Jeffery E. Frieden Dear Teacher, Don't Give Up!

“Am I Allowed to Have a Life?” with Dave Stuart Jr.

 

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Dear Teacher,

Tell me if this sounds familiar. You have a roster full of students who are at differing levels of ability. And it’s your job to get ALL of them to an acceptable level of proficiency. As the year unfolds, to do this, you realize that you need to stay at work a little later, take home a few more assignments to grade, get up just a little earlier in the morning to be in the classroom for a few more minutes to get it all done. Tired, and leaving your classroom after the sun has set for the third day in a row, in a flash of sudden anger, you say, “Am I allowed to have a life!?”

DSJ Headshot-small

In this episode, you will hear from teacher, content creator, and professional developer, Dave Stuart Jr. Several years ago, Dave started a blog that turned into a website, which developed into a couple of books, and eventually lead to the creation of a couple of online courses.

Believe it or not, a few years into the job, Dave actually quit teaching! For many of us, this is hard to believe. But after you hear his story, you will get a clearer picture of the why behind Dave’s writing, speaking, and professional development workshops. You will hear about how Dave figured out how to set limits on himself, two teacher archetypes to avoid, and why you should write an Everest Statement right now. And, as mentioned in the podcast, here’s the first chapter of Dave’s book, These 6 Things: How to Focus Your Teaching on What Matters Most.

If you want to connect with Dave, and get more details about his story, CLICK HERE.

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Jeffery E. Frieden Belief, Classroom Culture, Five Key Beliefs

Accelerating the Belonging Belief with Transfer Students

Let me run a scenario past you and see what you think. Imagine you have been teaching for six years. For reasons that you can’t control, you have to leave your teaching position and relocate to another city. You’re fortunate enough to find another job, but you’re teaching a different grade-level and you don’t know anyone on staff, nor do you know any of the students you will be teaching.

How do you think you would feel?

Now, how do you think students feel when they transfer schools? Continue reading “Accelerating the Belonging Belief with Transfer Students” →

Jeffery E. Frieden Argument, Books, Classroom Culture, Uncategorized

Lost in the Push for Literacy? 6 Reasons to Read THESE 6 THINGS

I recently finished reading an incredible book by Michigan teacher, Dave Stuart Jr. It was one of those reads that felt like a mixture between a vacation and conference. There were refreshing and affirming words of encouragement, but there were also mighty challenges put forth.

The title of the book is These 6 Things: How to Focus Your Teaching on What Matters Most. I have read books that boast they have the most important ideas for teaching, and usually they meant that the reader would have to buy into some sort of system that would be a complete overhaul and redesign of his or her classroom. No thanks, and this is not what These 6 Things is about. At. All.

Come along and I will show you six reasons why every secondary teacher, regardless of what content area he or she teaches, should read this book.
Continue reading “Lost in the Push for Literacy? 6 Reasons to Read THESE 6 THINGS” →

Jeffery E. Frieden Argument, Classroom Culture, Classroom Discussion, Listening and Speaking, Reading, Writing

Blending Argument into Classroom Culture

In my most recent post, I made the case against finding balance in life, but instead working to bring the ingredients of life together through blending. At the same time as the writing of that post, I found myself in chapter four of Dave Stuart Jr’s These 6 Things: How to Focus Your Teaching on What Matters Most.

As I was reading the book a little here, and writing that post a little there, a realization dawned on me: These 6 Things is a blessed picture of blending in the classroom. I think it was a mix of the timing of my post, all my prior experience with argument, but mostly that Dave Stuart Jr. just makes so much stinking sense (seriously, you should get the book), but I will now be using These 6 Things as a lens for how to make it all blend in my classroom. Continue reading “Blending Argument into Classroom Culture” →

Jeffery E. Frieden Make Them Process It, Revision, Writing, Writing Conversations

I Teach Revision on Day 2

When I was setting up my classroom for the 2018-2019 school year, I tweeted a picture of the only decoration I had up at the moment (see the featured image above). Moments later, Melissa-Ann Pero (@bshsmspero) thanks me for posting it, and says she’s going to make herself one.

A bit later on, she tweeted her creation, giving credit to Kelly Gallagher (@KellyGToGo) for RADaR and mentioning me in the process. And in my small Twitter world, the tweet caught fire. At the time of this writing, the post has been liked 305 times and retweeted 118 times!

See here:

Continue reading “I Teach Revision on Day 2” →