what I do is I send out grade level tasks and department tasks, and I have whatever is listed. Know where your kids are sitting in the lunch room.
00:34:06
Speaker
I'm trying to think what else is there. Understand the house days. There's the schedule. You know, take a little bit of initiative and run.
Encouraging Teacher Initiative and Independence
00:34:14
Speaker
And then they need to work on that as a grade level. And they have all day Thursday. They have all afternoon Wednesday. So they have time to figure that out. Sometimes coming from somebody who's an Enneagram eight, sometimes I feel like I am pulling the wagon because the ones in the twos they're afraid to ask.
00:34:36
Speaker
and they're afraid to ask and they're intimidated so they don't necessarily
00:34:46
Speaker
They don't, they don't want to come and ask. And so then it's like, you have to, you have to, so every time I see someone, what do you need? How can I help you? What do you need? How can I help you? If they don't answer honestly, that's on them. I can't read your mind. I agree with that. I agree with that. I feel like if you don't speak up, you're only hurting yourself. It's not, I mean, nobody's a mind reader that I know of. So how am I supposed to know unless,
00:35:15
Speaker
Unless, you know, I speak up and I mean, I'm sure there's some things out there where you have to, you know, explain dismissal or, you know, you have to do something, you know, like I said, we have a housekeeping thing and I have things on there, but I'm not going to take up all day with runners down.
00:35:35
Speaker
I'm just putting it out there because I just think that, you know, there's, there's a little bit of, of balance in everything. And I would like to know, for instance, in the, you know, like in the classroom, there are certain things that I am very, I'm a stickler about, and then there's some things that it doesn't really matter to me. You know, so does it matter if you wear, I mean, this is, this is ridiculous, but does it matter if you wear blue or red shoes? No, it doesn't really matter.
00:36:03
Speaker
But it does matter if you wear, you know, close to choose, you know what I mean? So there are some things that are real specific that I feel like would be great as a bulleted, you know, like, I have a problem, you know, you have to be here by, you know, 821. Or it doesn't matter as long as you're here by the bill.
00:36:25
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, again, I think I think what gets lost in the shuffle is, you know, you're a professional. So you need to admit what would you want your kids to do if they didn't know you want them to ask you? Or, you know, or row their own boat. If you as a professional, you know, I just say, Okay, think about the first day, what do you need? Do you have everything you need? Is everything clear? And after that, you got to ask or you got to row your own boat.
00:36:51
Speaker
You know, and then if you mess up, then we'll deal with it. But I just don't want people to, look, I tell people this
Looking Forward to Season Two
00:37:00
Speaker
all the time. The first morning back in school is the happiest that group's gonna be as a whole all year. Oh, how was your summer? Oh, you know, because no copper is broken yet. No parents matter than yet. That first morning is the happiest you're gonna have until the last day. Don't squish that enthusiasm. Bill, use it. Use it somehow.
00:37:21
Speaker
Very true, very true. Well, we have launched season two, and if we sound a little rusty, don't worry, it's gonna get better. It's gonna get better. And we're always looking for new topics, things that you'd like to see us cover, also guests. We're interested in having new guests this season, season two. We would love to hear from you. You can follow
00:37:47
Speaker
myself or Robert on Instagram. Robert, what's your Instagram? Principal with a Y. And we have our, it's all about perspective Instagram as well. So feel free to follow us and comments, leave a comment and like, and subscribe to this podcast, wherever you listen to your podcasts. And no matter, no matter what comes and happens this school year before school, the first day of school, remember,
00:38:16
Speaker
It's always about perspective. Have an awesome end of July, beginning of August, back to school season. And we look forward to seeing and hearing from you for the next episode.