Welcome to the Elementary STEM Coach Podcast. I’m your host Naomi Meredith, a former classroom teacher turned K-5 STEM teacher and coach. With over a decade of experience teaching and a master’s degree in STEM leadership, I’m here to coach you throughout the year to help you gain back more time to create innovative experiences for your students.

Are you planning on having a long-term sub soon in your elementary STEM space? I recently completed a long-term subbing for four months in K-5 STEM and have a lot of insight as to what you should and shouldn’t do while you are prepping to be away. Thank you so much for being here. It feels so good to be back.

I took a bit of a spring break from the podcast after subbing to refocus and recharge. I had quite a few trips also during this time and maybe you did too, so it was good to take a little break, but also it feels really good to be back. I am currently at one of my friends’ house right now watching her dogs and if you hear any crying, they’re not used to having a podcast being recorded and I have one dog in the lap and one in the other room because they’re being silly little girls, so if you hear dogs crying, that’s why.

Like I said in the intro, I long-term sub for one of my friends who teaches K-5 STEM from mid-October to mid-February. Basically every month had a major holiday, so that was a lot of fun and it was actually really cool. I was really surprised that how much I really enjoyed the school and the students during this time and enjoyed it so much.

I actually started two of my STEM after school clubs at their school, so that’s really cool being back every week where I get to see a lot of the kids and a ton of the kids will come and pop in to say hi. Everyone at the school is super, super kind and helpful. Even the times I come in for my club every week, everyone is just so great, so I was really lucky taking this on and helping a friend out and I had a really great experience, so I think my insight is going to help you out a ton if this is something you’re preparing for, whether you just know you’re going to be gone for a while or maybe this is something that you think is going to happen soon for you.

So here are my tips and tricks for prepping for a long-term sub. A lot of this might even sound like back to school-ish, and in a way it is. This could even be helpful if you have a student teacher because this is going to help you think through some things that you kind of automatically already do as a teacher, but you really need to spell it out for somebody else.

So first of all is setting up those basic systems behind the scenes, and if you’ve been listening for a while, I am all about the systems and routines, and with everything that I do, whether it’s creating stuff, but especially in the classroom, those systems are gold, and there are certain things that probably still need to happen when you are gone. So feel free to invite your sub to come in and watch. If this is a planned, you know you’re going to be gone at a certain, about at a certain time, have them come in and watch.

I was friends with the person that I subbed for, so it all worked out. We taught in the same district, but, and I had popped into her school here and there, but depending on who you have or if you kind of know, inviting them to come and watch is going to be really helpful. Also, you know during back to school when you get all of that paperwork, and it’s your school schedule, and a map of the school, and who to call, instead of stuffing those in a drawer, this is what I would do.

I actually put them in a binder and use this as my reference tool when needed, but this is also my sub binder. Also included in there, I just had all of my schedules, even for early release days, and also for delayed starts, all in this binder, and then I also wrote out like a basic daily outline that was generic, along with like the basic classroom rules, and those systems and routines. So, not only is this actually really helpful for when you have a long-term sub, but also any other day you have a sub as well.

This next resource was really helpful for me when I was long-term subbing, is having class lists with pictures. Now, this also probably depends on what attendance system that you have, but I would hope for you that this is an option. I used this a ton when I was getting to know the kids, and here and there, there actually were some mistakes, which was pretty crazy.

I actually wrote on these class lists sometimes. I would write down their nicknames, so if you can do that ahead of time, it’s helpful, but not necessary. I figured it out, and then I tried my best to keep them updated when students were leaving, and coming, and going.

This is me as the sub, so again, try if you can print this out. That’s really, really helpful. If not, things change.

Your teammates could probably do it, too. Also, depending on what your school allows or doesn’t allow, adding in any of those need-to-know notes about specific students, whether it is a certain plan they’re on, or something that the teacher needs to keep in mind. Also, double-check on your school what you can and can’t leave for a sub in this instance, but I started writing down a couple things as needed, just so I could remember, or things would kind of change when I talked to classroom teachers when they dropped their students off, too.

Also, in this finder or that list that you make, make sure to include any before and after school duties that you may have. I had actually hit my duties. She typically had afternoons, but because I was starting my after-school STEM club business and running to do clubs after subbing, I actually had to switch to morning duty every day, and that was quite the adventure.

Having car loop duty every day for about four months in the coldest months in Colorado, and I think this is payback for me never having morning duties my entire career teaching. I have a funny video that I’ll post in the show notes. It’s an ode to Mr. Rogers and all of the gear I had to wear every day to stay warm out there for 20-plus minutes, and greet children in the morning.

So, if I didn’t have enough coffee, I was definitely wide awake after doing that. All right. Next, when it comes to that preparation, is thinking about behavior management.

If you possibly have a behavior system, if you don’t, maybe start one. Teach this to your sub, and I hope it’s not anything overcomplicated. If you need an idea or you just don’t have anything at all, check out episode 179, and I have a behavior management system that I actually use when I pop in and sub.

However, you can use it in a regular classroom. You don’t have to be a sub to use what I’m mentioning in this video. If you can, have your long-term sub still implement the behavior management system that you already have in place, because this is definitely going to help with consistency in two ways.

Not only are the kids going to know what to expect when they have the sub, that transition is going to be really easy, but when you come back, they already are used to having those things in place, and they’re not relearning a whole lot. Of course, there’s little things here and there I probably do different than that teacher, but she had some things in place that I just continued to keep up, and they’re still doing once she’s been back. Depending on who you have subbing, this is also a good question or chat to have with your sub beforehand, is talking about behavior management.

Some of your long-term subs might not have ever taught in a specials class before, meaning they haven’t taught multiple classes a day. Maybe they’ve only been a classroom teacher in their career, so I highly recommend having that conversation. Maybe it’s a little bit awkward.

Maybe it’s just something they never even thought of. That is a huge, huge thing. Behavior management in general with teaching, but especially as a sub, the kids do act different, and they were trying to get away with things with me, and I let it be known.

I taught this as a class. This is what I did. I was the STEM teacher in my school not long ago, so I had to build up those relationships and that clout really, really fast so that we could have a good and successful time together, and it was.

It was really good, and finally, I’m sure you’re thinking about this probably first besides those other things I mentioned are the lesson plans. What am I going to do when I am gone for this long? I know that I am in a unique position where I was a unique long-term STEM sub where this is what I taught. Like I said, I still teach it in my community.

I’m still very active in elementary STEM, just not necessarily in my own school building all day, so there wasn’t a whole lot that teacher I subbed for that she had to prep really. However, this isn’t always the case, and so this question I asked her is what do you want to teach before and after you leave? This was a really good conversation to have, and you can still do this with who you have subbing because they actually might have some experience, and that’s probably why you’re picking them if you have a choice of things that maybe they could teach that when you are gone. Really, I was so lucky because my teacher, I really made sure for her to not stress, I have this covered.

This really helped know the things that she really wanted to do, and then I would just fill in the holes as we went. If this is really stressful, consider meeting monthly leading up to when you’re gone so then you guys can map out some things together, but here’s what we were thinking. There was actually a weird situation where I’m not going to even get into it.

However, if for some reason I wasn’t able to sub, what we were going to have a sub teach was do things with Hour of Code, the Lego education kits, because those are really plug and play. If you are new to STEM, anyone can teach those, and then do some STEM and stories, so that’s what we were thinking of. I did still implement a little bit of Hour of Code, but really what I ended up doing is I taught a lot of thematic lessons for my K-2, which a lot of them can be found in my monthly bundle.

It’s a huge bundle of things that apply to each month. I didn’t do as much as my project-based science lessons that I did when I taught K-5 STEM just because the background of the kids that I had were a bit different, and that was something I had to lead up to, so doing those monthly thematic lessons was really a lot of fun. Those were fun to teach because I hadn’t taught those in a while, and with my third through fifth graders, for a big chunk of the time, I used the Dash robots, and I did portions of the Wonder League robotics competition, and then there actually were specific things I had to teach per the teacher’s request towards the end, which I was made aware ahead of time.

So that’s what I mostly did, and so even if you break up your plans like that where you’re going to have the teacher teach the same thing for K-2, the same thing for 3-5 if possible, then that’s going to help cut down on the lesson planning. Overall, my best advice is for whatever reason why you need to be away from some time. I know it can be really, really stressful, but it will definitely be okay.

I was not the perfect sub. There’s probably things I did that probably annoyed the teacher I was subbing for, and maybe there’s a couple things I didn’t do correctly. However, I really wanted to make sure that she was relaxing using that time that she had off.

I really tried to not text her very much in terms of subbing. It was my goal as the sub because knowing being on the other side, I guess you could say in quotation marks, I know that it’s hard to find subs, and I wanted to do a good job for her and handle it on my own. I would problem solve, ask around on the building because I didn’t want her thinking about school, so it was like my way of giving back knowing how many great subs that I’ve had.

It was actually really cool being on that side, and I have popped in and subbed for her here and there, so that’s pretty fun to see the kids. Like I said, I do subs, but there’s been days she’s been gone, so I have been welcomed back. Are you hoping to get a long-term sub soon in your STEM space? What other questions do you have for me since I was in that position, and I do that daily subbing here and there? What do you want to know? Feel free to send me a DM on Instagram at Naomi Meredith underscore, or if you’re watching or listening on YouTube, make sure to add it in the comments.

Thanks so much for hanging out with me, and excited for more episodes to come. Thank you so much for listening to today’s episode of the Elementary STEM Coach Podcast. I would love to connect with you over on Instagram at Naomi Meredith underscore, or send me an email to elementarystemcoachpodcast at gmail.com. Also, make sure to check out my website, NaomiMeredith.com, to see all the show notes from today’s episode and shop my K-5 STEM resources.

Any questions you have, needs for resources, or ideas for episodes, get in touch. I’ll talk to you soon.