Day One and Beyond

Book excerpt: Your teacher training may have provided sound theory and a collection of instructional techniques, but it's often the practical details that can make day-to-day survival difficult in your first days, weeks, and years of teaching. For new teachers or those just new to the middle-school environment, here is an invaluable resource from the author of Meet Me in the Middle that will help you walk in the door prepared to teach. Oriented toward the unique experience of teaching grades 5 through 9, Day One and Beyond delivers proven best practices along with often-humorous observations that provide a window into the middle school environment. Based on his many years of research and experience in the middle school classroom, Rick offers frontline advice on: practical survival matters, such as what to do the first day and week, setting up the grade book and other record keeping, and what to do if you only have one computer in the classroom;classroom management, including discipline, getting students' attention, and roving classrooms;social issues, like the unique nature of middle-level students, relating to students, and positive relations with parents;professional concerns, from collegiality with teammates to professional resources all middle-level teachers should have.Content and instruction are important, but so are the practical matters that enable sound teaching practice. Day One and Beyond shows middle-level teachers how to manage the physical and emotional aspects of their unique environment so they can do what they've been trained to do: successfully teach young adolescents.