On Sunday, we looked back at some of The Loneliest Articles of 2007, today, we’ll go to the other extreme and look at the busiest articles of 2007. These are the articles that generated the most comments. I’ve gone through the articles and found those that received the most comments. After boiling down that list, I have come up with ...

In the Christmas break, I am looking back at this blog’s growth and development. I began writing a little bit for the blog in February, but didn’t officially launch it for real until June. Since that time, growth has been pretty consistent. I now seem to regularly get a small number of comments for every article I write, with some ...

This is perhaps my most favorite tip of them all! I haven’t regularly watched television since I was in 11th grade, but I have watched quite a bit of it. When I read “The 4-Hour Workweek,” Timothy Ferriss suggests a low-information diet. His theory is that if you simply ask people “what’s new in the [...]

I used to wake up every morning about an hour before I wanted to be at school. I try to get there by 7:20, so that meant waking up around 6:20. That resulted in an extremely rushed morning. Plus the traffic at my new school is way heavier than the traffic was at my old [...]

We put a sign up a few places around the band hall on Wednesday. It says:   EVERYONE NEEDS AN ATTITUDE ADJUSTMENT Choose Your Attitude I decided that I needed to take that advice myself. So I am going to adjust my attitude. I was reminded yesterday just how different 7th graders are than 6th graders. [...]

This is the fifth in a series of articles entitled 5 Habits of Highly Effective Teachers. Community Proecdures How do you interact with your community? I know for many teachers, this is a frightening proposition. Reading some things that other teachers post, it seems that most teachers who live in the same community wherein they teach either [...]

This is the fourth in a series of articles entitled 5 Habits of Highly Effective Teachers. Personal Procedures What are some of the personal habits that are important to me? As I’m sitting here in the middle of the summer writing this, I realize that some of my structure has left my life. I stay up too [...]

This is the third in a series of articles entitled 5 Habits of Highly Effective Teachers. Relationship Procedures in teaching, as in most any businesses — and life in general — relationships will either make you successful, or else make you fail. Our relationships spring ultimately from the first habit; our ability to communicate ...

I recently read an article written by a newly-hired teacher. She was concerned about the fall and how to establish procedures. My response was for her simply to be patient, ask lots of questions, and hang in there. When I was in her position, that kind of advice would have sounded trite and condescending to [...]