After learning virtually for some weeks, many of Michelle Russell’s math students got in the habit of writing down little or no evidence of how they reached their conclusions. Which got her thinking. “What does it really mean when you tell students to show their work?”
When we find time in our busy school day to introduce a current event text, like a magazine cover, we’re actually helping students understand how images are used to communicate and even manipulate. Frank Baker shares a resource-rich pandemic media literacy lesson.
Focusing on the elements of the epic hero, this activity from author and 2019 PA TOY Marilyn Pryle helps students learn about literary elements while reflecting on their own lives, goals, and obstacles as they consider the hero’s backstory, good qualities, flaw, and quest.
For those with positive stories, social-emotional learning helps reinforce the skills they need to succeed. For those with stories of trauma, SEL can help balance negative experiences with positive ones. Author-educator Marilee Sprenger shows how brain research can help.
Positive phone calls and texts to students’ families are powerful, writes principal and NBCT Rita Platt. Parents and caregivers enjoy hearing good things and will be more responsive when you get in touch with less happy news. Rita includes several starter scripts and scheduling ideas.
Kids need the opportunity to make choices about what they learn and how they learn it, writes Alex Valencic. This doesn’t mean education becomes a free-for-all. It’s a call to action for us to know our students and help spark a love of learning that will last a lifetime.
Media Literacy is a new elective course at Jeremy Hyler’s middle school this year, and he’s excited to be teaching it. “Could there be a more urgent time?” Hyler shares some of his 7th grade course design, includes his key resources, and reports on the first five weeks.
With the topsy-turvy world of the Covid pandemic crowding all of us this fall, we have to be mindful of how teachers new to the classroom are experiencing their unique first year. Assistant Principal DeAnna Miller shares some ways she is working to provide extra support.
Gilmore and Deos’s Integrating Technology targets teachers in its early chapters and IT leaders later on in its broad messaging. The authors present a useful theoretical model, says reviewer Jeny Randall, short on “how to” examples but long on vision for the future.
It's Not Easy Being Tween / Pandemic Teaching
by Cheryl Mizerny · Published 09/30/2020 · Last modified 10/01/2020
Millions of teachers are facing multiple professional and health challenges. Cheryl Mizerny reflects on the existential threat of Covid-19, the pedagogic and personal demands of sustaining hybrid classrooms, and how administrators, parents, and society can reduce the stress.
