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You Set The Tone Everyday – 10 Tips to help keep things positive!

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Saying Thank you

You Set The Tone Everyday – 10 tips to help keep things positive!

 

You’ve got the power! bamph… bamph bamph…bamph… (cue music!).  You know the song and you know it’s true. For good or for bad, the principal sets the tone in a school everyday. You set it through your actions, or inactions. What you say or what you don’t say. All eyes are on you. If it feels like a lot of responsibility… well, it is.

 

You’ve heard the saying:  “With great power comes great responsibility”. Don’t ever forget that,  because it is so true. If we were to go out and study all the great schools that are succeeding, almost always you will find out that there is a positive principal at the helm.

 

If you’re having a bad day, it’s almost guaranteed that the ones around you will have a bad day.

 

  1. You can’t be inconsistent or “up and down”. I know it’s hard. I know sometimes people around you mess up. I know some people don’t seem to care. I know there are rude people in the world. I know sometimes parents are worse than the students.  It doesn’t matter.  YOU have to be the calming voice. You have to be the voice of reason!
  2. Wait and wait some more. – In this case, it’s one of the only times when waiting is wonderful. Count to ten, then count ten more if you need to. Only when you’re composed and calm should you say anything. Words are like toothpaste in the tube. Once they’re out, they’re out.
  3. Think before you speak. – If you’ve waited and you still can’t think of anything positive to say, then don’t say anything. Sometimes silence says more than your words ever could.
  4. Say Thank you. – Say it and really mean it. It takes little effort on your part, but means the world to the people around you. They need to know that you care. Just remember that you couldn’t do it without their help. Be humble.
  5. If you’re not good at being grateful, find someone to help you! – One of the things I’ve learned about myself, is that everyone is not like me. I expect people to do their job. I don’t need a lot of thanks (though even I need a little), but thankfully, I’ve learned. People need to feel appreciated. People who feel appreciated are happier and more productive. Happiness spreads happiness. I realized that I am not as naturally appreciative as I could be, so I enlisted the help of my secretary, guidance counselor, or co-worker who really enjoyed making people feel good. I gave them the task of keeping my “thank you” and appreciate events up-to-date.  Know your strength and weaknesses and get help in those areas where you need it. You can’t be great at everything.
  6. Don’t be mean – The day-to-day challenges and the sometimes obvious (to you) poor decision-making that you have to deal with can make the most patient person sometimes become “snarky”. Don’t do it. Treat people with respect – at all times. You can lose  the respect and good will of your staff when you lash out. It only takes a minute to really hurt feelings and damage the good will that you’ve built up with people.
  7. Don’t make it personal. – See above.  Good people can make poor decisions. Just because someone is not doing the best job, it’s your job to find out how to maximize their strengths and talents. They are fellow humans who deserve your respect. No matter if you’re correcting, congratulating, guiding, etc… treat people professionally.
  8. Set the Example. – Ultimately YOU have to set the example in your school. All eyes are on you to see how you deal with difficult situations. A tough situation can be turned into a triumph and a learning experience for all.
  9. Be Real – You don’t have to be perfect. – People don’t follow leaders who are perfect. A good leader allows those around him or her to realize that mistakes happen. How you deal with everyday mistakes sets the tone for the whole organization. Do you allow the mistakes to derail your progress or do you use them as learning experiences to help grow as professionals.
  10. Be careful of how you handle when people who work for you make mistakes. Be even more careful of how you handle when YOU make mistakes. Be humble… I’ve said that before. You have a “bank account of good will” as the leader of a school. You want to consistently deposit into that account by showing appreciation, getting to know your staff personally, and dealing with mistakes in a calm, caring and professional manner. People should never worry that you will “blow up”. You never know when you will need to depend on your staff to help when you have made a mistake. CARING IS EVERYTHING. A true caring attitude can help fix a lot of mistakes.

 

Teaching and working with kids is a tough job in today’s atmosphere (not that it’s ever been easy), but having a solid, reliable, and positive person as the leader of a school makes everyone’s job easier.

Six Tips on starting a new position as a school principal (or starting fresh in your current job)

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When You Get People Together

Six Tips on starting a new position as a school principal (or starting fresh in your current job)

Woo Hoo!  You finally landed that principal position. It’s kind of like that feeling when you first went to a new school.  Will the other kids like me?  Will I fit in?  Will the school bully try to jam me in the locker. Ha!  You might be starting your first administrative position or you’re trying to know how to answer that question of “what would be the first things you would undertake if you become the new principal”.

Having gone through waaaay too many interviews for principal positions in my life (and having been on the other side of the table with HR), I will try to give you a few insights that I feel will be helpful for you. I will say this:  YOU are not Me:  Take these tips as guidelines and tailor them to your own personality.

  1. Set up a time to talk with your total staff (teachers, counselors, librarians, paraprofessionals, office staff, custodians, etc…) Send everyone that works at your school (and I mean everyone – don’t make the mistake of not inviting someone and creating an enemy early on) a letter requesting a short (non-mandatory) meeting with you before school starts. They should call your secretary to set up a time. If you don’t get a response, then have the secretary call them. It’s good information to know who are the people who don’t think it’s important to meet with the new principal. You can file that away and you can still meet with those people after school starts.
  1. In the letter you send, you should ask for three questions to be answered  A. What are the things that this school should be proud of. B. What are some areas that the school could improve upon?  C. If you could be principal for a week or two – What would you change and why?
  1. Listen – you only get one chance to make a first impression. They want to see that you care and that you will follow through on what you say you will do.
  1. Speak with Central Office supervisors (depending on the size of the system you’re joining – it could be the Superintendent, the Director of Instruction, Content Specialists, Dir. of Special Education, etc…)  – you might conduct the same exercise with them (or if that just doesn’t seem like it’s going to fly) then you could ask what priorities they would like for you to focus on to start the new school year.  Some will make it easy – I remember when I first got appointed at a School Board meeting and the Superintendent pulled me aside immediately and gave me three immediate directives:  A. Get the school fully accredited  B. Get all the students to graduate on time  and the one that he said came from the School Board members C. Fix the situation with all the “smooching” students that were in each other’s laps out in front of the school during lunchtime.  I thought that was pretty clear!
  1. Set up a time to meet with parents. There should be three different options for these meet and greet times.  For the parents who don’t work outside the home, or they work at night – you might plan a “Principal’s coffee” in the morning hours to meet and talk with parents, hear their concerns, and start sharing your “vision”   – Do you have a vision?? Something to think about!  There might be an afternoon or after school time to meet parents who come and pick up their kids from either school or after-school activities. Lastly, you should try to have a time to meet parents in the evening, for those who work regular hours and have to get home in time to fix dinner and then come back out. You might consider having at least one of these meet and greet sessions in a place other than the school.  Some parents still have “flashbacks” to their days in school and they may not have been pleasant ones.  Meeting at a non-threatening location such as the library or a fast food restaurant sometimes brings out people who would never visit you at your office.
  1. Lastly, I would then “sift” through all this information you have gathered and you should be able to generate a prioritized list that you will need to begin work on immediately.

Coming soon:  How to set up your List of Priorities and how to “attack” that list efficiently!

 

What do you think of this “plan of attack” for when you land your first administrative position? What would you add or how would you do it differently? Add your comments! I would love to hear our thoughts.

“A person who never made a mistake never tried anything new”  —Albert Einstein

The FIRST of TWO most important discipline questions to ask during a teacher interview

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image - Plan A

Without effective classroom management, a teacher will not be able to teach and students will not be able to learn. Write that down. That’s important!

I have rarely seen a teacher not be successful because of their lack of teaching techniques or an inadequate knowledge of their subject matter.  However, I have seen many teachers who, for whatever reason, could not relate well to students and could not handle the classroom management portion of their position.

Let me put it bluntly. There are many nice and well-meaning people who have a great knowledge of their content area. A lot of those people even love their subject area, however they cannot relate to students and are unable to keep their students’ interests and guide them.  Or, as is usually muttered in the copyroom…”the kids are eating her (or him) up”.

This is one scenario-based question that I always ask at an interview for a teaching position:  “If you were to be hired here and you had been in your position for about two weeks and the first two weeks went well; however, two students in the back of the room seemed to have decided to test you. They decided to talk while you were talking.

Where the attention has been on you earlier, now it was continually being drawn to these two students. It was becoming quite a distraction. Please walk me through the steps you would take, starting at the smallest intervention and (assuming they were good techniques, but these two students were very challenging) moving towards more serious interventions. What steps would you take before bringing the administration into the situation?”

10 Step to be taken by a teacher BEFORE contacting an administrator about a chronic discipline matter (not necessarily in order):

  1. The Look – that infamous “teacher look” that my 6th grade teacher, Ms. Martin, used to have. It could freeze you solid with one piercing glance. If her arms were crossed, it was even more effective. Of course you have to develop that style yourself.  Mine was the raised eybrow…
  2. Proximity – The student knows why you’ve moved nearer and so does the rest of the class.
  3. Tap on the desk. – Again, the student knows why.
  4. Quiet whisper in student’s ear to please be quiet.– If you know your students, you will know what tone to take with each one.
  5. Move the student(s) having issues to a different seat or area of the room.
  6. Asking student to please be quiet (out loud). – The goal is not to embarrass anyone, but to allow learning to continue
  7. Private talk outside the classroom – make sure that the rest of the class is working on an assignment of some type. Ask student what is wrong and why is this situation happening? – Sometimes you may be surprised at what they tell you. Then again, they may not tell you anything.
  8. Check with student’s other teachers to see if they’re having the same type of issues. – The teacher may out some positive techniques that are working in other classes.
  9. Contact parent(s). – Hold a team meeting of all the student’s teachers, if possible. Phone is much better than e-mail.
  10. Check with school counselor. – My wife is a school counselor and you would be surprised at how much she knows about the students and their personal lives. Students are dealing with much more than you might know.

I would suggest that, unless you are in desperate need, if a teaching candidate cannot come up with at least four of the following suggestions on this list, then they will likely struggle in dealing with students and being successful as a teacher.

I’m not saying it can’t be done… just be cautious. Most quality candidates will have learned most of this information in college or during their student teaching.

 

Important Note:  Of course, this does not apply toward any violence or blatant disrespect. No teacher should have to tolerate threats, being cursed at, or physical violence in the classroom. Those should immediately be reported!


Does this list look like your mental “teacher toolkit”?  Do you agree, disagree or have any steps that you feel need to be added?

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