As you relax into summer break, keep an eye on what’s up with STEM learning. Expert Anne Jolly shares resources for keeping up with STEM news and lesson ideas as you reflect on what worked (and didn’t) last year and consider how to amp things up for next fall’s students.
What a difference a year makes! Rita Platt reflects on takeaways from her first year as a principal with observations that may buoy other new and aspiring school leaders: avoid your office, encourage laughter, recognize that all staffers play essential roles, and much more.
In his latest book, Super Spellers Starter Sets, Mark Weakland provides a classroom resource to support the principles he presented in 2017’s Super Spellers – that spelling should not simply be a list of words to know for a test but a learned skill essential to literacy.
Authors Barbara Blackburn and Abbigail Armstrong give teachers a practical yet powerful classroom instructional tool for bringing rigor to Grades 6-12 math and science classrooms. Science educator Jennifer Sexton shares favorite strategies that will improve her practice.
Remember Ralphie’s theme in A Christmas Story? Today’s ELA educators would love to see that kind of writing commitment, says Jeremy Hyler. Instead he’s seeing a lack of writing endurance in his 6th and 7th graders. Here’s some of what Hyler does to improve their stamina.
Close Reading the Media / Visual Literacy
by Frank Baker · Published 05/15/2019 · Last modified 11/25/2019
It’s not a simple matter to separate photojournalism from visual propaganda intended to sway emotions and opinions. Drawing in part on iconic images from Dorothea Lange’s career, expert Frank Baker explores the question and shares SEL and media literacy lesson resources.
Book Reviews / Social & Emotional Learning
by MiddleWeb · Published 05/09/2019 · Last modified 01/17/2020
Building People is like a panel discussion on the current state of social emotional learning with 12 authors looking at where SEL is, its future, and ways to use SEL to help kids succeed. Teacher leader Laura Von Staden finds the book a useful if one-sided resource.
Future of History / Teaching Insights
by Sarah Cooper · Published 05/08/2019 · Last modified 11/21/2019
Returning from the 2018 NCSS conference, Sarah Cooper reignites her US history unit on reformers to deepen student understanding about historical, current and future activism. Learn more about the 10 Changemaker Questions she used to create a sense of action in her classes.
The final bell of the year will soon ring, but teachers still have the opportunity to provide students with encouragement, tools, and an expectation to play, explore, and discover the world outside school. Curtis Chandler’s post overflows with STEM resources to do just that.
In response to kids just being mean or in instances of downright bullying, teaching children to be calmly assertive can help. Rita Platt shares strategies that students can use to stand up for themselves and others – learning the difference between tattling and reporting.
