A great way to make yourself indispensible in your building is to have a wealth of new ideas. Every school faces challenges, and you can score huge amounts of points by working to help your school overcome those challenges. The perception is that new teachers have tons of great ideas because they are fresh out of college, where many research-based school reforms are being taught...right? Actually, we know that teacher education programs haven't changed significantly in the last 40 years. You are lucky, though...you have found www.newteacherhelp.com, which will give you as many good ideas as you can handle! These ideas are for teachers and administrators alike, and some of them are featured on my blog, called Administrator Alley...you can click on the blue link to visit my administrator help blog. Here are three ideas for administrators to implement, and how you (the first-year teacher) can help:
*Alphabet Lunch - Administrators can reduce the amount of noise in the cafeteria during lunch by implementing my "Alphabet Lunch" program. Read about it on Administrator Alley, and discover that you can help by volunteering to make the lists for each lunch, or make numbered labels for each of the cafeteria tables. If you want to go for mega points, volunteer to monitor one of the lunches to make sure that students are sitting in their assigned seats. You never know...it might inspire you to pursue a career in school administration (or give your bosses the idea that you would make a great administrator someday).
*Tardy Reduction Program - The number of tardy students in your building can be significantly reduced by keeping close track of the number of tardies that each student receives, then assigning Saturday School to chronically tardy students. You can help by volunteering to make the Tardy Binder and Tardy Book, or really score points by volunteering to host Saturday School once a month. Let's face it, you are going to have to write lesson plans, grade papers, and do other work at school during the month anyway...why not do it while you host Saturday School? You will elevate yourself to "elite" status in the eyes of your administrators if you do that.
*Write a Grant - Our newest newteacherhelp.com contributor, Dr. Douglas Brooks, is going to share with us the secrets of writing successful grants to bring much-needed money to your school district. Suggest that your administrators examine the "GrantSuccess" program, and volunteer to serve on the grant writing committee. Can you imagine how many points you will pocket if you are the catalyst for your district scoring a $115,000 technology grant like an Indiana school district earned last month by using Dr. Brooks' system? Just so you know...Dr. Brooks will be revealing his GrantSuccess program FREE to newteacherhelp.com readers!
