Of course, there are more than 10 things that we could give our darlings, but these are the ones that stood out in my mind. They’re not in any particular order, just the way I thought of them. Feel free to add your own! 🙂
1. A smile. If you are miserable, they usually are too.
2. Get rid of the worksheets. Granted, if a student can’t figure out 5 problems, they probably can’t do 25 – 100 of the same thing.
3. Talk to them about things in their life. And maybe, share something from yours.
4. Give them a fresh start. Every. Single. Day.
5. Challenge them. Every kid is not “the population.” They just might surprise you!
6. Provide consequences. Whether you believe it or not, they will thank you.
7. Remember they are only children. Oh boy, that’s a hard one to do sometimes, I know. 🙂
8. Try something new. They are 21st century learners, treat them as such.
9. Get off task. Isn’t it great to veer away from the planned topic for a bit?
10. Teach! Let them learn at least one new thing per day.
DIARY OF A PUBLIC SCHOOL TEACHER 
Comments on: "10 Gifts a Teacher Can Give Their Students!" (9)
Great “shopping list!”
Great list of awesome reminders!
If number ten happened in every classroom for every student we would see marvelous results! Wonderful post.
Thank you Cathy!
Those are great tips! I like the “get rid of worksheets” one. I remember, as a child with ADHD and LD, I used to actually try to erase some of the problems from my “dittoed” worksheets. Thats how much I hated them! (And with the ink used back then, it actually worked a little!)
Aaaah, I remember the ditto machine, brings back memories. 🙂
Number 11. Give your students the benefit of the doubt. Hear them out. They quite often have something worthwhile to say.
Yeah, sometimes, in the name of time, I will begin to cut off a student. But then I say, “Go ahead”, and after they’ve finished I realize that what they had to say was productive.
[…] 10 Gifts a Teacher Can Give Their Students! | Diary of a … – 10 Gifts a Teacher Can Give Their Students! November 28, 2011. … Give your students the benefit of the doubt. Hear them out. They quite often have something worthwhile to say. Oldschoolteach said: December 10, 2011 at 11:43 am. […]