The key to a successful school year is a well-thought-out plan. A well-designed plan will help keep you organized throughout the year, as well as encourage the use of engaging and exciting material for students to interact with on a regular basis. My 5-step plan for building a framework for a jam-packed, full-of-learning, stellar year is designed to build opportunities into your calendar and notice how both you and students flourish!

In this blog post, I offer a step-by-step process for you to try so that you can experience a successful pathway to achieving your goals. While you can set goals any time of the year, new beginnings—like a new calendar year, a new school year, or a new season—tend to be good markers. Goals tend to give us a bit more grace and room to pivot. They’re something to work towards, and they require a process. Of course, we always aim to reach our goals, but if we don’t, we can at least say we inched closer to them when we’ve stuck with a plan.

Believe.

Believe in yourself.

Believe in your teammate.

Believe in the students.

Believe in the caregivers.

Believe in the community.

John Hattie’s research (on research) consistently shows that the biggest impact on student learning is total teacher efficacy – believing that you impact learning and that your entire team impacts learning.

Be a goldfish.

Live in the moment.

Learn in the moment.

Teach in the moment.

Bounce back. Keep going. Move forward.

Being a goldfish prevents a hypocritical mindset. Being a goldfish means we are living our learning. Being a goldfish sets us up to fail forward – learning lessons from both the expected and unexpected challenges and opportunities.

Last week, we talked Ted Lasso’s Biscuits with the Boss. At Read Write Think with Renee, we call that time: Ten Minute Meets. We’re continuing that convo this week with some quick tips on how to fire up that time together - and sustain it over time.

One of the benefits of a Ten Minute Meet is they’re brief. In fact, the KEY to their success is keeping them brief. Perhaps because they are brief, they are easier to commit to and maintain consistently throughout the year, whether that’s once a month or every other month. The point is – it’s more than once. In order to truly be thinking partners – you want to brainstorm, explore, dream, try things out, return with outcomes, recalibrate, reflect, try again.

I’ve managed to immerse myself in Ted Lassoisms - and make some good connections between this new television legend and the work we do together in schools and classrooms.

I’ve got a few pieces of advice for you to consider this month as a new year takes shape and you’re craving some fun and fresh ideas.

This week: We’re talking Biscuits with the Boss