You will be completely overwhelmed. But guess what? So are all first year teachers. You will learn so much if you take it. I’m going to write the rest assuming you take it. Note that I quit after years of prep because I found it insane.

Because of you’re experience, start easy. You’re not going to be the best teacher, but so what most aren’t. Use your coteachers as resources.

These words will be your mantra: I do, we do, you do. You show them explicitly with a couple examples they only watch/listen, then you all do a couple examples together following you, then make one for them to do on their own while you watch them work individually and guiding those that need it.

Between these steps, stop and check for understanding. “Any questions.” And watch them work.

It’s 5th grade, even in kindergarten students can be helpful. Give jobs, let the high performers help others when they are done.

You don’t need to grade everything that they do. YOU DONT NEED TO GRADE EVERYTHING THAT THEY DO. Got a pile? Throw that shit in the trash. A couple examples from beginning of year and before each grading period (beginning, progress reports, report cards) are usually fine. If you have a lot of online tests then they grade themselves practically. You can keep examples even if you don’t grade them, so you have proof of progress or not if asked.

Of course some of this depends on your admin. Some literally demand well written weekly lesson plans and that’s the fastest way for me to leave an interview, which happened lol.

In the beginning my plans were ridiculously detailed. My own coach told me to stop, that’s only for observations. So I got a 7 period planner and made it all fit there. I was able to do this because my school had curriculum. If you have no curriculum to work from, I highly suggest simply copying the other teachers as you slowly figure it out.

You can go down the rabbit hole of detail but it just has such diminishing returns the more hours you put in. It’s elementary school, relax, but take it seriously. Friendly but firm.

5th graders are still kids, and will do almost anything for a starburst. I personally loved my classroom currency. Most teachers with classroom currency do so in the following format: teacher-name nickname-for-currency. Paris Bucks, Bishop Bucks, Duncan Dollars… or if you like animals why not Giraffe Tokens? Hand those out like hot cakes and and let them trade for candy, bathroom, break time, toys, recess/lunch with you, erasers, mechanical pencils, led (They waste a lot less when they have to pay.)

Start the day the same way every day. Have a warm up activity that is self directed such as typing practice that lets you have some breathing room. During this time I’d have a students doing jobs if needed such as changing calendar or whatever. After no more than 20 minutes I’d say start the day.

Showing up very early and staying very late is not good for you. Avoid it, avoid taking work home. Have at least 1 full weekend day to chill. And try not to work on weekends at all. You will probably need to stay an hour late or hour early, up to you, and could be longer your first months.

Print stuff a week ahead when possible. Have the first week back from break planned before you leave campus. Money is tight but buying my own printer/toner was a lifesaver.

Try not to spend too much money. It will be hard. Be effective with what you have and really consider your needs. I found dice with up to 20 sides to be helpful, add journals and you can do a lot. Individual whiteboards are great and students love using them.

You might want to consider reading The First Weeks of School. You will find there are huge fad waves in education every few years and in the end they don’t seem to help as much as they claim. You may find your new superintendent saying great things and getting lots of new fancy materials and then a couple years later they disappear pension in hand, district broke. Teaching is hard work, but also rewarding, but also it’s really hard work.

Some things I think can be helpful: have a desk set aside facing away from everyone else. It’s the break desk. It’s not a reward. It’s only purpose is for when a student is unable to focus due to emotions. It might be abused the first couple weeks, but once it’s actually needed no one ever uses it again unless they are sad/angry or anything else prevents them from being themselves.

Keep discipline on your computer/paper. Keep rewards public. I kept a spreadsheet for discipline marks for the day, no marks got a reward. I had a clip chart, answer questions or do something else really good? Clip up, clip up 4 times and get a classroom currency. I found this effective for getting participation up.

Once you have well organized systems in place, the classroom can really start feeling like it’s running itself, but it’s still exhausting. Also, there’s 1 in every class, you know the 1, these days it’s more like 3 though.

This was my weird crash course on trying to teach.