Guest posts by expert educators
Technology in our classrooms isn’t the enemy, writes Dr. Sonya Murray-Darden. Substitution is. Teachers can’t control how seductive the tools become. They can control whether the thinking still happens in the room. When students do the thinking themselves, learning accelerates.
Thanks to an extensive career as a teacher, principal and district leader, Jen Schwanke can testify that the vast majority of middle school educators feel deeply connected to the unique journey of adolescent learners. She believes MS principals should be drawn from that pool.
Move to learn! Prevent those mid-class energy slumps with movement and active learning strategies. Master teacher Kelly Owens describes 10 engaging, low-prep activities she uses to re-energize every student – from the quiet to the restless – to be their best all class long.
When math tutors create space to connect, speak and reflect, students not only gain confidence in their math skills, they strengthen their empathy and resilience and leave their sessions feeling capable, supported, and truly seen as learners, says tutoring expert Halley Bowman.
Understanding how sentences work is a reading skill, not just a writing skill, researchers tell us. When students understand how sentences are built, they read better. So, argues Patty McGee, grammar instruction is in fact reading instruction, and we should treat it that way.
Teaching math through inquiry can be excellent. It’s a goal to aspire to. But for many struggling students, jumping straight into pure inquiry without any explicit instruction first can be paralyzing. Juliana Tapper’s Math Wars model helps teachers find the happy (gray) medium.
Productive struggle is part of classroom instruction, building a structured task into the flow of learning so that students can apply what they know in new and novel ways, writes consultant and author Barbara Blackburn, who explores myths, student dispositions and more.
A “snail mail” pen pal project may seem outmoded for middle schoolers, with their brains wired for the instant gratification of texting and social media. And yet, as Scott Bonito discovered, having a mystery pen pal can make eyes light up and adolescent brains go into overdrive.
In “Prepared Classroom” Gail Boushey and Allison Behne illustrate why a well-planned classroom is a powerful tool for teachers to foster positive environments and support student learning. Stacy Haynes-Moore appreciated the detailed descriptions of routines and procedures.
Teacher fatigue at the end of the year is real and well earned, writes middle grades veteran Megan Kelly. “Still, you and your students have spent a significant amount of time together and it merits celebration.” Kelly shares three favorite “final days” activities at her school.
