As a teacher, you have undoubtedly come up with your own tried-and-true teaching tips throughout the years. You know what works and doesn’t work in your classroom. But ongoing challenges from a constantly changing world and new batches of students require you to grow, adapt and sharpen your teaching skills to engage with your students more effectively.
The National Board for Professional Teaching standards recently published a blog post from National Board Certified English teacher (NBCT) David B. Cohen: “7 Experiences New Teachers Should Seek Out for a More Satisfying Career.” Cohen notes that visiting other classrooms and schools was so beneficial in generating new ideas and sharing reflective conversations about teaching that he wrote a book based on his visits.
Listen, Learn, Write, Share
Writing about teaching may come easier to an English teacher like Cohen, but he makes the point that the exercise causes you to reflect on your students, your content area, your pedagogy, the community and other contextual details of your work. This writing could be a school or district newsletter article, a guest opinion piece for your local newspaper, or an article for a professional journal. More teachers are beginning to blog about teaching and education in general, and they often find new connections and dialogue in doing so.
Become a School Leader
There are multiple roles you can move into while still teaching, including grade level leader, content area specialist, department chair and instructional coach.
Go Back to School
One obvious way to acquire more teaching skills and make your qualifications current is to pursue further education. Not only can you expose yourself to newer strategies, technologies and solutions, but earning an advanced degree can provide a path to higher-level jobs and salaries.
Become Tech Savvy
You don’t need to be a tech expert to recognize the growing role of technology in your students’ lives. It’s important to keep up with the gadgets, software, apps, games and resources that can help your students learn better and faster. Not all educational technology is ideal for the classroom and cost may be a barrier, but if you’re aware of a tool that can help with student learning, you can make a case for incorporating it into your classroom.
Try New Ways to Engage Students
This can tie back to incorporating technology in the classroom, but it can also be as simple as making learning fun. Seek out experiments, team activities, hands-on activities and field trip ideas; these are all ways to put some fun back into the classroom and open up new teaching opportunities.
Become a National Board Certified Teacher
Emporia State University offers a fully online Master of Science in Curriculum & Instruction program designed to prepare you for the review process to become a National Board Certified Teacher. In addition, you will learn to design and implement curriculum for grades PreK-12, develop and hone leadership skills in technology integration and how it relates to curriculum reform, and much more.
Learn more about Emporia State University’s online Master of Science program in Curriculum & Instruction (C&I) – National Board Certification PreK-12.
