The unknown

I did some setup in my classroom today and while I feel more confident and clear-headed than I did a year ago, there is still an overwhelming feeling of not knowing what I should do.  I mean, I can make a very accurate to-do list, but there are so many decisions that I just don't know the right answer to.  Desks in clusters or rows?  Or a U shape?  Or something else I haven't even dreamed of yet?  Baskets to collect homework near the door, or near my desk, or maybe I shouldn't collect the homework at all, except last year giving homework points without collecting papers became so time-consuming.

I think this is the real problem: last year I did some things, and some of them (most of them?) didn't work as well as I wanted them to.  But I'm a different person this time around, figuratively speaking, and my students will literally be different people, and so it's possible that those things would work this time if I give them another try, or if I make minor tweaks.  It's hard to know what to do.

I do know that I have a few major things I want to change this year:

• Fix the tardiness issue.  Give detention to anyone not in the room when the bell rings.  No excuses.  This was a HUGE problem for me last year and I'm hoping that being strict early in the year will help.
• Call or text parents more often, and for more positive reasons.  I said I'd call every kid's parent to introduce myself when the year started last year, but it didn't happen.  This year I have a lot more kids but I do really want to do it.
• Have kids clean up the room BEFORE class ends.  This has a direct relationship to my ability to wrap up class activities in a timely fashion (which actually partly goes back to the homework issue at the start of class).  I wanted to be better about this even before I got my revised schedule, which has me teaching 4 periods in a row.  There is literally no time for me to clean up a trashed room or reorganize supplies before the next class comes in, which is how I got through last year.
• Get kids to actually listen to each other and have meaningful class discussions.  This is part of why I might want a U-shaped desk arrangement.  Also I made a poster of "Discussion Sentence Starters" and I plan to ask kids what they think about each other's comments rather than saying right or wrong myself after I call on someone.  Oh, and I want to do cold calling (my #1 takeaway from Teach Like a Champion
  ) to try to keep kids engaged and paying attention in whole-class discussion.

I am dying of impatience to meet my new students.  That's the biggest unknown right now.  Only 6 days away, eek!