Backwards Mapping and Long Range Planning for Teachers

I was honored to be able to join the wonderful team of The Rookie Teacher: Natasha Dunn and Andrew Blake for a great discussion this week on Long Range Planning. As the focus of my blog is to support and mentor new teachers, so it is with the The Rookie Teacher. Their collaborative blog out of Ontario, Canada is committed to facilitating new teacher collaboration, offering ideas, and resources, and inspiring a future of life long learners.

As a new teacher or veteran teacher, for that matter, this topic is a very important one to think about at this time of year. Developing your ability to do Long Range Planning and Backward Map your year is essential. It takes time and practice to develop and must not be done in isolation. During the course of our talk…we all agreed how valuable and powerful the act of collaborating with a grade level/division team plays in the process of long range planning and how successful backward design/mapping can be when creating strong plans. In addition, our time together actually sparked the topic for New Teacher Chat on Twitter that was held on Wed. 7/25/12 Long Range Plans.

Take some time to listen in to hear our conversations about long range plans, curriculum, split/combination classes, backward design/mapping, web 2.0 tools, staying organized, Post-It Notes, Pinterest, Evernote, Twitter, Live Binders, and more!

SHOW NOTES Topic: Long Range Planning

Each episode in the podcast’s by The Rookie Teacher feature three segments:

  1. Topic Discussion
  2. Quick Tip for Tomorrow
  3. The Rookie Resource Bank

Podcast:[audio http://msdunnonline.net/therookieteacher/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/09-Episode-9-Long-Range-Planning-special-guest-Lisa-Dabbs.mp3]

Quick Tip for Tomorrow: (from the show) Something you could do the next day in class with little or no prep and is applicable to most grade levels.

  • Andrew: About Me heads
  • Natasha: SMARTboard attendance
  • Lisa: One Little Word 
The Rookie Resource Bank: (from the show) any electronic, print, or event resource that we found could be helpful in your first few years of teaching and applicable to all teachers.

Like what you’ve heard? Have more questions? Contact us:

This is my first podcast with The Rookie Teacher crew and we had a blast! Huge thank you to Natasha Dunn and Andrew Blake for having me on their show.

Did you take a few minutes to listen to our podcast? Are you ready to start? How will you begin the process? Leave me a comment and let’s chat!

Photo credit:Mike Rohde via flickr

4 Comments

  2. Natasha Dunn
    Natasha Dunn on July 27, 2012 at 1:25 pm

    Thanks Lisa for posting this – another great example of collaboration at its best. With all the suggestions we spoke about on the podcast and on Wednesday’s #ntchat I feel confident and ready to continue my Long Range Planning (using Backwards Mapping, of course).

    Reply
    • teachingwithsoul
      teachingwithsoul on July 27, 2012 at 1:28 pm

      Natasha! This was so much fun for me and honored to join you and Andrew. Let’s be sure to schedule another chat soon, before the Holidays to see how peeps are doing with planning or even another topic. You are the best and so happy that you will be joining New Teacher Chat #ntchat as a monthly moderator! Cheers, my friend!

      Reply
  3. Natasha Dunn
    Natasha Dunn on July 27, 2012 at 1:24 pm

    Thanks Lisa for posting this – another great example of collaboration at it’s best. With all the suggestions we spoke about on the podcast and on Wednesday’s #ntchat I feel confident and ready to continue my Long Range Planning (using Backwards Mapping, of course).

    Reply

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LISA DABBS

Wife. Mom. Educator. Author. She started her career as an elementary school teacher in Southern California. In this role as teacher, she assisted with a grant project and became the Project Director of a Language and Literacy program. Read more

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