Teaching as a career is quite challenging and overwhelming at the same time. You enter into a whole new world where you meet new students, colleagues and learn many new things such as new curriculum, school policies, and agreements. But, why is teaching a good career choice? As a teacher, you can benefit society as a whole. You can inspire and motivate hundreds of students to achieve their goals.
In this modern society, educational technology is making a significant influence. Below are some tips which explain how young and new teachers benefit from such technology and help them make their career more organized and enjoyable.
1. Connect With Students, Parents And Other Teachers
Building a strong connection with your students, their parents and other teachers, who are in a similar situation, can be very helpful for new teachers. You can simply create a website such as a student portal or an online group on Facebook or Twitter, where you can invite and interact with them. On that website or group, you can share homework, classroom policies, newsletters, and links to important websites. Such groups and portals also help students to send animated wishes to teachers on teacher’s day.
Through this group, students can take the teacher’s help and can also ask the queries related to their homework. And, this will also keep the parents involved and informed with what is happening in the school every day.
You can even connect with other teachers with whom you can discuss various problems, brainstorm ideas, and come up with solutions.
Thus, social media is not just for sharing your selfies or your pet’s videos. It’s much more than that. It helps to bring together those people who share the same passions, ideas, hobbies, and career.
2. Engage In Professional Development
Having a degree doesn’t mean you are finished with learning new skills. Continued learning is essential to become an excellent teacher and be an expert in your respective fields. And, now with technology, it’s even easier. As a teacher, you need to be up-to-date with all the latest technological inventions.
Earlier, teachers used to attend various seminars and conferences, which were very far away and even time-consuming. But now, with technology, you can attend online seminars, also known as webinars, and also online conferences, held in any part of the world.
Nowadays, there are hundreds of educational websites for teachers that can help them enhance their skills. You can simply search for these websites on Google and read informative articles to expand your mind.
Thus, learning new skills and engaging in professional development can be very helpful for your career. It can keep you updated with the fresh and current teaching practices and also improve your knowledge about important things.
3. Take The Help Of The School Tech Team
Nowadays, almost every school and college use technology, and for that, they hire a special tech team. As a new teacher, you can always contact the department of education or other teachers to know about such teams. So, teachers, who are not aware of the new technologies, can always ask them for help. Also, there can be many situations where technology can let you down. Or, you may not understand something related to a certain program. In such circumstances, the school tech teams are always at your rescue.
Moreover, the school tech teams can also help you be updated about what other teachers are up to. Also, if you have some new ideas related to technology, you can always share with them.
4. Don’t Rely Too Much On Technology
It’s true that technology has many advantages. But, it can prove to be disadvantageous as well. Relying too much on technology can affect the career of new teachers. Technology should mainly be used for learning and class discussions.
There are some teachers who prepare all their lesson plans on their laptops. This can keep things organized. But, in case the system fails or interest crashes, they can also lose all their files.
For example, you have stored your lesson plans, papers and custom writings in your laptop. These are required urgently by the students, but the internet is not cooperating. So, this can not only lead to the wastage of time of your students but can also leave them behind from other classes.
5. Get Organized
This is another useful technology tip for new teachers. As a teacher, it is very important to stay organized as well as well-planned for the lessons. Earlier, teachers used to do a lot of paperwork and prepare notebooks to prepare important notes. But with the launch of new apps, things have become a lot easier. They can use these apps to prepare and store their notes. This can also save a lot of space which otherwise is taken by the notebooks.
Also, there are many planners out there which are specially designed for teachers. They have some special tools which can help them carry all necessary material to the class, leaving behind the unnecessary stuff.
But that doesn’t mean that you should rely too much on these apps and tools. Therefore, don’t integrate too many of these apps and tools at once as it can lead to a lot of confusion and waste of time.
To get the best out of these technological devices and aids, you must follow the above mentioned 5 tips. These can definitely help you practice and hone new skills, as well as, excel in your teaching career.
About the Author:
William Stewart is a writer by day and an avid reader by night. He is very passionate about inspiring the students and teachers to push the boundaries of traditional learning and make use of technology as much as possible. He likes to share ideas and tips that teachers and students can use in their classroom. Apart from this, he likes to travel, cook, play guitar, and spend time with his family.
