Productivity Tools: Getting Ready for Open House

You've gotten your first teaching job! You're in your dream school teaching the grade and subject you'd hoped for. You spent all summer planning exciting lessons that incorporate all of the great technology you learned about in your EDIT class. You just finished organizing your classroom layout and you decide to walk down to the teachers' lounge and grab something from the vending machine, after all, you're ready for the first day of school and you still have a week of preplanning left!

You enter the lounge and you notice a line of teachers waiting for the copy machine. Since you plan to NEVER use a worksheet -- or the textbook, you've had no need for the copier all week. You see your mentor teacher near the end of the line and you ask him what he's copying. Once you're revived after hearing his reply, you decide you need to get to work.

You realize that it's not just lessons that you've got to get ready for the first week of school. There are all kinds of materials and handouts that need to be prepared for Open House and the first week of school. According to your mentor teacher, you'll need newsletters, certificates, seating charts, and more to be prepared for classes to begin. Thank goodness for your EDIT class -- you know about productivity tools and how they can help you get things done. You'd planned to use them to work with students, but had forgotten all about how helpful they could be to you.

You've got a big task ahead of you though, you need to create a packet of materials for Open House and the first day of school.Your mentor teacher sits down with you and the other new teachers to help you generate a list of materials and handouts you will need for your students. You'll use this list as a checklist to make sure you get everything done - Open House is one week from today! See a partial list here.

Your mentor teacher also provides you with some links to use to create your materials:
• Microsoft Template Gallery for PCs
• Microsoft Template Gallery for Macs
• GLC Resources for First-Year Teachers
• GLC Templates
• Education World Templates
• Puzzle Maker
• Spreadsheet ideas
• Inner Geek Tutorials (Element K)

While your mentor teacher knows that you will find most everything that you need at the links listed above, you'll be able to go to a workshop on Thursday to learn more about creating newsletters and gradebooks - so you won't need a template for those two items.

For Thursday:

1. Read the chapter on Productivity Tools provided in class.
2. Begin working on your templates - review the assignment description if you have questions.
3. Remember that all components of this assignment are due on Tuesday, September 11 at the beginning of class.