How Can I help?

By Mrs. Office LadyOn In For Today1 Comment on How Can I help?

I worked at an all boys Catholic high school in the Bronx during 9/11. I worked at a high school in Connecticut during Sandy Hook. During the course of these past two decades, I have been in schools during lock downs, medical emergencies, and scary weather events.

What can I do to help? Stay calm. Model for children that we are safe, that the powers that be have our best interests at mind, and the best we can do to help is to be ready.

Ready to listen. Ready to take action when called upon, whether it’s answering emails, answering phones, making copies, wiping down an office. Just be ready.

We can’t be ready if we are monitoring the television or internet for information we probably already have. We can’t be ready if we are repeating the latest sound-byte from a media outlet. We can’t be ready if we are so consumed by fear that we are paralyzed.

Time to put aside our personal fears and let our children, and the children we work for know that there is no reason to fear. Make yourself available and optimistic, whether at home or in the office. Let’s look to the future and seize this time as an opportunity to reflect.

Reflect on how we can do things better. Reflect on some new skills we can practice. Reflect on how we can boost the morale of those struggling around us.

Stay healthy, stay hopeful, and stay strong.

Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally – or tricks from my childhood

By Mrs. Office LadyOn In More tips!

We all learned tricks when we were younger to help us remember information. Think about learning to spell words with NO phonological rationale – so we learned “F-R-I-E-N-D” is the correct spelling because it is a “friend to the end”.

While some tricks do not have much relevance in our adult life – I am proud to say that I have mastered tying my shoes, so ” Over, under, around and through, Meet Mr. Bunny Rabbit, pull and through” is no longer a guiding light for me; there are others that still are a part of my world:

  • The action is affect, the end result is effect. Affect is usually a verb, effect is usually a noun; “The effect of absences could be falling below grade level.” or “To affect a student’s performance, snacks are provided throughout the testing.”
  • “I before E except after C” – I know that auto-correct will automatically correct it, but this comes in handy when you have somebody looking over your shoulder as you are typing 
  • “The Principal is your PAL (princiPAL)” – same usage as above
  • Ctrl, ALT + Del to open task manager – when the computer is freezing and all I’m getting is a message that the program or site is not responding, I use this to open Task Manager and close the program that way and move on with my life!
  • “Righty tighty, lefty loosey” – when I need to screw an item into place such as replacing light bulbs, fixing that teeny, tiny screw to re-attach the arm on my eyeglasses, etc.
  • “Thirty days hath September, April, June, and November” – I never really use this – I open a calendar app somewhere – but if there is ever a question in a trivia quiz……
  • HOMES – the Great Lakes: Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie and Superior (mostly used when doing crosswords)

5 ways to foster teamwork at school:

By Mrs. Office LadyOn In Inspirational Quotes, More tips!
  1. Open communication –  let teachers know what you are doing and why. Yes, the mailboxes were moved, but it was because that space was needed for the new copier.
  2. Offer to help in the way that you can be of help. Teachers understand that you cannot cover their lunch duty, but maybe you can send a quick email to a colleague for them.
  3. Positive attitude – if you give the impression that you are  overworked or stressed, chances are teachers will not approach you to join the dodgeball team. 
  4. Adaptability – although you may have a better idea on how the task can be accomplished, be willing to go along with the other ideas. There are a million ways to accomplish most things; the best way is the way that makes the most sense for you. So, if it’s not your project – go with the flow and trust the person knows what they want.
  5. Whenever possible, remind everyone that every school employee is there for one reason and one reason alone – the student!