Keeping Myself Organized & Accountable

I was really excited and relieved after I finished this week’s reading. While I have many strengths and skills, “organized” is not in my top five. I know organizational skills are critical for success in the classroom, so this is something that I know I have to work on before I enter a classroom. I taught social studies this past summer to kindergarteners and first graders at an enrichment camp and I quickly learned how things can quickly get out of hand, when you lack organizational skills. Where are my handouts? What was the address for that website I wanted to show the class today? Where’s my seating chart? Attendance sheet? Where’s my lesson plan for today? These were just some of the questions I was asking myself during my first week of teaching. Although I had made a “plan” the night before, for some reason when I would get to class things would just fall apart. However, after reading chapter 4, I was thrilled to learn about some of the apps, which can help me get organized and stay accountable in the classroom. I was aware of some of the web-based resources available for enhancing teaching but was less familiar with the ones for lesson planning and assessment. I did some desk research and found additional sites, which offer lesson plans, templates for lesson plans and lesson plan trackers. For example, Planbookedu.com is a free online lesson planbook software for teachers. Per the website: Never struggle with lesson planning again. Your plans are available anywhere and are simple to create. I also found ThinkWave, a free online gradebook with student and parent access. It automates grading calculations and generates detailed reports and it’s all saved in the cloud. I like the idea of any tool, which can help me get organized. It’s important because at any moment an administrator can walk into my classroom and ask how my lesson plan meets common core standards or the progress of a particular child or how it fits into the unit. I also appreciate the tools, which provide access to the parents. This way parents can view the progress of his or her child in real time; no surprises during parent-teacher conferences or on the report card. I also came across a lot of resources for homeschools. According to the U.S. Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), in 2013, the number of homeschool students has grown by almost 300,000 since the last report in 2007 where 1.5 million students were homeschooled. I wonder if the growth of homeschools drove the need for more web-based lesson planning and tracking systems that are widely available today. Were you homeschooled? Do you know anyone who was or is currently being homeschooled? If so, what types of web-based resources and other technologies do they use for lesson planning and staying on track?