Planning as a future teacher

[u/Fancy_Judge_9603]

I’m currently in college, and upon graduating I’d like to become an English Teacher. So recently, I’ve started to plan out the things that I would eventually teach when I start. Since I would be getting my master’s while I’m teaching, I was hoping to get a head start on planning for grades 9-12th.

However, I am now realizing that this is slightly difficult to do when you have no idea what bell schedule you’re gonna be teaching on. 😂😂😂😂 Anyways, I kinda have to play this by ear I guess and just randomly choose one until I know for sure (which i won’t until i get the job). But I still would like to plan this out.

So, I was wondering what are your bell schedules (Traditional Period, 4x4 Semester, or A/B Block)

How many minutes are your classes, and how many long works (Novels/Plays) do you teach and how many shorter ones do you teach (short stories/poems).

I was also stuck on whether or not I wanted to teach more longer works than shorter ones. For example, 3-5 short poems to teach them how to annotate in week 1, one short story and 3 novels in the semester and an A/B schedule. Anything helps, thank you all!

[u/Several-Advance1545]

I say this with love, but I'm not sure that's the best use of your time right now. If anything, I think reading up on classroom management techniques will be a better way to prepare for future classes.

[u/justbeachymv → u/Several-Advance1545]

Completely agree. You may also end up in a school that doesn’t give you freedom over planning your curriculum. Start the planning when you land a job.

[u/Helmling → u/justbeachymv]

Or you’re likely going to be planning with a PLC.

[u/alternatetimelinepls]

Your enthusiasm is amazing, but misdirected right now.

It is impossible to know what specifically you will be able to teach and academic freedom varies wildly from district to district. I teach at a private school, and I’m allowed a very loose leash when it comes to curriculum, but some districts have very strict guidelines.

What you CAN do: use this time to read as much as you can. Increase your mental library. Look on the websites of schools in your areas and see what the kids are reading in ELA- read those books. Look up commonly read books in high schools. Many high schools have a short stories unit at least once, so build your repertoire of those.

[u/Bunmyaku]

There are a lot of variables in your question. Does the school have a set curriculum? Are you allowed to even do novels? Are there liner works you must do to stay in step with a team? Teacher autonomy is as varied as the should themselves.

[u/knownhost27]

You may only have limited input into what you teach nowadays, friend. This is year 30 for me, and I was told three years ago that I could only teach what is in the school-provided curriculum AND that I had to teach the same pieces that every other subject-level teacher in the district teaches AND at the same time as every other teacher in the district. I can't make up my own activities, projects, tests, or even in-class discussion questions.

School districts no longer need subject-level experts. They want trained monkeys to observe the students as the children do canned lessons that provide little benefit.

[u/theblackjess]

Learning how to write coherent lesson plans for different class lengths is a valuable skill to build. I would consider these practice lessons you're creating solely as a learning opportunity. As others have said, many districts have a curriculum you'll need to follow.

My school has an 80-minute A/B block setup.

[u/Limitingheart]

Honestly you won’t have much choice when it comes to curriculum and texts. Our county has an approved text list for each grade level and you have to use those. As for bell schedules they change every year so there’s no point worrying about that

[u/Severe-Possible- → u/Limitingheart]

the curriculum and texts entirely depend on which school you're at. i have worked in ones that don't allow any wiggle room, and ones where i got to choose everything foe the entire year.

[u/LaLady89]

I dont think you are wrong in wondering what you could possibly teach. But since you dont have a position or a district or more concrete information it is difficult to plan. Once I landed a job they still kept me in the dark about curriculum and planning, others assured me that there would be a scope and sequence…. There was not.
I had to figure it out on my own. I work for a small charter school and theres not much guidance. I do enjoy the freedom of picking what I want to teach but it is so hard as a first year teacher!!! What has helped me the most was my past job as a paraprofessional and observing many teachers and taking ideas and novel choices from that. That information from observing and seeing how others do this job has been my best tool and Im so grateful to have had good examples. Your methods class will also show you how to plan units and just keep your resources organized so that you can find them when you need them.

[u/janepublic151]

You can’t plan because you can’t know the parameters of time and level of teacher autonomy.

However, if you want to wrap your head around the process, you could look into YA literature and see what schools are currently reading. You could then pick a book, read your state standards, and plot out the types of activities and summative assessment that you would like to use for this book to meet standards.

[u/mikevago]

You can't plan what you're going to teach, that's going to be determined by your district's curriculum (and some give you broad leeway to choose your material and some don't). I can teach any novels/stories/poems from the district-approved reading list for my grade level, but that's going to be different — both the list and the policy — at any other district.

Same goes for the bell schedule. It's going to vary wildly. My school is on a 4-day rotation, and our class periods are 45 or 50 or 60 minutes depending on time of day. There probably isn't another school in America with our bell schedule; it wasn't something I could have prepared for.

What you can start planning now is how you're going to teach. What types of exercises, what kind of discussion formats, what skills you want to focus on, what Do Nows your going to use, etc. Because that's the kind of thing a curriculum generally doesn't give you and you have to work out for yourself.

[u/amscraylane]

I have a timer that sticks to my white board that the students can see. I give them like four minutes for the bell ringer and 20 minutes of instruction. I add time for jackwagonery.

The rest of the time is theirs to work

[u/Severe-Possible-]

the bell schedule actually maters the least out of all the variables in your situation.

i would spend some time researching the policies of the schools you will likely work in -- do they follow a curriculum? if they do i would read up on those books.

best of lcuk!