My Students

38 students. One teacher. A schoolwide push for all 8th graders to take advanced math. How can each pupil get the individual attention he or she needs, especially in such a difficult course?

When I was a middle school student in my district, my parents would have gone into debt to put me into private schools rather than let me go to the middle school where I now teach.

Plagued by violence and low academic expectations, it endangered the futures of the students that passed through it. Eleven years later, as I begin my first year teaching in the district where I grew up, the school has completely turned around. Although the school still serves high-need students from a wide variety of ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds, and although many students still face immense challenges in their daily lives, a new administration and faculty and an energized parent base have raised expectations and performance beyond where many thought they could go. Many of my students have low resources, and many were robbed of a high-quality elementary education, but they are all united by a belief that they go to a great school that's only getting better.

My Project

As a first-year teacher with classes going up to 38 students, I had no idea how to keep them all engaged. They have so many needs- from Special Ed to ELL to math they never had a chance to learn- and there's only one of me. I came up with the idea of individual whiteboards as a way to let me check everyone's understanding of a concept at once, so I know who needs my attention first. I went to Home Depot and convinced them to cut me whiteboards out of shower tiling. I masked the edges to prevent splinters, and made some erasers from wood blocks and felt. I also spent my last few dollars of savings (we haven't quite gotten our first paychecks yet) to buy some markers to start the year. Kids love the boards. I use them for their Do Nows, to check comprehension during my teaching, for guided practice, and even for exit assessments. If we have excellent behavior and stay really on-task, I can even give them a "mad minute" to sketch any (appropriate) thing they want.

Markers are expensive, and I'd like to secure a year's supply for my classroom.

Whiteboards have already let me catch so many areas for remediation and support that my diagnostic exam couldn't pick out– I instantly know who gets something, who doesn't, and who needs extra attention. Since I began using them, the academic gains in my classroom have accelerated, my class management has been easier, and my students happily engage in the day's lesson.