Happy FRIDAY, all! I’m coming to you today from the comfort of my couch – parent/teacher conferences last night + morning classroom worktime = time to write for Bethany! I feel like I’ve been absent from my blog over the last few months … because I HAVE! My girls are getting older and EVEN MORE involved in everything (I didn’t think that was possible) so, my husband and I are living our best (crazy, hectic, high-fiving each other as we pass in the garage on our way to pick up or drop off a kid from something) helping them live their best lives! Speaking of being busy … if you’re like me, you’re always looking for time-savers, right? Here are my current top 3 time-savers for teachers – let’s get to it!
Create self-grading activities
Looking back at my teaching career (this is my 16th year teaching … seriously, how did that happen?!) I realize how much precious time I spent (dare I say wasted) on grading EVERY single thing my students did in class. Over the last few years, I’ve switched gears and started designing self-grading activities for my students, using Pixel Art, “Go-to-Section” Google Forms, and the “homework” mode (it’s all in class, not homework!) of sites like Quizizz and Blooket!
Reflect and Refresh, Don’t Always Reinvent
This is REALLY hard for me – I have the constant need to “reinvent the wheel” for every assignment, not because I’m a control freak (maybe) or someone who has oodles of extra time to spend (ha!), but because I’m always looking for ways to improve. As I improve as a teacher, I want to improve activities for my students, OBVIOUSLY. However, over the last year or so, I’ve found myself wanting to scrap good activities and totally recreate them because they’re not as great as I want them to be. Anyone with me? Toward the end of last school year, I started intentionally reflecting on my instruction, activities, and assessments at the end of each unit, making notes in my plans and on files that I share with students. These reflections include everything from detailed notes about specific questions or standards to “this didn’t work – scrap it” and “this kicked butt!” Adding this small practice has not only given me SO much time back when it comes to planning but has also been an awesome reflection for me as a teacher – I’m always looking to grow! If you notice the heading for this tip is “reflect and refresh, don’t always reinvent.” Notice the emphasis on always? Yup, that’s right. There are a few things that I DO reinvent every year, specifically the instructional videos I create for my students. As an American Government teacher, I know that much of the content and examples I share with my students in our instructional video REQUIRES me to update my videos every year – the last thing I want to do is confuse students on who is actually the current Speaker of the House. So, I let my “reinvent the wheel” juices flow in the instructional video arena 🙂
Use AI!
Holy guacamole, have you jumped on the AI bandwagon, yet? If you haven’t, PLEASE join the fun! Think of the AI tools that are available to you as a teacher as digital teacher assistants that you can count on to generate a variety of readings, ideas, suggestions, modifications, and MORE to help take a few things off of your often overflowing teacher plate. As with any new tool, whether it be digital or physical, instructional or otherwise, we have to remember that WE are the experts and WE know what’s best for our students. Here are a few tasks I’m using AI for this year:
⭐️ Generating non-fiction texts with MagicSchool
⭐️ Creating reading comprehension questions AND adding them to a game with the new Quizizz extension
⭐️ Adjusting the level of existing texts and generating summaries, text vocabulary, multiple choice and short answer questions, and more with Diffit
…and the list goes on and on! The ways that teachers can use AI to take a few things off of our plates are ever-growing, and I’m excited to see what’s coming next!
What time-savers do you use to organize your teacher life? I’d love to hear your tips!
Thanks for reading 🙂
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