Latest / New Teacher Talk / Ep 219: Finding Your People in a New Building

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Ep 219: Finding Your People in a New Building · New Teacher Talk

Welcome back to New Teacher Talk.
Beth here with Anna and today we're talking about something
that can catch new teachers off guard.
How lonely a new building can feel.
Even in a room full of colleagues, y
ou might know your content cold,
but knowing who to go to when you're overwhelmed or
confused or just need to laugh,
that's a whole different thing.
And, nobody hands you that list on day one.
So we invited Sammi Katschke to talk about building a real
support network inside a new job,
the kind that carries you through a hard first year.
If you're starting somewhere new, stay with us.
You'll walk away feeling a little less alone.
So,
you're at a new job and this may be a new school district
for you or you could be fresh out of your undergrad and
starting your first job.
So,
how do you build a support network within your new school
and even within your new area?
You may be looking at moving and leaving behind most of the
people that you knew and relied on for the last year,
four years, whatever it may be.
My name is Sammi Katschke,
and I am the district band director and music teacher at
Chadwick-Milledgeville,
and today I'm going to be talking about how to build your
support network within a new job.
Hopefully by the end of this you will walk away with a few
ideas of where to start your support system or possibly
even realizing that you have a larger one than you already
think.
Let's start with where we came from.
Whether you are graduating from your undergrad or you had a
good support network going at the school you just left,
keep that.
Don't let that go away,
don't think that because you're moving on to something
different that that's automatically going to go away
because those people that you just spent a year with or
two, three, four, however many years you're with,
they're not going to just leave because you're not in the
same building anymore.
Personally I have a group that I graduated with from my
undergrad who we continually remind each other not to lose
touch and to keep sending ideas about what we're doing in
our classrooms and what we're doing on the breaks we get,
what conferences we've gone to, all of that.
Because at the end of the day those are the people that
you're comfortable with, those are the people that you know.
They're the ones that you're going to go to if your lesson
went horribly and you have no idea why and they're going to
talk you through it.
They're going to be able to give you ideas,
give you spots that maybe it didn't go as well as you would
hoped, talk about how it could go better, things like that.
Another big part of your support network if your school
district has this which at this point most do is going to
be your mentor.
For most people that's going to be somebody who is in the
building either within their content area or not but it's
going to be somebody that the district has set up for you
who has been there for a while who can help you with maybe
the administrative things in your classroom that you didn't
realize you needed to do or helping you figure out how to
use the online programs for the grade book or where you
post student assignments, things like that.
But they're going to be somebody who is there.
There'll be somebody in the building who at the end of the
day you can go talk to before school starts,
you can go talk to anything like that.
Then the next big step is going to be the teachers that you
interact with day in and day out.
So if you're in the elementary school wing then that's
going to be the teachers who are around you,
the ones who have classrooms next to you,
maybe the ones who have a prep period at the same time as
you.
People that you can just pop your head in,
you know say hi to, talk to your lessons maybe.
Getting to have some of those colleagues there is going to
be a huge bonus in your support system because a support
network is great and it is super important but having
everybody online is not always what you need.
Sometimes you need that person that you can sit across a
table from and have a conversation with about anything that
you are comfortable talking to them about.
So then the other thing that is really big,
and I feel like especially people who I've talked to,
who have just graduated are still trying to figure out,
is finding the teachers around you.
So this could be the teacher who teaches the same grade or
class or whatever as you,
but in the other building in the district or in the
building in the district next to you.
Somebody who is doing a similar job,
but not in that same building.
Because then you're gonna be able to get a better idea of
what other schools look like, what they're doing.
I know personally I have built a very large network of
other band directors and general music teachers who I can
reach out to if I have questions about different pieces,
things that I'm experiencing in my classroom,
anything like that.
I know that they'll be there to support me through whatever
I'm dealing with or be able to give me some answers,
or if nothing else,
be able to point me in the direction of where I need to go.
Of course,
having teachers and other people who are doing the same
thing as you is huge in having a support network.
But the other thing that I know I overlooked a lot in my
undergrad,
and I'm trying to do a better job of it now as I start
teaching,
is not overlooking the people outside of education.
Do not overlook your friends that you had in college who
weren't ed majors or weren't whatever specific thing you
were studying.
Don't overlook the friends that you had in high school,
anything like that.
Because if they supported you through your undergrad,
or if they were somebody that you talked to,
or even if they were somebody that helped you get through
your first year of teaching,
they're not going anywhere because the ed programs are
hard.
And being a friend with people inside of them are also
hard, but they want to see you succeed.
They are there for your support.
They are not just there to get something out of this.
And then lastly,
keep in touch with the mentors that you've had.
If it's somebody you've been taught with,
who you really liked,
if it was a teacher that you had while you were doing your
clinicals or practicums or whatever your university may
have called them, keep in touch with those people.
Keep in touch with the people who you were in their
classroom and you really liked what you saw,
or you really liked what they did.
That relationship may not be the same.
It may be a mentor kind of thing,
but that is going to be a very valuable relationship when
it comes to making sure that you don't push yourself to the
point of burnout,
making sure that you keep yourself going so that you are
the best person for your students.
Truly,
it is invaluable when it comes to making sure that you're
not an island, you are not the only one going through this,
and having those people there will help keep you grounded
in that idea.
So please be sure to follow New Teacher Talk on Apple
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Talk.
Two things before we close out.
First,
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And second, send us your questions.
We'd love to answer them or even build a future episode
around them.
Thank you for spending time with us.
We'll see you next time.