Rule #2 - Just Grade it - - Don't let it pile!

This seems to be one of the hardest things for me to do at the beginning of the year. Getting back in the "swing" of things and I can convince myself that I don't need to grade one day because I will grade it tomorrow. Well tomorrow never comes and a week later, I am forced into my room to grade for what feels like an ETERNITY. (And as much as I love my precious children, after deciphering the hieroglyphics we call handwriting, I am a little frustrated at myself.

So.. Rule #2 is - Just Grade it! (It's kind of like NIKE and how they say "Just do it" teachers have to do that too. ) Just get it done, one more thing off the list and then we can send it home.

Grade it as soon as they return it. This may be the simplest rule, and YET the hardest one to follow through, because on Friday afternoon as your sprinting out the door, no one thinks to take home papers or notebooks to grade. If you need a solution, pick one day a week after school, and shut the door and grade. Pick that one day when you have nothing else going on and assign yourself an hour of grading weekly. ( If it was me, I would pick a Monday because graded papers go home on Tuesday.)

Hope this help someone! We all do it, but it doesn't make it a good thing. :-p