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.
Class Apps / Teaching during Pandemic
by Curtis Chandler · Published 09/29/2020 · Last modified 01/31/2024
With the stressors of COVID-19 teaching likely to be around for some time to come, educator Curtis Chandler suggests ways he and others can use research-based strategies to reduce teaching stress, hold pandemic angst at bay and bolster our capacity to serve kids well.
With all of her math students learning online at least some of the time, Michelle Russell has struggled to “get it right.” Her six lessons learned so far include: Don’t assume they know technology basics. Mix firmness with compassion. Grow their self-sufficiency. Yours?
Teacher collaboration became a lifeline, not a luxury, when Covid-19 interrupted traditional school schedules and forced us to gain new skills and more effective teaching practices. Tan Huynh and Andrea Honigsfeld celebrate the positives of the new normal for ELs and all kids.
The Caring Teacher asks educators to reexamine how and why they teach the way they do, to record reflections, questions and thoughts toward the goal of reducing bias and increasing student success. Linda Biondi believes every moment spent in reflection will be worth it.
