This is episode 234 of Teacher Approved.

You're listening to Teacher Approved, the podcast helping

educators elevate what matters and simplify the rest. I'm

Heidi.

And I'm Emily. We're the creators behind Second Story

Window, where we give research based and teacher approved

strategies that make teaching less stressful and more

effective. You can check out the show notes and resources from

each episode at secondstorywindow.net.

We're so glad you're tuning in today. Let's get to

the show.

Hey there. Thanks for joining us today. In today's

episode, we're laying out a plan for how to stay on top of your

December essentials and still find time to prep for January,

and we're sharing all of our best tips for work packet

success.

But let's start with a try it tomorrow, where we share

a quick win that you can try in your classroom right away. So

Emily, what do we have this week?

Tomorrow, invite your students to write a quick thank

you note. It can be to a classmate, another teacher, a

school staff member, or even to themselves.

I love that. You can keep it simple. You know, just fold

up a piece of paper and let them write one or two sentences. The

act of showing appreciation helps kids slow down, reflect

and connect with others.

It's such a great way to infuse a little more gratitude

into the day. And bonus, it only takes two minutes.

If you like this idea or anything else we share here on

the podcast, would you take a second and give us a five star

rating? Ratings and reviews are one way that new listeners find

us, so every one is actually a huge help to us.

December in the classroom is a strange mix of joy and

chaos. On one hand, there's so much to love about this time of

year, the excitement, the traditions, the sparkle in the

kids eyes. Being a teacher in December can be so much fun.

But on the other hand, you're juggling performances,

assemblies, half days, absences, and a level of collective energy

that makes you wonder if someone filled the water fountain with

Red Bull.

In the past, maybe you've tried white knuckling your way

through lessons while half the class is absent and the other

half is bouncing off the walls, or maybe you just gave up

entirely.

But there is a smarter way to approach December, one

that keeps students engaged, protects your sanity and

actually set you up for an easier January.

That's what we're talking about today, how to plan content

that works with the realities of teaching children in December.

So if you joined us last week, you'll remember that we

shared the smooth December framework to help you get ready

for January. Instead of trying to prep it all, focus on four

your pockets of prep, your classroom reset plan,

your student engagement hook, and your teacher comfort plan.

If you missed that episode, definitely go back and

check it out, because it lays the groundwork for what we'll be

diving into today. Now that you've identified your pockets

of prep, we'll make a plan for using them to tackle your

December tasks.

And planning December starts with an important

decision. When are you going to stop teaching new content? We

call this, cleverly enough, your stop new content date, and it's

basically what it sounds like. It's the last day that you'll

introduce anything new to your students before winter break.

Despite what your pacing guide may say, at some point in

December, teaching new content really just stops being

productive because kids are too distracted and the absences are

too frequent.

And then you end up reteaching everything in January

anyway, which means you aren't actually saving time by pushing

through. You're just creating more work for yourself.

So how do you figure out when that stopping point should

be? A good rule of thumb is to plan to stop teaching new

content about two to four school days before your winter break

starts.

Now to figure out your specific day, ask yourself a few

questions. First, what is your last full week of school? That's

probably when you want to wrap up any new units.

Second, when do interruptions start piling up?

If you've got concerts, assemblies or parties scheduled,

those are likely to eat up a lot of your instructional time.

And third, which units absolutely must be finished

before break? You might have to teach double math lessons for a

day or two so that you're not starting January already behind,

but that is doable.

So take a look at what has to happen before the end of

the month, and work backwards from there. Then choose your

official stop teaching new content date and write it in

your planner. Circle it and make it official.

That's the finish line. Everything before that date,

you're covering your regular content. Everything after that

date, you are in a different mode.

And that shift is where the magic happens, because once

you're past that date, your goal isn't to teach new material,

it's to reinforce, review, and reset.

This time of year, your schedule is as full of

interruptions as Swiss cheese is full of holes, and that's why we

call these Swiss cheese weeks.

We did have a cute name for that. Those are the weeks

where there's a regular day of school planned, but the day is

anything but regular.

And you know that makes planning really tricky. You

can't pretend it's business as usual, but you also can't just

throw everything out the window.

Because you just aren't going to have the same amount of

instructional time that you normally do, you need a clear

picture of what's essential. Take a look at your pacing

guide, your scope and sequence, and anything else that informs

your planning. What content absolutely has to be covered

before you start winter break?

These are your must do's. This is what has to be done

before you hit your stop new content date. When time gets

short or your kids are distracted, focus on the must

do's and be flexible with everything else. Knowing what

you absolutely have to cover helps you recognize where you

can make a cut without getting completely behind.

Of course, no matter how well you plan, the day can still

go off the rails if student behavior does too. So next week

we will talk about how to keep expectations alive and your

classroom running smoothly all the way to break.

Okay, are you with us so far? You have now identified

your stop new content date, you've got a strategy for

covering essential content. And now the big question, what do

you actually do during those last few days before break if

you're not going to teach any new content?

So those days are for review, reflection, and reset.

Plan as many independent activities as your students can

handle, and look for ways to limit how much time you have to

spend teaching whole group or small group lessons.

Obviously, this is not a long term plan. Your students do

need lessons, but two days before a break, is another math

lesson really gonna make the difference in their achievement

this year?

No, I think not. In fact, it may make things harder,

because your class will be checked out, and trying to force

them to focus will lead to resistance and behavior problems

and resentment and reteaching later, all the stuff they didn't

absorb. So adopt a Plan B schedule and make everyone's

life happier.

Now, to be clear, this is not about time filler. You're

not wasting learning opportunities. You're just

restructuring how that learning happens. Think review

worksheets, games, digital practice or educational videos.

This is the time to revisit everything that you have covered

in the last four months.

One of my favorite meaningful time fillers was

setting up stations and having kids rotate through all the math

games that they had learned this year. It got kids moving, it

gave them a chance to review, and I got to sneak in a little

pocket of prep for my own tasks.

You can also use these post new content days to refresh

procedures. By December, some of your routines have probably

gotten a little sloppy. Tighten these up now so that you can hit

the ground running when you return in January.

Also consider if you want to reset your class jobs,

reorganize your classroom library, or have kids clean out

their desks, because future you will be so grateful to walk into

a tidy, organized classroom in January.

And you know, our favorite thing is helping out a

future you. And in your planning, don't forget some

joyful structure. These are activities that feel festive and

special, but they are still structured and calm. Work

packets are one of our favorite forms of joyful structure, and

we will talk about those in our teacher approved tip, but also

consider seasonal read alouds, kindness challenges or simple

art projects.

The goal is to sprinkle in some seasonal spark while

still keeping the structure high and preventing overwhelm.

Okay, let's pull everything together so you know

exactly what to do next. Step one, identify your stop, new

content date and put it on the calendar. That's your finish

line. Everything before that date is new learning. Everything

after that date is for review, reflection, and reset.

Step two, figure out your December must do's. These are

the lessons and assessments you absolutely need to finish before

that date.

Inside the December teacher survival kit, there are

two pages to help you with this. One is the December content to

cover page, and that's where you list all of the lessons,

activities and assessments that you would like to teach. And

then, based on that list, you create your must do's and could

do's page.

That step alone is a game changer, because it helps you

see what really matters and what can wait until January.

Step three is to make a list of meaningful activities

for those post content days. Think review, projects, or calm

seasonal activities that your students can do independently.

And there's a page for this in the survival kit too. It's

organized by categories like review, learning games and

videos, so that you can gather all of your ideas in one place.

In these last few days before the break, plan as many

independent activities as your students can handle. This is how

you get ahead without adding to your stress. While your students

are busy doing their independent work, you've created a little

pocket of prep time where you can tackle your independent

work, meaning all the tasks it takes to wrap up December and

plan the start of January.

Step four is to make a master list of all of the tasks

needed to plan and prepare your December content, your

meaningful time fillers, and the first few days back in January.

The list will be long, but don't worry, our next step is our

secret weapon. Step five is to use your pockets of prep

planner.

This is the key to the whole system, and here's why.

The pockets of prep planner helps you match every task to

your situation. It's organized around where you are working:

digital tasks, classroom tasks, workroom tasks, and by how much

time and energy you have.

Now, obviously you could do this with just a piece of

paper if you don't have the survival kit, but the survival

kit has cool drop down menus so you can quickly tag each task

based on priority and the effort that it requires to complete.

Yeah, it's a pain to fill it out, but this sheet is the

most teacher approved of all our teacher approved tips. We cannot

overstate how helpful this is. Let's say your students are

watching a short video. You've got 15 minutes, you're in your

classroom and you're running on low energy. You open your list

and see create January welcome slides. Boom, that's the perfect

15 minute low energy classroom based task for that moment.

Without that list, you're going to be spending your

limited pocket of prep thinking, oh, what should I do now? But

this way, you can just look at your list. You can see exactly

what fits the moment. No decision fatigue, no wasted

minutes and no wondering what's important. You just pick, do,

and move on.

And truly, those small moments add up. A 10 minute

pocket here, a 15 minute pocket there, that's how you're going

to make real progress without working nights or weekends or

winter break.

Yes. So let's recap. Step one, pick your stop new content

date. Step two, decide your December must do's. Step three,

plan meaningful time fillers. Step four, make your December to

do list. Step five, plug those tasks into your pockets of prep

planner.

Follow these steps and you will walk out in December

knowing that everything for January is ready to go, and that

winter break actually gets to be a stress free break.

So now you've got a full plan for how to get through

December with your sanity intact. But before we wrap up,

we want to leave you with one final reminder. The reason that

all of this matters.

This isn't just about checklists and planners. It's

about protecting your future self. As you're planning your

December, keep in mind what future you needs. What would

make walking into your classroom in January feel calm instead of

chaotic?

Maybe it's having a stack of January materials already

copied and waiting in that January ready bin that you

prepared last week. Maybe it's making sure all of the December

decorations are taken down before you leave. Or maybe it's

clearing the stack of papers on your counter so your room feels

fresh and organized.

Use those last few days strategically. While kids are

working on their goal setting activity, you're gathering books

for your next read aloud. While they're doing a work packet,

you're setting up your January math slides.

Small bits of prep now save you so much stress later.

Future You deserves to walk into January feeling ready, not

behind.

We'd love to hear how you're preparing for teaching in

December. Come join the conversation in our Teacher

Approved Facebook group.

Now for our Teacher Approved Tip of the Week, where we share an

actionable tip to help you elevate what matters and

simplify the rest. This week's teacher approved tip is prepare

some work packets. Tell us about it, Heidi.

A work packet is exactly what it sounds like, a

collection of worksheets stapled together, but the magic is in

how you put it together and how you present it to your class.

And look, I can hear some eye rolls out there.

That's a skill.

This is our unpopular opinion. Work packets are not

all wrong, and they may sound like boring, busy work. But hear

us out, because when you do them right, kids genuinely love them.

And we're not exaggerating, they do get

excited.

Yes.

So let's start with what goes in a work packet. The focus

should be on reviewing academic content, but you want to

sprinkle in a few just for fun pages to keep the kids engaged.

A packet can be any size, but we have found that 12 page packets

are really ideal. So you would maybe have four pages of festive

math review, four pages of language arts review and four

pages of fun.

That amount of work easily keeps students busy for

90 minutes to two hours. But, and this is the important part,

don't try to do it all in one sitting. The first work session

can be longer because the interest is really high. So you

could maybe do 30 to 40 minutes in one go. But after that, 20

minute stretches are about as long as kids can manage before

they need a break.

And the longer you're doing a packet, you might need

to, like, make those stretches a little bit shorter.

Yeah.

So here's how this might look in your day. After your

morning routine, you introduce the work packet, and you give

kids 30 or 35 minutes to work on it, and then you know, you take

a break for recess.

When they come back, you could do another 15 minutes of

work. And then you do something different, a video, a read

aloud, a movement break, and then later in the day, you give

them another 20 minutes to keep working on their packets.

Now let's talk about how to make your work packet feel

special instead of like a punishment. First try organizing

it around a theme. It could be something as broad as winter or

December, or something more specific, like gingerbread or

penguins.

The content on each page doesn't have to be about the

theme. You could have a page of two digit subtraction practice,

but if there's a snowman graphic on the page, it feels festive

and fun.

Yeah, clip art makes it all exciting. Besides giving it

a theme, mix up the content. Alternate between math, language

arts and fun pages so that it doesn't feel like a workbook.

And third, leverage the power of choice. When you

introduce the packet to your class, make a big deal about

this. You get to decide what order you work in. You can start

wherever you want and do the pages in any order.

Kids feel so much more invested when they have control

over their work. That simple choice transforms this whole

experience.

Now, if there is a specific page you need everyone

to complete, like, maybe you want to use one page for a

grade, you can include that in the directions, like everyone

needs to do the multiplication practice on page three. But

after that, you can do the pages in any order.

And here is our copy saving tip. Reduce your master

pages to 50% and then copy two activities onto one page. Now,

if you run those copies double sided, you can fit four

activities onto a single sheet of paper.

And obviously that does reduce the amount of room for

writing, and we've done this successfully with students as

young as second grade, but if you teach first grade or

kindergarten, you might want to test out the reduced page size

first. In second grade, I feel like some of them enjoy the

challenge of having to write in these tiny little spaces.

The beauty of work packets is that they are

engaging for students, and they give you time to work. While

your class is quietly reviewing two digit addition and solving

winter themed word searches, you can be preparing materials for

January, organizing your classroom and tackling anything

else on that pockets of prep list.

It's a total win win. Students are doing meaningful

review work, and you're getting ahead instead of falling behind.

So if you're looking for a simple, low stress way to fill

some of that post content time in December, give work packets a

try. Your students might surprise you with how much they

enjoy them.

To wrap up the show, we're sharing what we're giving extra

credit to this week. Emily, what get your extra credit?

I'm giving extra credit to the coconut milk bath soak from

Herbivore.

Okay.

Listen, this stuff is not cheap. In fact, I've had two

jars of this for years that I've been hoarding because it's too

special. I didn't want to just use it on any old bath. But I

finally decided that was stupid, because they were literally

getting dusty. I'm like, I'm going to use them. I'm just

going to use them. And then I figured I'd use it up, and then

forget all about it. But the bad news is that it actually is

amazing, and now I want to buy more. But it smells incredible

and it makes your skin feel so soft. So put this on a splurge

list for yourself, or a really nice gift for a bath loving

friend. And I just saw it's on a lightning deal on Amazon, so I'm

gonna have to go grab a couple more jars.

Yeah, that's a good idea. And think about how you might

want to pamper yourself during winter break. Everyone deserves

a long, luxurious bath, so might want to grab those.

That's why I'm sharing it right now. I figured it would be

good for self care or a really good gift idea.

Perfect.

Check it out. Link's in the show notes. What are you

giving extra credit to, Heidi?

I guess this is self care, but it's much less

exciting. I'm giving extra credit to the Nexcare max hold

waterproof bandages.

Ooh, la, la.

And that's a mouthful to say. I will put a link to them

in the show notes. But if you are at the store and you're

looking at the all of the bandages, these ones have black

writing on the front of the box that says max hold. And they

definitely live up to the name. It says they hold for up to 48

hours, but literally, after 48 hours, I had to get out my

sharpest little craft scissors and do Band Aid surgery to get

it off. Like I just couldn't peel up any of the edges. They

were too secure. But the thing is, this hasn't given me any

kind of allergic reaction that I normally get from wearing band

aids for a long time. And I actually did try switching over

to regular band aids, and by the end of the day, half my leg was

covered in hives, so.

It's the worst.

If you have a need for waterproof band aids, definitely

grab a box of bees. I have been very impressed.

Well, I'll have to add them to the stash.

That is it for today's episode. Figure out your stop

new content date and work backwards from there. You have

got this.

We hope you enjoyed this episode of Teacher Approved. I'm Heidi.

And I'm Emily. Thank you for listening. Be sure to follow

or subscribe in your podcast app so that you never miss an

episode.

You can connect with us and other teachers in the

Teacher Approved Facebook group. We'll see you here next week.

Bye for now.

Bye.