In social studies we want students to visualize the relationships between historical events and be able to think chronologically. Megan Kelly has 6th graders begin with personal timelines. Other teaching tools include videos, a history card game, memes and manipulatives.
As you work with your students on grammar instruction, Sean Ruday recommends emphasizing that grammatical concepts are key parts of writer’s craft toolkit. An understanding of the precise purpose of each tool will help them become thoughtful and artful communicators.
Writing workshop can be an exciting part of the day for students in the middle, writes author and workshop expert Lynne Dorfman. Even when middle level schedules aren’t a great fit for extended workshop writing, teachers can nurture “writerly” attitudes with daily quickwrites.
It took the pandemic to convince Lauren Brown to finally check out Edpuzzle as a teaching tool. She’s quickly become a fan. Whether you are teaching live, online or in a hybrid model, Edpuzzle can be a helpful way to engage students in video content that you select or create.
If you are looking for a book that provides a realistic yet hopeful view of what it means to be an educator and a researcher by way of viewing yourself as a Scholar-Practitioner, then this book fits the bill, writes teacher educator/researcher Megan Reister.
For any educator interested in offering student choice but unsure of how to begin, Laurie Westphal’s Differentiating Instruction With Menus approach offers a strategy that will ease fears about loss of control and assure quality work, writes teacher Erin Corrigan-Smith.
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.
STEM kids need to ratchet up their know-how about the real-world problem of plastics pollution and work together on sensible solutions. As they tackle this impending global crisis, they’ll grow problem-solving competencies for a lifetime, writes STEM educator Anne Jolly.
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.
April Wells tackles inequity in gifted education by sharing the story of an urban district that redesigned its gifted programs and took aggressive steps to remedy the lack of racial, economic and language diversity. Teacher educator Sarah Pennington finds the book timely.
