Angela Watson's Truth for Teachers

In this episode of Truth for Teachers, we're talking about how to keep teaching from ruining your marriage (or any relationship you have with a significant other). I can't tell you how many emails I've gotten over the years from teachers telling me that teaching is ruining their marriage. I've heard of husbands giving their wives ultimatums: It's either teaching or me. And I've also heard from many 40HTW club members over the years that they have used strategies from the club to reduce their workload, which has ultimately helped them strengthen their marriage and have more time to spend with their partners. This episode will use a slightly different format, as I've asked club members to share some of the things that they are doing to preserve their marriage and keep teaching from coming in between themselves and their partners. Join me today as I'll be sharing some of the advice that they've written, and also play a couple audio clips so you can hear things in their own words. Click here to read or share the transcript and audio or participate in the discussion.

Do you feel like it's less work to go into school sick than to write plans for a sub? If I wasn't contagious, I showed up to my classroom every day, because planning lessons for six subject areas and prepping/organizing all the materials was a massive job. The solution? To remember that unexpected absences aren't really unexpected: We know they're going to happen from time to time. So even though you don't know when, you can still do the bulk of your preparation in advance, and set up your expectations and routines to make things go more smoothly. In this week's episode, I share 5 tips to help you simplify prep for substitutes, and how you get ready-to-use sub plans I've created. Click here to see the emergency sub plans AND get one day's assignments for FREE. Click here to read or share the transcript and audio or participate in the discussion.

Join me today and listen in on a conversation I had with Shawnta Barnes, where she shares her very honest and transparent thoughts and feedback on why really great teachers get saddled with the biggest workload. This is an episode that I've been wanting to do because I have experienced this situation myself, where my class list was loaded up with the most challenging kids, only because the administration said, "You can handle it." And ... I know this happens in schools all across the country, where teachers are almost being punished for their effectiveness or are expected to pick up other people's slack. While there might not be any instant solutions to this known problem, Shawnta and I will talk about some specific things you can do to advocate for yourself. Click here to read or share the condensed transcript and audio or participate in the discussion.

In this week's episode, I'm excited to try this new episode format because I get a lot of questions from teachers which I haven't been able to answer up until now. Either I don't have enough information or knowledge to answer, or I don't have enough to say that would fill an entire podcast episode. And sometimes, the question is just so specific to that person that it wouldn't make a good episode for everyone else. I think this will be a really fun way to cover a wide variety of topics in a short amount of time and still give you a lot of value. Basically, I'm going to give my BEST piece of advice for each scenario. All of these questions came from Instagram. If you want to ask a question, go to my Instagram Story Highlights, or fill out the form at truthforteachers.com. Click here to read or share the transcript and audio or participate in the discussion.

One of the issues I'm most passionate about is making teaching more effective, efficient, and enjoyable, so I've gathered a group of educators to create a Productivity Roundtable. Joining me are five members of the 40 Hour Teacher Workweek Club's graduate program. They have done a tremendous amount of work in experimenting with various productivity strategies in their classrooms and creating systems and routines that work well for them and their students. Since they teach at different grade levels and subject areas, in different types of school settings and communities, in a diverse set of locations throughout the United States, you're going to hear what works with a variety of teaching contexts and teaching styles. This time around, we're talking about how to manage differentiation. During the roundtable, we'll move past "differentiation" as a buzzword and talk about what's happening in real classrooms. Each roundtable member will share how they differentiate instruction, and then move into how we can make differentiation more scalable. We'll finish up by talking about their differentiation fails and mistakes, and some traps or pitfalls they think teachers should avoid as they look for ways to differentiate. Click here to listen to the audio, or read or share the highlights from the roundtable session and participate in the discussion.

In this episode, I decided to put myself out there and tell Truth for Teachers listeners some facts that are embarrassing for me to admit. I've heard podcasters in other niches do this episode format, and I felt like I knew them much better afterward. I also related to a lot of what they shared — it made me feel less alone to hear someone else admit the things that a lot of people think or feel, even if we're not always talking about it. Click here to read or share the condensed transcript and audio or participate in the discussion.

We are back from our summer hiatus and kicking off a new season of the Truth for Teachers Podcast! Are you in the middle of the back-to-school craziness or preparing for it? It's that time of year for a lot of you, and I know a lot of teachers begin to have back-to-school nightmares or trouble sleeping due to this very high-pressure time. There are so many things at the start of the school year that are unknown or unfamiliar and completely out of your control. That stress can come from feeling like you have to prove yourself and worrying that you're not doing enough. And there is the pressure of having a new group of kids and their parents or even any changes in personnel at your school. So it's natural to try to handle that by controlling as many things as possible, or oppositely, bending over backward to be likable or worry how to win your kids over. Join me today for a quick trick that you can use to lessen your anxiety during those first weeks of school. Learn to shift your focus to help build better relationships that are centered on what kids really need from you! Click here to read or share the transcript and audio or participate in the discussion.

Season 8 of the podcast will be back next Sunday, August 12th! Here's a quick sneak peek of what you can expect and what will be different. If you're ready for a back-to-school message now, check out these previous episodes in your podcast player: EP100—What if my students don't like me and we don't connect? Overcoming the back-to-school teacher jitters EP101—Stay reflective on the WHY and avoid comparison: Your classroom does not have to be Pinterest-worthy S4 EP1—Five back to school time traps and how to escape them S2 EP1—How to turn back-to-school anxiety into excitement

We're in between seasons of the Truth for Teachers podcast, but I have lots of new info and ideas for you in the meanwhile. I'm highlighting the best excerpts from interviews I've done on other educators' podcasts in the last few weeks. Listen in here as we chat about mindset, balance, wellness, productivity, and time management. Want more? Check out the full interviews on these podcasts (each is producing new episodes throughout the summer, so you'll find lots of other great episodes, too): Always a Lesson with Gretchen Bridgers: http://alwaysalesson.com/155-bonus-edition-interview-angela-watson/ Teach 4 the Heart with Linda Kardamis: https://teach4theheart.com/delegate-meaningful-classroom-jobs/ Spark Creativity with Betsy Mork: http://www.nowsparkcreativity.com/2018/06/episode-041-teacher-mindset-happiness.html Teacher's Aid with Jon Harper and Mandy Froelich: http://www.bamradionetwork.com/teachers-aid/4693-how-my-teachers-find-the-time-to-teach-sleep-live-and-love Dr. Will Show Podcast with Dr. Will Deyamport: https://soundcloud.com/dr-will-deyamport-iii/angela-watson-angela_watson-the-hustle-is-sold-separately Also, check out this episode of the EDpiphany podcast called "How to make teaching a sustainable, lifelong career." A teacher named Kirsten talks about how she used the 40 Hour Teacher Workweek Club to reverse burnout: https://player.fm/series/2159427/209766236

The first few weeks of summer are almost always blissful, and the time seems to stretch ahead endlessly. We have plenty of days off in which we can afford to take it easy and not worry about getting things done. But in the back of your mind, you always know what's coming. You might be like many teachers, who start off the summer with a list of 500 things they hope to get done. So you're stuck in that horrible place of procrastination limbo, where you're not motivated enough to get things done but you're also not fully relaxing. And at the end of the day, you haven't really enjoyed yourself AND you also haven't gotten anything done. Join me today as I discuss how to prepare for school over the summer through 5 easy steps that will leave you feeling refreshed. Click here to read or share the condensed transcript and audio, participate in the discussion, or get the FREE template for your end-of-summer vision.