First Day of Beginning Teacher Training

Today was the first day of Beginning Teacher Training for my county.  It was exciting to be in a group of other beginning teachers.  The variety of teachers amazed me.  Most folks in this training were either experienced teachers from other districts or last year's "mid-year" hires.  Only a few of us are true beginning teachers, though both myself and a friend of mine both had been TAs in the county.  A LOT of information was thrown our way.  Luckily, much of it was familiar because of having already been in the county.  I can't imagine being new to the county and having so much information to digest.  Our New Teacher Handbook is at least 5 inches thick, no exaggeration!  It will be good, however, to have all of this relevant information at our fingertips as we need it. 

Probably the most beneficial information for me today was what will be required of us as beginning teachers, such as Professional Development needed, relationships with mentors, monthly "Teacher Talks" with other new teachers, etc. 

We also had a speaker who was a third year teacher who had been recognized for his strong classroom management plan.  While he didn't present anything "new," I found how he presented his expectations to his students to be very powerful.  He also shared a website http://teacher.net/ with us where his discipline plan had been feature in a Harry Wong article.  I can't wait to go explore this site further.