CMS SPRINT #1a: Students who had gotten the teacher before me fired!

Dear Difference Maker,

Let me tell you a story about the time I signed on to teach a group of students who got their previous teacher fired!

It was my first year of teaching in a rural school out in the middle of nowhere!  I accepted a job to teach grades 3,4,5 and 6 of students who were behaviorally unfiltered and had acclimated toward hourly disruption and chaos.

I was offered the job because of the excellent discipline I had demonstrated during my student teaching internship.

Here’s what happened right out of the starting gate:

• I had to write lesson plans for all four grade levels in every single subject area, plus provide daily activities for teaching music and art.
• Because there were no aides to help, I never got a break from the moment I opened the doors to when I left for the day.  Not even recess.
• I was correcting papers until midnight and then getting up at 5 a.m. to do it all over again.
• I was having nightmares almost every night in anticipation in managing this group of behaviorally scary students.

Then one evening driving home from school, I had a realization that I was never going to make it at this pace.

I needed a solution!

My #1 life motto had always been:  If it’s not fun, I’m not doing it!

So I started thinking about what I could do differently to make teaching this unruly group of students easy and fun, yet contained!

I began contemplating what teachers did in the good old days when they had all twelve grade levels in one room … and because I shifted my focus off “the problem, the problem, the problem” that’s when it happened!  A creative solution emerged.

I had a visual in my mind that teachers in one-room schoolhouses must have teamed students up to learn together. 

The next day, that’s exactly what I did.  I started teaming my students up in a variety of creative ways, each and every day.

To put an end to the cliques, we drew random numbers many times throughout the day so no team was exactly the same from subject to subject, day after day.

Of course problems popped up and so we Teamed Up to have constructive, unifying conversations to find solutions – together – as a team.  I invited them into two-way conversations to get to the heart of what was going on.

Here’s what happened:

Every. Single. Student. started learning better and having more fun and I wasn’t staying up until midnight grading papers anymore because we did it in teams.

Here’s what I learned from this:

1. Focusing on the new, fun solutions brings creative ideas. This goes for a teacher’s resolve to manage their time as well as student behaviors.

2. By immediately implementing the Teaming Up ideas I envisioned, not only did I survive my first year, but my students also thrived.

3. BONUS:  as a unified community of caring individuals emerged, the unproductive behaviors of the past completely dissolved, and their productivity accelerated from teaming up to learn with each other.

This is important because:

Rather than staying stuck in old-worn out ways of doing things, allow yourself to get creative.  Think easy and fun.  Think unity.

The moral of this story is multi-faceted:

1-     better solutions come from reaching for better feeling thoughts,
2-     team synergy really does make the dream work,
3-     and maybe most importantly, many hands do make light work.

Here’s how you can use this step by step:

Step 1:  List off 5 ways you can use my 9 Unifying Conversations and Activities to Create Cohesive, Engaged, High-Performing Teams that will help you win back time while making a difference in the lives of others … no matter what the age!

Step 2:  Even simpler, just think about how much work you can be getting done when you are able to guide struggling individuals in how to talk so that they can be seen, heard and felt within the context of a synergistic community of their peers.

After all, we’re all just little kids in big bodies striving to get along!

If you’d like to go to the next level and be able to unify a group of de-energized, disengaged, disgruntled individuals to build a socially safe community to work in, then I have Great News: the heavy lifting has been done for you.

All you need to do with my program is 1) PRESS PLAY, 2) ask the questions provided to help people find common ground and 3) listen intently on each person’s response so you will demonstrate how to understand more compassionately.

I’d like to invite you to check out the Free Excerpt of my 9 Week Team Synergy Training.   The 25 FREE I Make A Difference wristbands that you will need in Week 4 ends soon so click here …

Reaching out …

PS … FYI: Coming up over the next few weeks are: Administrative Professionals Day April 27, National Secretaries Week ǀ Professional Secretaries Week: April 24 – 30, Teacher Appreciation Week: May 2 – 6, Nurse Appreciation Week: May 6-12, Mother’s Day: May 8, Father’s Day June 19 and Graduations …

Founder of Heart Productions & Publishing LLC, the Pacific Northwest