Podcast

30: Teacher Talk: Monica Monfre’s Advice for Staying Organized in the Classroom

This week we have Monica Monfre, Founder of Make Caviar &

The Chalkboard Lifestyle, discussing how to set yourself up for success before the school year, especially if you are an educator, teacher or homeschool. Monica, an experienced educator, shares valuable insights and tips on how teachers can establish routines and stay organized throughout the school year, whether in traditional classroom settings or homeschooling.

In this episode we talk about:

Why setting yourself up with a plan will save you time.
What happens when things change during the school year.
How to NOT stay in the classroom until the late hours trying to keep up with the work.

Other Episodes You Might Be Interested In:

Ep. 02: Digital Space vs. Physical Space Organizing

Ep. 10: 10 Note Taking Made Easy: The Different Styles You Need to Know

Ep. 19: Finding your Summer Groove: Staying Organized During the Long Break

Ep. 21: Avoiding Burnout and Achieving Mindful Organization with Jennifer Bassman

Where to find Monica Monfre online:

Web: https://www.monicamonfre.com/

IG: https://www.instagram.com/monicamonfre/

—

The Organized & Productive podcast is brought to you by The Organized Flamingo and hosted by Stephanie Y. Deininger! For those of you who love the thought of organizing & being more productive, but don’t know where to start or constantly up against hurdles that don’t let you advance the way you want to, this podcast is for you!

Review full show notes and resources at https://theorganizedflamingo.com/podcast

Connect with Stephanie

https://www.instagram.com/theorganizedflamingo/

Review the Transcript:

Hello, Monica. It's so good to see you. I'm so glad you are our guest today because I've been wanting to talk about this for a really long time. and as our community knows, we already did the introduction and we get straight to the nitty gritty, and I've been wanting to talk to a former teacher for so long on the podcast specifically because I feel like you and kinda like — either school teachers or educators are a wealth of knowledge when it comes to organizing and productive. Like, you have to be you kind of have to be in your own way, and that's the thing. like, in your way. So I'm excited about the conversation today. So welcome. Welcome. we are going to 1st just get to the why is this even an important topic and why we're devoting an entire episode to this. And that is why is it important to establish routines or be organized before you even start the school year or very early on in the school year, whether, again, if you're homeschooling or if you're more in the traditional classroom style. Like, why is this an important part of, of an educators organizing journey?

Oh my gosh. This is such a great question. And, Stephanie, I don't know if you know this, but my very first day of teaching was the very first day I showed up to the job. Like, I had never done student teaching before I was hired non traditionally, and I was, you know, a smidgen organized. I had no idea what was gonna hit me. but literally, they tell teachers whether it's your 1st year or your 20th year. Right? You have to be ready to hit the pavement running, like, the they eat, there's no, like, yay, it's the 1st day of school, like, let's all, especially if you teach high school, I taught high schoolers. So for me, I think when I look back at those 1st years, when I was still figuring it out, And now when I, like, think back to, like, years, 13, 14, 15, starting off, organized, just for my brain, also allowed me to feel really ready to just be present with my students and to start off strong, whether that organization was how you're gonna enter the classroom, like, that's part of being organized, whether was the routines of, like, this is how my day's gonna start. this is how I'm gonna end my day. I remember my 1st year, like, I had no organization. I would show up, like, an hour before school. 3 o'clock 4 o'clock came. I worked in a charter school, and I would be there till, like, or 7 because I had no idea how to start and end my day. So even that much of organization helps with sustainability. And then also when the students were like, miss, where should I put this? And I would be like, oh my gosh. If you could see my class during the 1st year, there was papers everywhere. It felt organized in my brain. but I know that the more that I got organized and the sooner I did it, the more effective active I was inside the classroom and the just the better my classroom ran.

You mentioned something very important here, and that's the, the because you're handling other people's you know, education and you're with other people, like, you can't control that. And so that's the space that you can control. Like, you just mentioned that, like, hey, I don't I can't I can't have, you know, so and so student be organized or whatever. They they they are doing what they're they're doing. And, feel like you just kind of took control of that on your own, because you could control. You can you can help that. So let's talk about it. It's so funny. Oh. Oh, go ahead. Good.

I was just gonna say it's so funny because my students are probably more organized than I ever was. And so they helped teach me how to be more organized.

But that's that's the thing. Again, they're only consumed with their own, you know, organization, not the whole classrooms. That's 30, you know, it could be 15, 30 bodies, even if you're, homeschooler, that's still more than one person you are responsible for. So, that's something to to always think about. Like, you're not just organizing yourself, but other people too. okay. So now, you know, that's the importance of it. How long do you think it took you to find a good rhythm, like, your style? Like, what worked for you? Oh gosh.

It takes a long time. I think that for newer teachers, I just would say, like, give yourself grace because it took me a while. I think and there's lots of different parts of organization inside of the classroom. So I didn't really have an organization to my day until probably year 3, because I was just sort of trying to get by. But the organization around how I collected papers, that really was the 1st year. Right? I started to think about how could look in testing it out. One thing that I think is so unique for teachers is you might have multiple different systems based upon your class. So I taught 5 periods, when I first started 5, 5 sections, and 2 of those I had a co teacher with. So Those organization were different because again, we're managing 2 people's organization styles and also students who maybe had different legal requirements around what organization needed to look like for them. so certain ones got better. I would still say that when I left teaching, in last year. So my last full year was 2021 to 2022. I felt like I was pretty down to the organization aspects it. And the thing that I I wish if I could have gotten it done faster would have been my calendar and just putting in dates on there. So my 1st year, I was like, paper planner also, I think it's so key. You might ask this question later, but I was teaching for 15 years. So when I started teaching was 2007 to 2008, and the technology that helped me get my life together as a teacher drastically changed. I mean, 15 years isn't a huge like, span, I think. But it's it's a huge span in the technology and teaching world. So I do think that I had to switch everything up, but those 1st couple of years, I I definitely would say the grace. to get to get some things together. And the most important thing, though, after year 3, when I got my day to get together, I enjoyed teaching so much more But it took me a while to figure out what it would be like if I wasn't at the school building from 7 AM to 7 PM.

Yeah. And what would be the one tip or, like, what would be the one thing that or haven't maybe that carried you through, you think? Like, the one that you were consistent with, even if things were changing around you, even if you were co teaching, like, What's that one habit you you think you would have credit to your, staying organized long term?

I think putting timers into my calendar. Teachers talk a lot about timers for students, but it was super helpful for me to have either timers or reminders. So using Google Calendar has been the one thing that once I figured out how to use it, it was so helpful. And when I think about being organized, whether it's, like, putting in appointments for the beginning of the day and saying, like, change your board, like, change the date on your board, the things that you just think you would do, but having those sort of set up. And then also putting in a reminder, I hope it's okay to say this, Stephanie, but to go to the bathroom, right, like, I would forget, like, I think things, if you're not in the classroom, you might not think about, ah, I just go to the bathroom whenever I like me to, but as a teacher, I was like, You have 15 minutes now. That'd be a great time to go to the bathroom, get some water, maybe put some sustenance in your body. and I had to so those are, like, the base organizing that will sustain you, whether your kids are doing what they're supposed to do or not is are you taken care of?

Oh, a 100%. And I'm glad you mentioned it. Yeah. We can though, those are, like, basic human needs. And we sometimes forget when we're talking about, oh, I wish I was more organized. or, oh my gosh, I'm such a mess or a hot mess express. You don't think about, well, how just go to the basics? Are you taking care of yourself? Because if that not sustained, then the rest will be really hard. Not impossible, but really hard. Your energy won't be up. It's kinda like exercising or really just anything. Like, you have to be able to sustain it. So I I can see that a 100%. Yeah. That's a great point. Thanks for mentioning that. Yeah. human needs. Everybody meet your facing and human needs. Oh my gosh. I worked at a school before that did let us eat in front of the kids because they were like, if the kids can't eat, you can't eat, and I was like,

Oh my gosh. Like, how am I gonna get by? And I think that's, like, the Google calendar just reminding myself but it was time to do the things so important.

Yeah. Okay. So let's talk a little bit. Let like, let's go into and segue into, okay, great. You're you're putting things on the calendar and you've got your, you know, your timers or whatever that one thing that is helping you, you get, you know, stay organized long term. Great. But then life happened. either at the school, things change, you got added another educator into into the picture, if you were more home based, just like things got shake shaken up. What what's something what are a couple tips that you would give people that are going through a major change, and they just feel really overwhelmed. And they don't think they can go back to their old routines, or it's getting really hard to go back, or even restart one that they just haven't even had. Like, what would you what are some of those tips that you would give to people?

There are so many. I think one of the things that I loved about teaching, and I still love about it is that it does always change. So it I think what's really helpful is to do an organization routine at the beginning of the week and at the end of the week. I think Aftons are here to do lists are really important. What I found that I loved, and I have some, like, sitting here because I still haven't given this up is I love sticky notes. So it was really helpful for me, in teaching a stressful. So I used to love to put sticky notes around the room. That would be the the things that I had to do And then when they were finished, depending on how I felt that day, if it was a great day, I would just toss them away. If it was, like, a really stressful day, I would use the sticky notes as a way to, like, tear up or to crumple up. so a thing that I think one of the most important things is maybe putting it in your planner. Sometimes planning putting in the signer on the Google calendar can feel really, like, permanent. And then if you don't get it done and feels really like, stressful. So if you're going through a big change, one of the things that I love as a teacher again, we're sticky notes. I know they can get lots So they're not probably they're not always the most important, but it was helpful to me to know that there was malleability in that routine. And I didn't feel many teachers, were probably former high achievers inside of their space, and they we want things to be done perfect and done right. So if it's in a book, it can feel like, oh, I'm a failure versus, like, If it's a sticky note, I can just move it to a different day or I can just, like, throw it away. And I don't even know that it ever existed before. And then by doing that, it allowed me to sort of also see what were things that were pretty consistent that then I could create more systems around. so giving yourself some flexibility and some trial and error, again, there's lots of different ways to organize sticky notes, but I really liked, 1st of all, they give them to you. And I'm a big fan of whatever the school gives me I use. And I like that they were color coded. I like that they could, again, I could throw them out. And I also think that if you're somebody who really enjoys motivation, buying sticky notes that have, like, really positive, really nice things on them can help you stay motivated throughout your daily routine and throughout your organization. So I'm a huge fan of sticky notes for organizing and scheduling.

And further, I love that. I didn't even think about that mobility of that task and that, like you said, we do we talk about that a lot in paper planner type of organizing, but absolutely. You can see that when you have a room, like your room or your area that you can move it around to where you need to go where it needs to go next or just have it be movable, like the reminder would be movable. So, I love that. Okay. So we talk you actually mentioned this earlier about the digital organizing. So let's talk a little bit about that because you're right. Things have changed very quickly, and we actually talk about how digital organizing is is 1. It's a of course, it's a category within organizing. But people sometimes think about it as, oh, it's just It it's not even a thing. It's like digital files or digital or or or it's not even a thing. People just think about their physical space. So with digital organizing, do were you a hybrid type of person? We did it take you a while to transition from one to the other? Was it an easy transition for you? And what tips would you give to somebody that, is going through that now, especially because we're going so much more in the hybrid mode. so that they can stay organized both in their digital space and their physical space.

Yeah. It was hybrid for me. I think one of the things. So I think about how I scheduled my calendar versus how I scheduled or how I organized my files. One of the things that was helpful at some schools I wanna talk about files first. Some schools had, like, a system that you had to use, and that was really helpful. Like, how do we name our curriculum? How do we name our lessons? How do we name our worksheets? Google classroom, like, through the pandemic, I think people had to get organized because of Google room and because parents were getting access to it. but one thing I used to when I first heard, I would say, like, fun things. I'd be like, unit 1, da da, and I soon learned that the way that digital organizing happens in Google or any file is knowing that numbers first and then letters. So as I progress, I have I actually have to go back and I'm even reorganizing by adding in the years and adding in the reminders and color coding because Teachers. One of the best things about if you set up a strong organizational system for your curriculum, it's so much easier to pull up that lesson. I'm blessed and that I remember like, oh, I taught this lesson in October. Like, I always would teach James Baldwin. My dungeon shook, like, every single year, I knew I taught that in the very 1st week of school. if I needed to find it, I could oftentimes just go back to that date planner, but not everybody remembers exactly what you've taught. So I think in your files, putting them by dates, remembering the years for so that you can have easy access and replicate it. And if your administration also needs access, they're not trying to figure out what you meant by unit 1, shapes and sounds. Like, they know that this was taught in 2023.

September 1st, unit 1, lesson 1, and then just being really consistent. wasn't always that organized, but it's helpful to think of it that way. And then when I think about my calendars, I also I really like to write things down. This is where I always I need to listen to some of your other podcasts about this too because for me, I like to write things down because when I write, it creates memory in my brain. So if I'm writing it down, that actually creates this is nerdy. I'm so sorry, but this creates the brain matter. So I still really like to have a digital plan I like an undated one so that if I miss dates, I don't feel like I wasted time. and then I would sit there with my Google calendar or whichever school calendar you're might be using. I know a lot of teachers like to use passion planners, and they have a digital program in it, a physical one. So I like to do the hybrid only because the writing reminds me that it's creating that that memory for me, but digital is nice because I can easily share it with whoever needs to see it, whether that's your administration or your co teachers, and it can be color coded. And I used to like to block off time too, if I was, like, not available. I wanted people to see that I'm not available. I used to hide out in my classroom, so people can't see that on a digital planner, throwing up paper plan or so. Hybrid is still good to me, but I would say just being really organized and hot, like, knowing what your school does and then what you do. And I also had a shadow organizing system because I found my school to be very disorganized. worked in many of them, so nobody needs to know which one it was. And I found them to be very disorganized, and I remember them saying, like, it was in my evaluation. Like, We always know where your lesson plans are. So I think it's really important that the school they might have theirs, but if you have a shadow organization system, that that can be something that helps you set, you know, sets you apart from other educators and becomes a strength though. You might even be able to share with your team what you're doing. So for sure. Yeah. I hope that's helpful. It it absolutely. And, well, one of the reasons, like, you're the guest today for this topic is because you are so good at identifying what your, trouble are in your memory bank, and then you kind of adjust to that. Now every time we have a conversation, you're like, okay. I know this. This is something I'm not going to remember. So it's you know, so I need to make adjustments for that, or this comes very natural to me. Like you said, I I usually will will will know what I teach around this time, so that doesn't need as much. work, if you will. So I feel like you just follow your, your own habits and work from that, which is what we talk about they're gonna sprinkle, like, having it be as organic to your being as possible. So you're not trying to force all these 30 different new habits at the beginning of the year that you've never even done before. And all of a sudden, you wanna be this, like, you know, stellar, organized teacher. And you're like, I've never done that before. Your brain's like, what? What? What are we doing?

And I think one thing I haven't mentioned that's, I guess if I think back to one of your first questions and then this question, I used to save all of my grading until all of the kids have submitted it, and then it would be a of, like, 3 hours of grading and it would overwhelm me. So one of the things I did do, and I think it'd be re it's a and if I could go back, I would even add layers on this, is putting in, like, 15 to 20 minutes a day to grade what's turned in. And I think we talk about it, like, an analogy to mail it. When you get your mail, like, open it up, toss, file. Like, when kids turn in paperwork decide, like, is that something you can grade now? Is it something you have to wait to grade? And then even marking down, I think one of the things I would sometimes forget, like, I would grade something, and I would give it back to the students and sad story, students don't really care what I had to say in their paper. They would throw it away. And then if a digital computer went down or something went down or somebody over wrote, they'd be like, Where's my grade? And so, again, a couple of things that I think I would do if I was doing this over again is I would take pictures of, like, what are the gauge of the students and put them into a file so that I have that digital tracking of it as well as, you know, if you're working with a co teacher or with a team, it's kind of like tracking who's, like, turning things in. Again, as teachers, even though we're organized for ourself, we're also organized for everybody else. So grading, I would go back to that very first question you asked me if there's one thing I would have gotten together much sooner. It would have been how do I wanna grade and my system for tracking the turn in. Because when I taught high school literature, if 20 kids turned in a two page essay, I was so overwhelmed. I was almost happy when some of them didn't turn it in. So I was like, oh, less paper.

Hey, Kit. Just remember that teachers are humans as well in all the good possible ways. So Give a little grace there too. Yeah. Yeah. I I can see that. I can see that the grading would be really overwhelming all at once.

Oh my gosh. It was like it's like when you go in vacation and you come back and you've got, like, all of this mail and you're like, I don't wanna go through all of that. That's sort of what it would feel like every day. when I was giving assignments.

Oh, love it. Okay. This has been such a fun conversation, and for everyone listening, if you're not following Monica, you need to because she is a wealth of knowledge when it comes to, like, the real life of organizing, most of our guests are, but with with you, Monica, you're, you know, since we're here together right now, you were a teacher and you were with a lot of like human beings, other human beings. So you get to see you got to see the human, interaction of, of how people get and stay organized long term, like other children to, like, children and other educators. And, like, you were just amongst a lot of people at once. And I think that, is a talent in itself when you can juggle all that. so I'm very happy and very excited that you are here today to talk through all this. If you're not gonna, if you're not following Monica, you definitely should. She also, like I said, she has wealth of knowledge about about this, but she also extends her knowledge into other parts of a real life, like real life and business life. So, I know you have lots of other of these tips that you share in your social media. So head on over there. Okay. So to finish off our conversation, we always ask our guest these questions. The first is if there is one thing you would like to, leave our listeners with, like, one tip, one thought, what would it be? Oh, I think it would be stickers. Like, get stickers. I don't you know, it's it's been hard for me to to write everything, but I like stickers. And so stickers make everything fun, whether you're a teacher for your students or a teacher for yourself. Yeah. I love that. Okay. So and then the second question is, what is your favorite magazine, whether digital or physical that you'd like to read for business or pleasure. And why? I really like real simple. I still get it. I don't read it as often as I should, but I just love the like, I love that it's bigger print. I think they actually changed the side of their magazine, but when it first came out, I love those bigger print. I love that it's got tips and tools for business folks, for teachers, love this got recipes in it. I love this got fashion in it. It just it, to me, it feels like me. Yeah. Agreed. Awesome. Okay. Well, where can people reach you? We talked about where they that you're out there in the social world. Let us know what are, some websites or sites or social media platforms where people can find you. I love Instagram. I'm my main account is Monica Montfrey, m o n i c a, m o n f r e. Yes. I taught high school literature. Yes. I have an illustrative name. even though I'm married, I still like to go by my alliterative name. same for my website, www.monicamonfrey.com. definitely check those out. Stay tuned. There's things that are always shifting and changing inside of my world. And Those are probably the two places that Instagram is probably where. Unless you're on Facebook, I like to be on Facebook too. Awesome. Alright. Well, thank you again for sharing your experience and all your insights with us, and everyone head on over and find Monica on the social webs. Thanks again, Monica. Thanks so much, Stephanie.