Whether you’re working to create more meaningful learning experiences, establish mastery of standards, or get your planning more organized, you’ll reach for this practical, ready-to-use resource again and again, writes teacher Amy Leach. A valuable companion on anyone’s teaching journey.
When teachers design classrooms around how students think and engage – not just what they’re expected to know – we unlock a learning environment where curiosity replaces compliance, and excitement replaces dread, writes middle grades educator and NBCT Kathleen Palmieri.
As Kasey Short enters her 20th year as a middle grades educator, she’s been thinking a lot about some lessons she’s learned that now help her build a strong foundation in the early weeks of each school year. See how her tips for beginning teachers match up with your own.
So much to do! As teachers in grades 4-6 enter their first classrooms, Kathleen Palmieri offers keys to getting started. She includes accessing mentors, keeping track of planning, Google tools, engaging students, finding sources for class libraries and décor, and self-care.
As new teachers and other educators in schools with many struggling readers search for equitable instructional approaches that will accelerate (not remediate) student learning, metacognition and reciprocal teaching strategies can help, write Sonya Murray and Gwendolyn Turner.
Stephanie Farley was a reluctant adventurer 30 years ago when she took a teaching job “until something better” came along. To her surprise, she discovered a career that has given her the gifts of meaning, mastery and connection – “a powerfully engaging, ever-evolving vocation.”
The decision to give students “extra credit” should be closely tied to a teacher’s reasons for grading, says teaching coach Barbara Blackburn. Do you grade to measure understanding, provide accountability or compare students? She includes a “redo” tool – her preferred option.
The Heart-Centered Teacher lives up to its promise of renewal, writes educator Sarah Cooper. Routman’s newest book “strives to be a mosaic of sorts: a combination of sometimes searing, sometimes poignant personal stories with on-the-ground insights from decades of experience.”
Like many teachers during last year’s “post-Covid” return to school, middle school veteran Sarah Cooper slipped into the fog and funk and wondered if the joy in teaching was gone for good. Here’s how she wrenched herself through the dark time and found her groove again.
Deciding when – and how much – to help our students can be difficult, writes new-teacher educator Curtis Chandler. It requires both a self-assessment of our own preconceptions and the ability to strike a delicate balance between high expectations and full support for all.
