The only way to leave school at the bell as a teacher each day is to have some solid teacher routines. I have a few things that I think you should incorporate into your daily teacher routines, as well as some weekly teacher routines. Yes, I’ve been teaching for five years now, but I’ve had something new added to my plate each year. I don’t think leaving school by the bell really has much to do with my years of teaching experience. If anything, it has to do with years of building these routines into habits that I refuse to let go of.
Leave school at the bell with these teacher routines:
- Prioritize your to do list: You will always have a million things on your to do list. Put the things with the closest due date at the top of the list. Put big lengthy projects (with a decently close due date) toward the top of the list. I use the app To Do Ist to help me keep track of what needs to get done and when.
- Put your phone in airplane mode: this will disconnect the phone from nearby cell towers and wifi. This means you don’t get notifications and don’t get you distracted during your planning time.
- Keep the place organized: If you aren’t constantly cleaning up after yourself, then you can save yourself a bunch of time. Learn more about my thoughts on classroom clutter.
- Pull out copies and write on the board before you leave. This gives you some leeway if there’s traffic or something that holds you up in the morning. In the best of circumstances it gives you time to wake up in the morning so you don’t have to jump directly into work.
- Reflect on your lessons. Take a few notes about what went well in your lesson and what you’ll want to change the next time around. This will save you time during your lesson planning next year.
Here’s exactly how I spend my planning periods each week. In this, I get myself on a schedule that keeps me ahead of my plans and gets me out of the building at the end of my contract hours.
My Teacher Weekly Planning Schedule
- Friday: Each Friday, I write my lesson plans for, not next week, but the following week. Then I get to go home and think about how I want to teach the week’s lessons (if I choose to.)
- Monday: On Monday, I work on the notes that I am going to give the kids. In this, I am usually doing powerpoint or Smart Notebook slides. I make sure that I cover all of my standards.
- Tuesday: Tuesdays I create and curate the activities my students will do in class. It is a combination of creating classwork and homework, finding things online (both paid and free), and pulling questions from my textbook.
- Wednesday: Each Wednesday I work on the answer keys for the things I collected on Tuesday. I make sure that the questions are well written, have proper answers and that there aren’t any typos. This is usually a pretty easy day for me. Sometimes there is a little bit of leftover work from Monday or Tuesday that gets done here as well.
- Thursday: On Thursdays I hit the copier and send everything through. This is usually an easier day as well. I think it’s a good idea to do the tough stuff early in the week. It helps me in case there’s too much to do and I need some extra time. After copies, I will either schedule or “draft” my digital stuff in Google Classroom.
- Friday: Now we’re back to Friday. I school at the bell feeling prepared because everything for the week ahead is scheduled. I write some lesson plans for the week after next and they’re quick because of the All Star Planning Method. Learn more about it in the All Star Planing Masterclass.
