Where do I find time to prep?

I took my first GLAD® training in the fall of 2004. When I returned to campus after the 5-day demo, my principal asked me to write a reflection of what I had learned. I recently found that (really old) document on my computer while clearing out files.

            …One of my favorite strategies was the Narrative. It’s like a story board where you place pictures of the story you’re teaching on a background, and it can be used to teach content, academic vocabulary, and story elements…I also think the expert groups, process grid and cooperative strip paragraph have great promise for teaching note taking from research and expository writing…My biggest concern is finding the time to do the prep that’s required for these new strategies…

Those thoughts have been echoed by multitudes of teachers over the decades!

Your GLAD® training inspires you! Your brain is full of research-based, practical teaching strategies that you know will help your students. And you are making so many connections to your curriculum and how it could be enhanced and improved with these new ideas.

But you are also feeling overwhelmed at the thought of having to create everything from scratch. There are simply not enough hours in the day to do all the tasks you normally have on your plate.

How are you ever going to find time to fit in GLAD® prep?

While there is no magic that we can offer to add hours to your day, just like everything else in life, from creating lesson plans for next week to going to the dentist, it comes down to efficient time management and priorities. 

Your curriculum is a guide, not a scope and sequence:

In many districts we’ve trained in, the administrator who organizes the GLAD® PD tells us the message they want teachers to walk away with is that the district adopted materials are to be used as resources, not a lock-step scope and sequence.

Not only do you have license and the encouragement to use parts of the curriculum that work and change those that don’t…that’s why they scheduled GLAD® training – to give teachers skills and strategies to supplement, or use in lieu of, practices that don’t fit the needs of their students.

You may find yourself making the natural progression to incorporate more GLAD® strategies into your existing practice little by little. Rather than spending 20 minutes standing at the copier, use that same time to write out a chant and gather pictures to teach a vocabulary lesson you know will be more engaging than a worksheet.

Baby steps

As you are making the natural progression to incorporate more GLAD®, chunk your prep similarly to how we chunk the lessons for students. Your “chunk” could be to pick 1 unit a year to “GLAD up” and spend time creating strategies for just that unit. Each year work on “GLADing up” a new unit.

Your “chunk” might be to use a few strategies that particularly speak to you. Create and practice those 3-5 strategies for each unit you teach. Next year add 1-3 new ones, and so forth.

Divide and conquer

Our favorite and most effective prep advice is to work with a team. When you took your GLAD® training, one of the resources you received was the Collaborative Planning Guidelines. It’s basically a checklist for how to prep a whole GLAD® unit of study. Many hands make light work! Hang on to that document and use it as a guide whenever your team has a planning meeting.

Carve out dedicated time

Many teachers’ favorite part of the training is the afternoon planning time. What other PD gives teachers time to actually prep and get ready for implementation?! None that we can think of!

Whether it’s something you work into your personal and team prep schedules, a district hosted GLAD® make-n-take event, or a customized support PD you take from Next Steps, prioritizing dedicated GLAD® time to think through your lessons and plan for how to reach students best is always time well spent!

Thanks for reading!

Your biggest fans,

Jody & Sara