The Toilet Paper

Hello, all!  Welcome to my blog.  Something that I have implemented this year as the new math coach is something called the Toilet Paper.  I got this idea from a blog I stumbled upon Mattson’s Musings.  She talks about the idea of “micro-PD” and how she had all these ideas floating around that she wanted to share, but couldn’t think of the best way to get them to her teachers.  I could completely understand where she was coming from!  So I took her idea and ran with it!

On a daily basis, I spend a lot of time reading short articles I find either from newsletters I subscribe to or twitter or what not.  I wasn’t sure where to start!  So I picked an article I had just read that was relevant to a hot topic everyone was already talking about that week – differentiation.  I started by making a flyer style page with a little bit of information I wanted to share from the article.  I chose to only put the part of the article about differentiation.  I used a fabulous website Piktochart (if you haven’t checked it out, you should!).  Here was the first issue of “The Toilet Paper.”

It had sort of mixed reviews.  Morale was low at the point I put them up and so a few teachers thought it was administration making them do something else.  But I put up an issue in a plastic sheet protector in every teacher bathroom in an easy spot to see while you are “doing your business.” Other teachers thought it was wonderful and started talking about some of the ideas mentioned.

I don’t have a consistent schedule of when I replace them yet, but I try to do a new one about every week and a half.  So far I have done 8 issues with varying topics.  I have found that sometimes images are more powerful and sometimes people like the words.  So I keep mixing it up.  They are getting better as I do them, I think.  The format is looking better, too.

I still to this day keep getting people telling me how much they are enjoying them.  I figure if someone reads it and learns something from it, it’s serving the purpose.  Others who don’t like it don’t have to read it.  It’s a good way to reach a wide variety of people because all the adults in the building use these bathrooms including substitutes, paraprofessionals, special education teachers, related arts teachers, and general education teachers.  You definitely have a “captive” audience!