New Year's Resolution -Purpose

     
      I can't believe that a new year is about to begin. What happened to 2014???  I am not a fan of resolutions, mostly because I never seem to keep them. I love the idea from Primary Powers to use one word for my resolution. I picked PURPOSE because it sums up my teaching plan for the rest of the year.  I find that it is so easy to get distracted by all the things that teachers are supposed to do that I lose my purpose for doing things.  
       This became very evident to me right before break and I was busy teaching Native Americans and rushing through the Lakota tribe (with 4 -6 kids absent almost each day the week before break), and after having the ELL teacher taking 5 of my ELL kids to do an assignment and when she returned - she told me that they knew nothing about the tribe! They did not know the region they lived in, that they hunted buffalo or anything! This was after 3 days of teaching and doing activities about the Lakota Indians. I quickly realized that 1. I needed to reteach it and that I had not really had a purpose to my lessons.  I also realized that I did not use my WBT  5 part lesson plan which is amazing and so helpful to all my students. So, as I am doing a little planning for the new year, I am revising my lesson plans to have a purpose and I will be checking for understanding as I go and not waiting for several days to go by.  
   For me, purpose also means that as I make choices as to what to focus on as I am teaching, I need to know what my purpose is for the lesson and the unit - what do my students need to know? It means to start from the end and work backwards in my lesson planning - which I do most of the time but not always. I also know that I can't improve everything at once but I need to focus on one thing and decide if other things fit my purpose. 
   What is your one word resolution for the new year? How are you going to improve yourself in the new year?