13
Sep
Posted By Ryan Duques
New Teacher Survival Guide Series Installment Seven TutaPoint’s New Teacher Survival Guide series is produced to help teachers new to the classroom navigate their first few months on the job.
A teacher’s first year is often the most challenging. Learning how to manage a classroom, design lesson plans that work for students, cooperate with faculty and administrators, and manage the time to perform all of these tasks and more is difficult for entering teachers. This new teacher guide offers tips for new teachers and strategies for new teachers to help your first year be successful in seven critical areas.
New Teacher Tips: How to Gain Publicity for your Class
Especially for teachers working in an environment where they are expected to contribute through grant acquisition or maintain a publications list, gaining publicity is a valuable skill. The needs of students, administrations, and educators must be weighed against one another in every publication effort.
A new teacher’s first publication will probably be a new teacher arrival announcement. Schools love to advertise new teachers to the community in local newspapers (click here for a list), but also be sure to include it in your school newsletter and post it to free news wire sites like EducationNewsWire.org. Here tips for new teachers for writing an arrival announcement.
§ Go beyond the teacher biography. In other words, don’t focus on qualifications; make the biography goals focused. What do you want to do – use research on technology in the classroom to improve student learning or integrate core courses in a new way? Why did you choose this district – involved community, smaller classes, personal/professional goal alignment?
§ Include graphics. An art teacher might use a picture of their work. A chemistry teacher might have a photo of themselves while working in the lab. An English teacher might use a shot of a book cover or other publication. Be creative.
Other publicity efforts won’t be as guided by the administration as a teacher introduction, unless of course students are involved, as in the case of a club that needs publicity. Keep these publicity strategies for new teachers in mind, and always run a complete draft of anything you want published by the administration first.
§ Keep student privacy in mind. Students under the age of 18 can’t generally give legal consent for their words or images to be used without parental consent. Always look for parental consent in writing.
§ Cultivate relationships with local press. Local presses favor steady contributors. Be as regular as you can in communications, and see if you can return the favor for running your pieces. A history teacher might offer to pen an article on local history, for example.
§ Think outside the box. Have you ever heard of guerilla marketing? Post funny fliers on the community’s main street or have students dress in costume to help promote an effort.
§ Promote students. Again with parent and administration approval, promote your students. Nominate them for awards or highlight outstanding projects on sites like TeacherTube.
§ Engage students with the community. What needs to be done in the community that students can do? ESL tutoring, library organization, animal shelter volunteering? Cast a wide net, discuss your plan with the administration, gain parental approval, and get the local papers interested in covering student community efforts.
There are numerous benefits to publicity. Teachers with good publicity are more likely to get all types of grants, receive recognition, obtain philanthropic support, and achieve future publications. Be proactive in your publicity approach.
