CCP: Episode 36 // Why Now is the Best Time to Be a Teacher
Being a teacher is a lot of work, but in the middle of a pandemic…it’s even harder.
I’m here today to focus on the positive and point out some reasons why it’s the best time to be a teacher even during a pandemic and virtual learning.
Did I get a few eye rolls? Maybe a few chuckles? That’s okay. I’m here to put a little happiness in our lives as well as new perspective on teaching in 2020.
You’ll Learn
(Timestamps Shown)
A different perspective on the pandemic (0:36)
Where to find fun teacher tips daily (1:29)
We have an amazing online community of teachers (2:42)
Why it’s best that we didn’t have this pandemic 5-15 years ago (4:43)
Why it’s possible to have virtual learning (4:56)
How I’ve learned Google Classroom and Google Slides (5:37)
That we have resources at our fingertips (7:23)
How to become a Classroom Nook Community Member (9:18)
A famous Theodore Roosevelt quote (10:11)
LINKS & RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE
Instagram: Classroom Nook
Video Tutorials for Teachers
REVIEW & SUBSCRIBE TO THE CLASSROOM COMMUTE PODCAST
Don’t miss a single episode. Subscribe to the podcast and you’ll get notified each week when a new episode gets dropped! And - if you love what you hear, I’d be so honored if you took a quick moment to rate and review the podcast so that other awesome teachers can find the podcast!
TRANSCRIPT
Ep 36: Why Now is the Best Time to Be a Teacher transcript powered by Sonix—easily convert your audio to text with Sonix.
Ep 36: Why Now is the Best Time to Be a Teacher was automatically transcribed by Sonix with the latest audio-to-text algorithms. This transcript may contain errors. Sonix is the best audio automated transcription service in 2020. Our automated transcription algorithms works with many of the popular audio file formats.
Hey, teachers, if you have a classroom and a commute, you're in the right place. I'm your host, Rachael, and I want to ride along with you each week on your ride into school. This podcast is the place for busy teachers who want actionable tips, simple strategies, and just want to enjoy their job more. Let's go.
Hello and welcome to another episode of The Classroom Commute Podcast, I'm Rachael your host, and I'm really excited to be here with you today because I'm going to speak a little happiness into your life today, which I'm sure you could totally use because we are in back to school season and most likely you're feeling overwhelmed, drowning in all the things that you need to do, and wondering how the heck you're going to make it through this beginning of the school year that looks like no other school year we've done before. Today I want to focus on the positive and point out some of the reasons why right now in 2020 in the middle of a pandemic, in the middle of virtual learning, why right now is the best time to be a teacher. You might be thinking, OK, turn you off right now, I don't want to hear it, but stay with me for a couple of minutes here because you might just have a little bit different perspective walking out of this podcast episode than you have coming into it.
But before we get started, I wanted to remind you that I have been sharing, every single day, some fun teacher tips, some real time behind the scenes action going on here at The Classroom Nook headquarters. I would love for you to join me over there. you can find me at The Classroom Nook. And like I said, every day I'm over there talking with teachers and sharing some fun stories and Instagram posts in the feed. I would love to connect with you over there. So come on over and follow me. Another quick thing to mention before we jump into today's episode is if you have not already had a chance to leave a review for the podcast, I would love for you to do that today. Just take a couple of minutes to share what you're loving about the podcast. And by doing so, you will help other teachers find us so that we can all be one big happy carpool family on our way to school on The Classroom Commute Podcast. So if you have a moment, please leave a quick review.
All right, let's talk why now, right now is the best time to be a teacher. Like I mentioned, you might be a little skeptical at this point because you are feeling very overwhelmed by all the new demands that you have going on. But I am here to breathe some new life and to give you a positive and encouraging perspective.
The first reason that I think right now is a great time to be a teacher is because we have access to an amazing online community of teachers. There is no lack of inspiration or ideas that we can get from other teachers from all over the country, even all over the world who are doing what you're doing right now. Think about it, what if we only had the people in our schools, our co-teachers and the people that work in our building? If we only had them to look to for help, we would have such a limited view of what's possible. Just take a scroll through Instagram, Facebook or Pinterest, and you are going to get tip after tip of things that other teachers are doing around the country or in the world to be successful in online teaching. We have such a great resource at our fingertips, literally at our fingertips to help inspire us and keep us moving forward. I am sure that the people that you work with ,your teachers and co-workers are amazing and have great ideas, but we kind of just recycle through those ideas when we only have the same ten teachers to look to for inspiration. By going to things like Instagram, Pinterest and Facebook or wherever else that you reach out to online, we have endless ideas. I bet in just a few seconds you can think of at least one thing that you're doing in your classroom right now because of somebody that you saw doing it on Instagram, Facebook, or Pinterest. Don't take that for granted. This online community that we have to reach out to, even if you never meet those people in person or never have a face to face conversation, we are learning from each other every single day. If you're like me, who has been in the education world for quite some time, I did not have this when I first started teaching. I didn't have the online community that exists today. So if you are teaching right now, be super thankful for that online community. And if you don't have an online community that you're part of yet, reach out to Facebook groups that you can be a part of. There are so many. Again, I would encourage you and invite you to follow me on Instagram where I'm sharing tips every single day that hopefully will inspire you and encourage you in your teaching journey.
Another reason why it is an awesome time to be an educator today is because of the access that we have to great technology. Think about it, imagine if this pandemic hit 10 or 15 years ago. Imagine no Google Classroom, no Zoom, no Google Meet. How would we continue teaching without these resources? It's pretty hard to think about the things that we're doing today to reach our students even though we are participating in hybrid models or even full virtual online teaching, it's hard to think about what we would be doing. How would we be making that possible to teach our students when they're at home? Sure, there are some growing pains that come with learning new technology. I think we all figured that out this spring when we kind of experience this pandemic for the first time but so much is made possible through things like Google Classroom, Zoom, and Google Meet, that would not have been possible 10, 15, maybe even 5 years ago, all the amazing things that have come out in the last few years.
That actually leads me to my next reason why right now is an awesome time to be a teacher. Of course, we are super thankful for that great technology that we now have access to in this day and age. But a lot of times that, again, like I said, comes with some growing pains and we're going to run into some snags and have questions about how to use it most effectively. We have at our fingertips an amazing resource in the form of YouTube where you can go and type in almost any topic or question and have somebody who is already figured it out walk you through it. I have literally learned everything that I do with Google Classroom and Google Slides by watching YouTube videos. If I have a question, that's where I go. I actually don't even Google things anymore because it's just so much easier for me to go to YouTube and find a video that will walk me through it. I'm a visual learner and I just love seeing somebody else go through it, walk me through it so that I can understand it myself. And when I figure something out, I love to share what I've learned with other people. I've actually put together several YouTube videos that kind of help walk teachers through some technology issues that they may be having. I have several videos in my Members Resource Library that you can access if you go to the website at classroomnook.com/podcast/36. I've put together some self-help videos there that will walk you through some things that maybe you're struggling with when using some new technology platforms. There is just a wealth of knowledge that we can use to answer any question that we have. I would encourage you if you are feeling stuck and struggling with something in your online platform that you're using, just go to YouTube, type it in, and I almost guarantee you're going to find something that's going to help you tackle whatever issue you are having.
A final reason that I think right now in 2020, during a pandemic, it is a great time to be a teacher is simply because of the amount of resources that we have available to us. There is no need to reinvent the wheel because likely what you need somebody else has already created. When the pandemic hit, teachers basically had to change their way of teaching overnight. No longer could we print out something for our students. Now, we had to provide it almost completely digitally to our students. Can you imagine doing this if you had to create everything yourself? Right now we have access to online marketplaces like Teachers Pay Teachers, where you literally have access to endless teaching resources, both paid and a whole bunch of free resources that you can use with your students in your classroom. They're not just any teaching resource. They're resources that have been created and tested and approved by both teachers and students. And better yet, these resources are being revised over and over to make them better. I know for myself, I listen so closely to feedback given by teachers, I have revised almost every single resource that is now currently in my Teachers Pay Teachers store. I have revised at least one, likely three, four, five times to make them better based on what teachers are saying that they need, which is why Teachers Pay Teachers is such a great resource for teachers. You are getting resources that you know have worked in other teachers classrooms. You know it's going to save you so much time, all for just a few dollars and you can have your nights and your weekends back. If this pandemic would have hit, again 10-15 years ago, we would only have our Scott Foresman in our Houghton Mifflin and McGraw Hill textbooks to refer to. And that's it, they're not digital. I think we are super blessed by things like Teachers Pay Teachers to help give us resources that we need right now at a moment's notice so that we can provide our students with amazing instruction despite the challenging times.
In addition, if you are a Classroom Nook Community Member, you have access to my Members Resource Library, which has over a hundred resources that are just completely free for you to use in your classroom. Many of them are digital resources that you can use to help teach students virtually if you need to. If you are not yet a member, you can become a member for free, completely free and have access to this library of growing resources. You can do so if you head over to the show notes at classroomnook.com/podcast/36 and I will let you know how you can get in on that Member's Resource Library. I also have a special section right in the Members Resource Library specifically for 'Distance Learning Resources'. If you did not grab those resources when I put them out in the spring, make sure you grab them now. You can still get them today and use them this coming school year.
See, teaching in 2020 is not all that bad. We are lucky to have what we have. The school that I used to teach in was called Theodore Roosevelt School. As you walked into the building, there was a famous Theodore Roosevelt quote that said, "Do what you can, with what you have, where you are." I think that is a great way to end today's episode, because we are where we are. We are in the middle of a pandemic, but that does not mean that we have to throw in the towel and be done with it all. We can do what we can, use the resources that we have in front of us, use the online community that we have access to and still make a difference in our students lives each and every day. I hope that by listening to this episode today, you feel inspired to go out and do the best that you can. Nobody is expecting perfect. And if they are, you need to turn that voice off in your head and do what you can, with what you have, where you are.
Thank you so much for spending a little bit of your day with me, and I hope you'll tune in again next week. Bye for now.
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