Let me ask you a question, teacher friend...
How are you, really?
I have thought long and hard about how I view teacher wellbeing, what it is, how we get it, and there are so many factors that we need to consider:
- How much autonomy and trust you have.
- The support you’re getting from leadership.
- The culture of the school.
- How empowered you feel in your classroom .
- How confident and masterful you feel.
- The opportunities that are afforded to you.
- How fulfilling you feel the work is.
But today I wanted to talk about one factor that for me has had the most impact on how I am mentally and emotionally in the day to day in my role as a teacher.
One thing that has had the biggest impact on how I have been able to develop professionally.
Our teaching village.
They say it takes a village as a teacher but what does that mean? It certainly doesn’t just mean having people around us because when I felt my lowest in teaching, I had PLENTY of teachers around me.
For me having a village as a teacher needs to be about having like-minded people around us that we can trust to be vulnerable with, ask questions to, bounce ideas off, be inspired and empowered by (and empower them in return). To be able to access support in whatever form needed. To never have your struggles minimised or shrugged off, but heard and validated.
This was so pivotal for me, that I am changing the way that I support teachers here at The Unteachables Academy. I am making The Behaviour Club, my teaching village, central to what I offer. TBC is a dynamic community where like-minded teachers can connect, share, and grow together. With masterclasses, resources, and a thriving online network, this club is designed to support educators every step of the way.
Click here to join us and become a member of The Behaviour Club!
Have a question, comment, or just want to say hello? Drop us a text!
👉 JOIN THE $1 KICKSTART! Click for more info and to jump in!
RESOURCES AND MORE SUPPORT:
- Shop all resources
- Join The Behaviour Club
- My book! It’s Never Just About the Behaviour: A holistic approach to classroom behaviour management
- The Low-Level Behaviour Bootcamp
- Free guide: 'Chats that Create Change'
Connect with me:
- Follow on Instagram @the.unteachables
- Check out my website
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Oh hi teachers, Welcome to Unteachables podcast
Congratulations.
You have just stumbled acrossthe best free professional
development and support youcould ask for.
I'm Claire English, apassionate secondary teacher,
author, teacher mentor andgenerally just a big behavior
nerd, and I created theUnteachables podcast to
demystify and simplify classroommanagement.
I want this podcast to be thetangible support, community
(00:23):
validation, mentorship all thosepretty important things that we
need as teachers to be able towalk into our classrooms feeling
empowered and, dare I say it,happy and thrive, especially in
the face of these really toughbehaviors.
So ready for some no-nonsense,judgment-free and realistic
classroom management support?
I've got your teacher friend.
Let's do this.
Hello wonderful teachers.
(00:44):
Oh, my gosh, that is not a goodstart with my voice, is it?
Hello wonderful teachers,welcome back to another week of
the Unteachables podcast.
The last week has been hell.
I rarely record a podcast theday that it goes out, but I am
sitting here at 10am recording apodcast episode the morning
(01:07):
that I'm supposed to bereleasing that podcast episode
and that never happens.
I'm usually really ahead ofthings.
I'm usually, you know, gettingthings prepared, getting things
out.
But, as you can hear in myvoice, we have been hit very
hard by the plague in myhousehold.
My sweet baby brought homeinfluenza from daycare and she
(01:31):
also had an ear infection, butit means that the last week
we've taken her back to urgentcare three times.
She was a very, very sicklittle girl.
Thankfully, on day nine shestarted to turn a corner and
started to be herself and she isa hundred percent herself now.
Thankfully, it was a very scaryperiod of time and, of course,
(01:53):
she passed it on to my husbandand I.
So, as we were trying to takecare of a very sick little
toddler and take her to urgentcare and everything we ourselves
were were crumbling to amillion pieces and yeah, it's a
very, very bad flu bug that'sgoing around at the moment and I
hope that anybody else in thesouthern hemisphere with me
(02:15):
stays clear away from it,because it was very hard hitting
, but on that, probably going tobe cutting a lot of this out as
I try to breathe.
Um, this has been a very fun,very amazing week as well,
because I guess I can go into ita little bit later, but I have
(02:35):
just opened doors to thebehavior club, uh, which is what
I've been working on for thelast four months, and it, of
course, classic Claire momentthat the week I'm supposed to be
releasing the behavior club andopening up doors.
We're so sick that every littlething is like a mad, mad
scramble to the finish line.
But we're there and I opened upmy founding member spaces
(03:00):
yesterday and I have mybrilliant community.
That's in there now.
Founding members, of course youcan still come and join us, but
I'll talk about that later inthe episode.
What I also want to quickly talkabout in the start of this
episode is my book is never justabout the behavior the like.
The last seven episodes of thepodcast will be dedicated to
(03:22):
that.
That is is done now.
If you want to hear more aboutthe book, you can go back and
listen to those seven episodesin order so you can kind of get
a feel of what the book's about.
But I received this review onAmazon and I've received so many
beautiful reviews on Amazon,but this one came through when I
was in the thick of thesickness.
And Matthew Moskin MatthewMoskin, if you are listening to
(03:45):
this know that that review thatI'm about to read.
It got me through feeling verydark.
You said this book has finallyhelped me navigate the world of
classroom management.
I feel as a new teacher.
I've had so many questionsregarding behavior.
This is the only book that hasprovided answers to my ambiguous
(04:06):
questions.
One of the most helpful thingsabout this book is that the
actual phrases and conversationsare modeled for me.
I always want very clearexamples of things in this book
delivered.
It's made me feel empowered asa teacher.
It allows and supports me tocreate the environment that I
want for myself and my students.
It tells me clear directions onhow to turn my room into an
island of safety.
(04:26):
Going into my second year, Ifeel a hundred times more
confident in the type ofenvironment I want to establish
and, most importantly, how I cando that.
Such a beautiful book.
I cried when it ended becauseI've had such an emotional
connection.
The strategies I've learnedfrom the book have already made
a world of difference to me andin my mindset alone.
My gosh, matthew.
(04:47):
Like, please know that thatreview meant so much to read.
That book was a labor of loveand um, everything that you've
just written there about likethe clear examples and you know,
showing the how and the whylike that is exactly what I
wanted from the book.
So thank you so much for thatbeautiful, thoughtful review
that would have taken a littlewhile to write out.
(05:09):
Now onto this episode of thepodcast.
It is titled let's have a heartto heart how are you going?
Because I really want to have aheart to heart.
How are you going?
And the reason I want to talkabout that is because the answer
to that question has reallychanged and shifted and shaped
for me over the last 13 years ofbeing a teacher.
And the reason why I want totalk about this in particular,
(05:31):
it's because the reason why I'vepivoted the unteachables now
and I'll talk about the waysthat I've pivoted my offers and
how I'm going to be supportingteachers has changed from now on
, and it really does have to dowith this question of how are we
, why are we like, why are wefeeling this way and how can we
(05:54):
feel a little bit better asteachers.
So I have thought long and hardabout how I view teacher
wellbeing, what it is, how weget it, and there are so many
factors and every single personis impacted differently by this.
You know it could be that youfeel crap because of a lack of
autonomy, maybe trust is anissue, maybe you're not getting
enough support from leadership,maybe the culture of the school
(06:16):
is toxic.
How empowered you feel in yourclassroom has a big weight on
how we feel as teachers, howconfident and how masterful and
how all over it we feel.
If we're walking into ourclassroom feeling confident and
masterful in our classroommanagement and our teaching and
learning, our wellbeing is goingto be better, the opportunities
(06:37):
are afforded to us, howfulfilling we feel the work is.
So many things impact on ourwellbeing as teachers.
Some of those things are in ourcontrol and some of those
things are not in our control.
And I want to talk about onething for me that has had the
most impact and one of thethings that actually I didn't
(06:58):
think was in my control untilthis very moment.
For me, the absolute darkesttime I've had as a teacher was
working in a small school.
I was the only English teacher.
I was also the assistant headteacher and I felt like in the
day to day I was always eithermanaging up with somebody my
(07:18):
principal, and I'm not going tosay too much about him, I'll
just leave it there or I wasmanaging down, managing the rest
of the teachers.
I was a teaching and learninglead, so I had a lot of
responsibility for the entirestaff team.
The teachers were brilliant.
If you were listening to thisand if you're a teacher of that
school, I don't think you wouldbe there's a very small staff,
(07:39):
but the teachers were sobrilliant but I felt completely
alone.
I was working in a silo that itwas just the nature of the
beast, with the role that I had,where I didn't feel like I fit
anywhere, really like where Icould belong.
Um, now, the best time I've hadas a teacher was when I was
(08:00):
working with a big Englishfaculty and we're like a little
family and I say that withcaution because I feel like
anytime you say we are a familyin a work context, it can be a
little bit toxic, like I.
I really cautious of eversaying we are a family here
because it can be used againstpeople.
(08:21):
Um, but I did feel like I was afamily with these people.
In fact, you know, seven, eight, nine years on I can't remember
exactly how many years I stillsome of these people are still
people that I would consider mybest friends and my family.
So, um, that particular context, not only did I feel like I had
(08:42):
this beautiful faculty aroundme, that had these shared
experiences that I could talk to, that were my village, but I
also had leaders who heavilyinvested in staff professional
development, heavily invested inus and made us feel.
Two particular leaders did thismade us feel like we could do
absolutely anything.
(09:03):
I was dealing with the samestuff as I was in that smaller
school similar students, similarcontext, the same challenges
with parents.
The only difference was in thatsmaller school I didn't have a
supportive village, and they sayit takes a village as a teacher
.
But what does that actuallymean?
It doesn't mean just havingpeople around us, because I had
(09:24):
people around me at that smallerschool.
I had a beautiful team ofteachers around me, I had the
leadership team that I workedwith, but I felt my lowest.
I think that having a village asa teacher needs to mean having
like minded people around usthat we can trust to be
vulnerable with, to askquestions to that we know aren't
(09:46):
going to be taken as silly youknow, bounce ideas off and be
inspired and empowered by, butalso be that for them as well,
like not just being somebodythat takes, takes, takes, but in
that village you are anintegral part of what you do
there as teachers and you arejust as important as the teacher
next to you and the teachernext to them, just to be able to
(10:07):
access support, in whateverform.
You need to never have yourstruggles minimized or shrugged
off, but feel heard andvalidated.
And my philosophy forleadership has always been if
somebody comes to me, if youcome to me and you say that
you're struggling with something, I don't care if that something
is so small to another person,I don't care if it's something
(10:29):
that others would think isreally simple.
I don't care if it's somethingthat I would think, oh, that's a
bit, that's a bit simple, isn'tit?
You know, like that, thatshouldn't be an issue.
There's so much shrugging off ofthings in schools.
There's so much of oh, we justhaven't tried, you haven't tried
to build a relationship, youhaven't tried to not take things
personally, you aren't tryingto differentiate your lessons or
(10:51):
really like.
This is really condescendingsupport or a lack of support.
So I want you to reflect rightnow on the situation that you
are in.
How are you really going rightnow in the school that you're in
, and what would make you feeldifferently about the situation
you are in right now, in thismoment?
(11:12):
Are you lacking that truevillage?
Are you lacking the supportthat you need in order to feel
empowered and thrive in yourclassroom and if you are nodding
along with anything that I said, think about how you can
establish that village.
Who can you reach out to lookaround the staff room?
Is there somebody that you canconnect with?
Is there somebody that you cantrust?
(11:34):
Is there somebody that you lookup to, a mentor of some kind
that you can pull aside andtrust and talk to?
You might not have this.
I went six years not having thisand it is so hard if that is
you and you really really don'thave that, because a village can
just be two people as well.
A village can just be you andyour teacher, bestie and you
(11:55):
know somebody that you can talkto over a coffee in the staff
room when nobody's around.
Um, so I am sending support ifthat is the case and I really
hope that this podcast can be asource of a village and
community for you, because, eventhough it was just me talking
very poorly at the moment, mightI add, I'm very scared about
listening back to this podcastbefore I post it but I really do
(12:19):
hope this podcast can be thatsource of village and community
for you, and there are a lot ofpeople that listen to this
podcast who share your values,share the same direction that
you want to head with classroommanagement, want to be the same
kind of teacher that you want tobe, with those same values.
And that brings me on to theunteachables, because there are
going to be some changes in theway that I offer support to
(12:42):
teachers.
You know that that'll teachthem is my signature course.
That'll teach them isincredible and I don't mean to
be tooting my own horn, but itis really about developing your
classroom management from theground up.
It is about that fulltransformation of okay, we start
with this module here, we endwith this module here, and by
the time you get through thatcourse, your teaching practice
(13:04):
is going to have this bigtransformation.
But I want to offer more than acourse.
I need it to be more than acourse.
It has to be classroommanagement and that level of
support for teachers.
It's more than just training.
And when I was sitting down, Isat down, you know, a few months
back, and I had a big piece ofpaper and I'm like what do I
(13:27):
want from this?
What do I want for teachers?
And to do that.
I thought about the things inmy career that has made the
biggest difference in terms oftraining, development, progress,
choice theory, training, envoy.
There are a bunch of differentthings I could pinpoint,
training wise that have beenreally beneficial.
All of the marvelous in-schooltraining I received from my
(13:50):
mentor, cara these all shaped mypractice right.
But when I think about it moredeeply and when I really dug
into that, it wasn't thetraining itself.
I could have gone to thattraining and gone.
You know what?
Bish bash bosh.
That's it.
I'm done.
I'm going to go and try toimplement in my classroom.
Oh, whoops, I've tried.
(14:10):
I have a question, I've lost itand now I'm not going to be
doing this anymore.
It really was the ongoingsupport that was most
transformative.
It was being there withteachers who had also done that
same training.
Teachers that spoke my language, teachers that I could bounce
ideas off.
Teachers that I could sitacross the table going.
Hey, oh my gosh, have you triedthose spiralling questions from
choice theory today?
No, how about we try some now,because I feel like I need to
(14:34):
brush up on this?
Or teachers that are theregoing, oh my gosh, I tried X, Y
and Z from Envoy today.
It was bloody transformative.
Everybody, you need to givethis a difference.
So I really reflected for a longtime on what my goal is here.
It is to support teachers tothrive in their classrooms, to
(14:56):
have the capacity to supporttheir students, and teachers
can't support their studentswithout feeling supported
themselves.
And so that brings me onto whatI am doing now.
I'm pivoting my offers a littlebit.
Yes, I will still be offeringthat'll teach them.
Yes, I'll still be offeringseparate training programs.
If this is not something thatyou need, but you would still
(15:16):
like to learn from me, it'simportant that I still have
those on offer as well.
But I have created what I alsosaid at the start, so I was not
that big of a surprise thebehavior club.
The behavior club is a communityfor teachers who don't just
want to craft their teachingpractice, but do so with ongoing
(15:36):
support that you need to buildthe confidence to really
hardwire those skills.
What I'm trying to do is I'mtrying to emulate what got me to
this point, and really what gotme to this point was my mentor,
cara, and uh, like all of theincredible things that she did
in bringing community together,she would send us on these
(15:56):
professional developmenttraining, but then she would
also hold these meetings andwe'd be brought into these
meetings and we'd have thesediscussions and we'd be able to
bounce ideas off each other andit would just be this beautiful
community where we could bevulnerable and share our wins
and celebrate the positives thathave happened but also talk
about the struggles.
That is what I am trying toemulate with this club
(16:20):
Everything that has been pivotalfor my own practice in really
being able to get to a pointwhere I'm able to support other
teachers.
This is not a sales pitch, theway at all.
This is an invitation because Idon't want somebody in the club
that isn't 100% in need of thisor on board with this.
It is for somebody who isstruggling with classroom
(16:42):
management, who needs a village.
If you're not going well at themoment, I want you to join us.
It is the cost of a coffee aweek because I wanted it to be
really accessible.
I know that that'll teach themand my other courses might not
feel as accessible to someteachers because it is that one
big course.
So, because of the nature ofthis offer, I'm drip feeding
(17:06):
different courses monthly.
It'll be a big focus oncommunity for people who are
aligned with the values, I amable to charge, and because it's
me with a bunch of people inthe community, I am able to
charge less for that.
So I'm able to support you.
So, if you're aligned withthose values that you hear me
talk about in the AnteasablesAcademy, if you need a village,
(17:28):
if you need that ongoing support, if you want to learn from me,
I want you to pull up a seat andbe there with me.
There is so much that's goingto be inside the club.
It's actually a ridiculousamount for the price, to be
honest, but because I ambringing people together, I can
afford to do it in this way.
So you should get in now,because I'll always honor the
(17:49):
monthly price that you joined on, even when it goes up, when the
offer grows, when I have, youknow, 30 courses in there, 40
courses in there, not just one,two, three you will keep the
same price.
So the kinds of things you'llget every single month you'll
get a masterclass.
So each month I'm going to bediving deep into a topic or
challenge around behavior.
(18:10):
So I'll be taking you step bystep through, like a game plan
on how to address that.
Then you'll have youraccompanying resources, from
email templates to socialemotional learning lessons,
frameworks, behavior discussionprompts.
I will be providing you withany resources that you need to
(18:30):
feel confident to take action,to take it into the classroom,
to hardwire these skills.
Then you have your virtualcoffee catch-ups monthly Meet
with me for a heartfelt chataround the topic, to answer any
questions that you have.
You can also watch the recordingforever of that and, most
importantly, your behavior clubcommunity.
(18:51):
It's like a virtual staff room,but everybody's on the same
page.
Show up as your most authenticself, engage in the topics that
I put out there, shoot thebreeze, ask for support, join a
challenge, celebrate thewonderful things you're doing
and just have that village.
Already.
I've got my founding members inthere, so I've got over a
hundred people in there alreadythat are just the most
(19:15):
inspirational, empowering,incredible teachers I have spent
.
That's also why my voice iseven croakier than it would have
been, because I just spent thelast two hours in there
recording welcome videos andtalking to people about the
wonderful things that they'veshared.
So just join this amazingcommunity If what I've spoken
about has resonated and youthink that a village is exactly
(19:37):
what you need to be able toprogress with your practice.
Also, as the behavior club grows, so too will the big behavior
vault, so you can return toeverything.
So if you're thinking at onepoint in your career, oh my gosh
, I am just struggling withlow-level behaviors, you go back
into that big behavior vaultand you find that course on
low-level behaviors and youwatch that course and you can
(20:00):
start to hardwire those skills.
And then the resource librarywill also be growing month after
month and it will have amazingresources in there, like social
emotional learning lessons,regulation toolboxes, teaching
and learning toolboxes, scriptsand prompts.
You need to have discussionswith students and their parents,
(20:20):
so much more.
So this month, if you'relistening in real time, the big
behavior challenge that I'veaddressed is deescalating
dysregulated behaviors.
So in that you get yourmasterclass and that goes
through a game plan on how toreduce, respond to and resolve
big, challenging, dysregulatedbehaviors.
(20:41):
You get a fully resourced socialemotional learning lesson.
Flipping our lid.
You get the coffee catch upwhere I talk about overcoming
the challenges of staying calmand regulated as teachers.
You get the regulation toolbox,which includes 29 calm cards to
use on the go.
It's like a portable calmcorner which is perfect for
secondary teachers and you getmany, many prompts and templates
(21:06):
to help you navigate thosebehaviors with students and
communicating that to theirparents as well.
It is a massive month and ofcourse then, month on month,
there'll be new things that youcan dive into, talk about, um
hardwire, all the rest of it,and I am so excited to really
crack into all of this.
(21:27):
So if you would like to join usfor the behavior club, you can
head to the dash onteachablescom forward, slash TBC
and I will put the link to thatin the show notes as well.
And again, if membershipsaren't your thing, that is fine.
If you still want to accesscourses and resources separately
, I do offer that.
(21:48):
I've actually uploaded everysingle resource from inside the
club, of course, not themasterclass, but the resources
that accompany it.
So the lesson, the templates,the cards.
I have uploaded those into TPTfor anybody who would like to
purchase those separately,because I still want you to be
able to have access to them.
Or you can sign up for one ofthe courses, but the courses
(22:11):
aren't up just yet.
And if you're from a school andyou would like multiple teachers
to join the club, please justemail me at claire at the dash
on teachablescom because I dooffer bespoke packages for
multiple staff members and alsoschools.
You will be able to alsopurchase the individual packs
for your school if you want touse one as a training session.
(22:33):
So I think that I have pushedmy voice pretty much as far as I
will go today and I've gotanother few recordings to do
before I leave for Australia ina few days.
So I'm going to go rest myvoice and I will see you next
week.
But if you have any questionswhatsoever about the BehaviClub,
if it is right for you again,this is not a sales pitch.
(22:55):
I want the right teachers forthe right reasons in the
BehaviClub.
I want to support the peoplewho really desperately need this
level of support.
I can't freaking wait to seeyou in there, sending all my
best teachers Until next week.
Oh hi teachers, Welcome to Unteachables podcast
Congratulations.
You have just stumbled acrossthe best free professional
development and support youcould ask for.
I'm Claire English, apassionate secondary teacher,
author, teacher mentor andgenerally just a big behavior
nerd, and I created theUnteachables podcast to
demystify and simplify classroommanagement.
I want this podcast to be thetangible support, community
(00:23):
validation, mentorship all thosepretty important things that we
need as teachers to be able towalk into our classrooms feeling
empowered and, dare I say it,happy and thrive, especially in
the face of these really toughbehaviors.
So ready for some no-nonsense,judgment-free and realistic
classroom management support?
I've got your teacher friend.
Let's do this.
Hello wonderful teachers.
(00:44):
Oh, my gosh, that is not a goodstart with my voice, is it?
Hello wonderful teachers,welcome back to another week of
the Unteachables podcast.
The last week has been hell.
I rarely record a podcast theday that it goes out, but I am
sitting here at 10am recording apodcast episode the morning
(01:07):
that I'm supposed to bereleasing that podcast episode
and that never happens.
I'm usually really ahead ofthings.
I'm usually, you know, gettingthings prepared, getting things
out.
But, as you can hear in myvoice, we have been hit very
hard by the plague in myhousehold.
My sweet baby brought homeinfluenza from daycare and she
(01:31):
also had an ear infection, butit means that the last week
we've taken her back to urgentcare three times.
She was a very, very sicklittle girl.
Thankfully, on day nine shestarted to turn a corner and
started to be herself and she isa hundred percent herself now.
Thankfully, it was a very scaryperiod of time and, of course,
(01:53):
she passed it on to my husbandand I.
So, as we were trying to takecare of a very sick little
toddler and take her to urgentcare and everything we ourselves
were were crumbling to amillion pieces and yeah, it's a
very, very bad flu bug that'sgoing around at the moment and I
hope that anybody else in thesouthern hemisphere with me
(02:15):
stays clear away from it,because it was very hard hitting
, but on that, probably going tobe cutting a lot of this out as
I try to breathe.
Um, this has been a very fun,very amazing week as well,
because I guess I can go into ita little bit later, but I have
(02:35):
just opened doors to thebehavior club, uh, which is what
I've been working on for thelast four months, and it, of
course, classic Claire momentthat the week I'm supposed to be
releasing the behavior club andopening up doors.
We're so sick that every littlething is like a mad, mad
scramble to the finish line.
But we're there and I opened upmy founding member spaces
(03:00):
yesterday and I have mybrilliant community.
That's in there now.
Founding members, of course youcan still come and join us, but
I'll talk about that later inthe episode.
What I also want to quickly talkabout in the start of this
episode is my book is never justabout the behavior the like.
The last seven episodes of thepodcast will be dedicated to
(03:22):
that.
That is is done now.
If you want to hear more aboutthe book, you can go back and
listen to those seven episodesin order so you can kind of get
a feel of what the book's about.
But I received this review onAmazon and I've received so many
beautiful reviews on Amazon,but this one came through when I
was in the thick of thesickness.
And Matthew Moskin MatthewMoskin, if you are listening to
(03:45):
this know that that review thatI'm about to read.
It got me through feeling verydark.
You said this book has finallyhelped me navigate the world of
classroom management.
I feel as a new teacher.
I've had so many questionsregarding behavior.
This is the only book that hasprovided answers to my ambiguous
(04:06):
questions.
One of the most helpful thingsabout this book is that the
actual phrases and conversationsare modeled for me.
I always want very clearexamples of things in this book
delivered.
It's made me feel empowered asa teacher.
It allows and supports me tocreate the environment that I
want for myself and my students.
It tells me clear directions onhow to turn my room into an
island of safety.
(04:26):
Going into my second year, Ifeel a hundred times more
confident in the type ofenvironment I want to establish
and, most importantly, how I cando that.
Such a beautiful book.
I cried when it ended becauseI've had such an emotional
connection.
The strategies I've learnedfrom the book have already made
a world of difference to me andin my mindset alone.
My gosh, matthew.
(04:47):
Like, please know that thatreview meant so much to read.
That book was a labor of loveand um, everything that you've
just written there about likethe clear examples and you know,
showing the how and the whylike that is exactly what I
wanted from the book.
So thank you so much for thatbeautiful, thoughtful review
that would have taken a littlewhile to write out.
(05:09):
Now onto this episode of thepodcast.
It is titled let's have a heartto heart how are you going?
Because I really want to have aheart to heart.
How are you going?
And the reason I want to talkabout that is because the answer
to that question has reallychanged and shifted and shaped
for me over the last 13 years ofbeing a teacher.
And the reason why I want totalk about this in particular,
(05:31):
it's because the reason why I'vepivoted the unteachables now
and I'll talk about the waysthat I've pivoted my offers and
how I'm going to be supportingteachers has changed from now on
, and it really does have to dowith this question of how are we
, why are we like, why are wefeeling this way and how can we
(05:54):
feel a little bit better asteachers.
So I have thought long and hardabout how I view teacher
wellbeing, what it is, how weget it, and there are so many
factors and every single personis impacted differently by this.
You know it could be that youfeel crap because of a lack of
autonomy, maybe trust is anissue, maybe you're not getting
enough support from leadership,maybe the culture of the school
(06:16):
is toxic.
How empowered you feel in yourclassroom has a big weight on
how we feel as teachers, howconfident and how masterful and
how all over it we feel.
If we're walking into ourclassroom feeling confident and
masterful in our classroommanagement and our teaching and
learning, our wellbeing is goingto be better, the opportunities
(06:37):
are afforded to us, howfulfilling we feel the work is.
So many things impact on ourwellbeing as teachers.
Some of those things are in ourcontrol and some of those
things are not in our control.
And I want to talk about onething for me that has had the
most impact and one of thethings that actually I didn't
(06:58):
think was in my control untilthis very moment.
For me, the absolute darkesttime I've had as a teacher was
working in a small school.
I was the only English teacher.
I was also the assistant headteacher and I felt like in the
day to day I was always eithermanaging up with somebody my
(07:18):
principal, and I'm not going tosay too much about him, I'll
just leave it there or I wasmanaging down, managing the rest
of the teachers.
I was a teaching and learninglead, so I had a lot of
responsibility for the entirestaff team.
The teachers were brilliant.
If you were listening to thisand if you're a teacher of that
school, I don't think you wouldbe there's a very small staff,
(07:39):
but the teachers were sobrilliant but I felt completely
alone.
I was working in a silo that itwas just the nature of the
beast, with the role that I had,where I didn't feel like I fit
anywhere, really like where Icould belong.
Um, now, the best time I've hadas a teacher was when I was
(08:00):
working with a big Englishfaculty and we're like a little
family and I say that withcaution because I feel like
anytime you say we are a familyin a work context, it can be a
little bit toxic, like I.
I really cautious of eversaying we are a family here
because it can be used againstpeople.
(08:21):
Um, but I did feel like I was afamily with these people.
In fact, you know, seven, eight, nine years on I can't remember
exactly how many years I stillsome of these people are still
people that I would consider mybest friends and my family.
So, um, that particular context, not only did I feel like I had
(08:42):
this beautiful faculty aroundme, that had these shared
experiences that I could talk to, that were my village, but I
also had leaders who heavilyinvested in staff professional
development, heavily invested inus and made us feel.
Two particular leaders did thismade us feel like we could do
absolutely anything.
(09:03):
I was dealing with the samestuff as I was in that smaller
school similar students, similarcontext, the same challenges
with parents.
The only difference was in thatsmaller school I didn't have a
supportive village, and they sayit takes a village as a teacher
.
But what does that actuallymean?
It doesn't mean just havingpeople around us, because I had
(09:24):
people around me at that smallerschool.
I had a beautiful team ofteachers around me, I had the
leadership team that I workedwith, but I felt my lowest.
I think that having a village asa teacher needs to mean having
like minded people around usthat we can trust to be
vulnerable with, to askquestions to that we know aren't
(09:46):
going to be taken as silly youknow, bounce ideas off and be
inspired and empowered by, butalso be that for them as well,
like not just being somebodythat takes, takes, takes, but in
that village you are anintegral part of what you do
there as teachers and you arejust as important as the teacher
next to you and the teachernext to them, just to be able to
(10:07):
access support, in whateverform.
You need to never have yourstruggles minimized or shrugged
off, but feel heard andvalidated.
And my philosophy forleadership has always been if
somebody comes to me, if youcome to me and you say that
you're struggling with something, I don't care if that something
is so small to another person,I don't care if it's something
(10:29):
that others would think isreally simple.
I don't care if it's somethingthat I would think, oh, that's a
bit, that's a bit simple, isn'tit?
You know, like that, thatshouldn't be an issue.
There's so much shrugging off ofthings in schools.
There's so much of oh, we justhaven't tried, you haven't tried
to build a relationship, youhaven't tried to not take things
personally, you aren't tryingto differentiate your lessons or
(10:51):
really like.
This is really condescendingsupport or a lack of support.
So I want you to reflect rightnow on the situation that you
are in.
How are you really going rightnow in the school that you're in
, and what would make you feeldifferently about the situation
you are in right now, in thismoment?
(11:12):
Are you lacking that truevillage?
Are you lacking the supportthat you need in order to feel
empowered and thrive in yourclassroom and if you are nodding
along with anything that I said, think about how you can
establish that village.
Who can you reach out to lookaround the staff room?
Is there somebody that you canconnect with?
Is there somebody that you cantrust?
(11:34):
Is there somebody that you lookup to, a mentor of some kind
that you can pull aside andtrust and talk to?
You might not have this.
I went six years not having thisand it is so hard if that is
you and you really really don'thave that, because a village can
just be two people as well.
A village can just be you andyour teacher, bestie and you
(11:55):
know somebody that you can talkto over a coffee in the staff
room when nobody's around.
Um, so I am sending support ifthat is the case and I really
hope that this podcast can be asource of a village and
community for you, because, eventhough it was just me talking
very poorly at the moment, mightI add, I'm very scared about
listening back to this podcastbefore I post it but I really do
(12:19):
hope this podcast can be thatsource of village and community
for you, and there are a lot ofpeople that listen to this
podcast who share your values,share the same direction that
you want to head with classroommanagement, want to be the same
kind of teacher that you want tobe, with those same values.
And that brings me on to theunteachables, because there are
going to be some changes in theway that I offer support to
(12:42):
teachers.
You know that that'll teachthem is my signature course.
That'll teach them isincredible and I don't mean to
be tooting my own horn, but itis really about developing your
classroom management from theground up.
It is about that fulltransformation of okay, we start
with this module here, we endwith this module here, and by
the time you get through thatcourse, your teaching practice
(13:04):
is going to have this bigtransformation.
But I want to offer more than acourse.
I need it to be more than acourse.
It has to be classroommanagement and that level of
support for teachers.
It's more than just training.
And when I was sitting down, Isat down, you know, a few months
back, and I had a big piece ofpaper and I'm like what do I
(13:27):
want from this?
What do I want for teachers?
And to do that.
I thought about the things inmy career that has made the
biggest difference in terms oftraining, development, progress,
choice theory, training, envoy.
There are a bunch of differentthings I could pinpoint,
training wise that have beenreally beneficial.
All of the marvelous in-schooltraining I received from my
(13:50):
mentor, cara these all shaped mypractice right.
But when I think about it moredeeply and when I really dug
into that, it wasn't thetraining itself.
I could have gone to thattraining and gone.
You know what?
Bish bash bosh.
That's it.
I'm done.
I'm going to go and try toimplement in my classroom.
Oh, whoops, I've tried.
(14:10):
I have a question, I've lost itand now I'm not going to be
doing this anymore.
It really was the ongoingsupport that was most
transformative.
It was being there withteachers who had also done that
same training.
Teachers that spoke my language, teachers that I could bounce
ideas off.
Teachers that I could sitacross the table going.
Hey, oh my gosh, have you triedthose spiralling questions from
choice theory today?
No, how about we try some now,because I feel like I need to
(14:34):
brush up on this?
Or teachers that are theregoing, oh my gosh, I tried X, Y
and Z from Envoy today.
It was bloody transformative.
Everybody, you need to givethis a difference.
So I really reflected for a longtime on what my goal is here.
It is to support teachers tothrive in their classrooms, to
(14:56):
have the capacity to supporttheir students, and teachers
can't support their studentswithout feeling supported
themselves.
And so that brings me onto whatI am doing now.
I'm pivoting my offers a littlebit.
Yes, I will still be offeringthat'll teach them.
Yes, I'll still be offeringseparate training programs.
If this is not something thatyou need, but you would still
(15:16):
like to learn from me, it'simportant that I still have
those on offer as well.
But I have created what I alsosaid at the start, so I was not
that big of a surprise thebehavior club.
The behavior club is a communityfor teachers who don't just
want to craft their teachingpractice, but do so with ongoing
(15:36):
support that you need to buildthe confidence to really
hardwire those skills.
What I'm trying to do is I'mtrying to emulate what got me to
this point, and really what gotme to this point was my mentor,
cara, and uh, like all of theincredible things that she did
in bringing community together,she would send us on these
(15:56):
professional developmenttraining, but then she would
also hold these meetings andwe'd be brought into these
meetings and we'd have thesediscussions and we'd be able to
bounce ideas off each other andit would just be this beautiful
community where we could bevulnerable and share our wins
and celebrate the positives thathave happened but also talk
about the struggles.
That is what I am trying toemulate with this club
(16:20):
Everything that has been pivotalfor my own practice in really
being able to get to a pointwhere I'm able to support other
teachers.
This is not a sales pitch, theway at all.
This is an invitation because Idon't want somebody in the club
that isn't 100% in need of thisor on board with this.
It is for somebody who isstruggling with classroom
(16:42):
management, who needs a village.
If you're not going well at themoment, I want you to join us.
It is the cost of a coffee aweek because I wanted it to be
really accessible.
I know that that'll teach themand my other courses might not
feel as accessible to someteachers because it is that one
big course.
So, because of the nature ofthis offer, I'm drip feeding
(17:06):
different courses monthly.
It'll be a big focus oncommunity for people who are
aligned with the values, I amable to charge, and because it's
me with a bunch of people inthe community, I am able to
charge less for that.
So I'm able to support you.
So, if you're aligned withthose values that you hear me
talk about in the AnteasablesAcademy, if you need a village,
(17:28):
if you need that ongoing support, if you want to learn from me,
I want you to pull up a seat andbe there with me.
There is so much that's goingto be inside the club.
It's actually a ridiculousamount for the price, to be
honest, but because I ambringing people together, I can
afford to do it in this way.
So you should get in now,because I'll always honor the
(17:49):
monthly price that you joined on, even when it goes up, when the
offer grows, when I have, youknow, 30 courses in there, 40
courses in there, not just one,two, three you will keep the
same price.
So the kinds of things you'llget every single month you'll
get a masterclass.
So each month I'm going to bediving deep into a topic or
challenge around behavior.
(18:10):
So I'll be taking you step bystep through, like a game plan
on how to address that.
Then you'll have youraccompanying resources, from
email templates to socialemotional learning lessons,
frameworks, behavior discussionprompts.
I will be providing you withany resources that you need to
(18:30):
feel confident to take action,to take it into the classroom,
to hardwire these skills.
Then you have your virtualcoffee catch-ups monthly Meet
with me for a heartfelt chataround the topic, to answer any
questions that you have.
You can also watch the recordingforever of that and, most
importantly, your behavior clubcommunity.
(18:51):
It's like a virtual staff room,but everybody's on the same
page.
Show up as your most authenticself, engage in the topics that
I put out there, shoot thebreeze, ask for support, join a
challenge, celebrate thewonderful things you're doing
and just have that village.
Already.
I've got my founding members inthere, so I've got over a
hundred people in there alreadythat are just the most
(19:15):
inspirational, empowering,incredible teachers I have spent
.
That's also why my voice iseven croakier than it would have
been, because I just spent thelast two hours in there
recording welcome videos andtalking to people about the
wonderful things that they'veshared.
So just join this amazingcommunity If what I've spoken
about has resonated and youthink that a village is exactly
(19:37):
what you need to be able toprogress with your practice.
Also, as the behavior club grows, so too will the big behavior
vault, so you can return toeverything.
So if you're thinking at onepoint in your career, oh my gosh
, I am just struggling withlow-level behaviors, you go back
into that big behavior vaultand you find that course on
low-level behaviors and youwatch that course and you can
(20:00):
start to hardwire those skills.
And then the resource librarywill also be growing month after
month and it will have amazingresources in there, like social
emotional learning lessons,regulation toolboxes, teaching
and learning toolboxes, scriptsand prompts.
You need to have discussionswith students and their parents,
(20:20):
so much more.
So this month, if you'relistening in real time, the big
behavior challenge that I'veaddressed is deescalating
dysregulated behaviors.
So in that you get yourmasterclass and that goes
through a game plan on how toreduce, respond to and resolve
big, challenging, dysregulatedbehaviors.
(20:41):
You get a fully resourced socialemotional learning lesson.
Flipping our lid.
You get the coffee catch upwhere I talk about overcoming
the challenges of staying calmand regulated as teachers.
You get the regulation toolbox,which includes 29 calm cards to
use on the go.
It's like a portable calmcorner which is perfect for
secondary teachers and you getmany, many prompts and templates
(21:06):
to help you navigate thosebehaviors with students and
communicating that to theirparents as well.
It is a massive month and ofcourse then, month on month,
there'll be new things that youcan dive into, talk about, um
hardwire, all the rest of it,and I am so excited to really
crack into all of this.
(21:27):
So if you would like to join usfor the behavior club, you can
head to the dash onteachablescom forward, slash TBC
and I will put the link to thatin the show notes as well.
And again, if membershipsaren't your thing, that is fine.
If you still want to accesscourses and resources separately
, I do offer that.
(21:48):
I've actually uploaded everysingle resource from inside the
club, of course, not themasterclass, but the resources
that accompany it.
So the lesson, the templates,the cards.
I have uploaded those into TPTfor anybody who would like to
purchase those separately,because I still want you to be
able to have access to them.
Or you can sign up for one ofthe courses, but the courses
(22:11):
aren't up just yet.
And if you're from a school andyou would like multiple teachers
to join the club, please justemail me at claire at the dash
on teachablescom because I dooffer bespoke packages for
multiple staff members and alsoschools.
You will be able to alsopurchase the individual packs
for your school if you want touse one as a training session.
(22:33):
So I think that I have pushedmy voice pretty much as far as I
will go today and I've gotanother few recordings to do
before I leave for Australia ina few days.
So I'm going to go rest myvoice and I will see you next
week.
But if you have any questionswhatsoever about the BehaviClub,
if it is right for you again,this is not a sales pitch.
(22:55):
I want the right teachers forthe right reasons in the
BehaviClub.
I want to support the peoplewho really desperately need this
level of support.
I can't freaking wait to seeyou in there, sending all my
best teachers Until next week.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
New Heights with Jason & Travis Kelce
Football’s funniest family duo — Jason Kelce of the Philadelphia Eagles and Travis Kelce of the Kansas City Chiefs — team up to provide next-level access to life in the league as it unfolds. The two brothers and Super Bowl champions drop weekly insights about the weekly slate of games and share their INSIDE perspectives on trending NFL news and sports headlines. They also endlessly rag on each other as brothers do, chat the latest in pop culture and welcome some very popular and well-known friends to chat with them. Check out new episodes every Wednesday. Follow New Heights on the Wondery App, YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to new episodes early and ad-free, and get exclusive content on Wondery+. Join Wondery+ in the Wondery App, Apple Podcasts or Spotify. And join our new membership for a unique fan experience by going to the New Heights YouTube channel now!
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.