Palo Alto High School English teacher David B. Cohen has done a favor for the teaching profession by writing Capturing the Spark: Inspired Teaching, Thriving Schools. The book pushes back again a tired and prosaic cynicism about the teaching profession that reflexively asserts that American education is in a sad and dilapidated state, soiled by […]
Posted inSocial Studies
Conference Review: National Council for Social Studies
The National Council for Social Studies had its 96th annual conference this past week in Washington, DC. Like the NEA’s Representative Assembly, the assembly is held in the nation’s capital during election years. It marked my first in attendance. Being from central Pennsylvania, I’m fortunate enough to be able to drive to the District of […]
Posted inInstruction & Curriculum
NCTE and ALAN Conference Highlights
I spent the weekend before Thanksgiving in Atlanta, Georgia at the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) and the Assembly on Literature for Adolescents of the NCTE (ALAN) conferences. As a first-timer, I didn’t know exactly what to expect. I have been to local and state-level teacher conferences before as well as national blogging […]
Posted inSchool Improvement
TEDTalk: Help for Kids the Education System Forgets
One of the best TED Talks I’ve seen in a while was by Victor Rios, a sociology professor at the University of California. The segment, titled “Help for kids the education system ignores” was poignant, direct, and necessary. His speech highlighted how some of our neediest students are falling through the cracks, and what our mandate – as […]
Posted inInstruction & Curriculum
On Modifications: Should All Students Climb the Mountain the Same Way?
As a former special education teacher, I remember hearing all of the time about how students needed to all do the same thing in the classroom because, at the end of the year, they would all take the same test. Despite the intellectual ability of the student, many teachers still argue that all students should […]
Posted inInstruction & Curriculum
What Do You Do With the Highly Advanced Reader?
As a teacher of gifted students, I’ve come to expect the unexpected. Most students demonstrate asynchronous development. Others are bright but underachieving. Still, other students are not truly gifted, but are bright “teacher pleasers,” with the sort of behaviors that make teachers lives easier. What I did not expect was to find three students in […]
Posted inCurrent Events in Education
Retire Right: 10 Steps to Turning Off the Classroom Lights for Good
I remember the first week I was hired quite well. There was so much going on – I had a curriculum to write, seating charts to generate, copies to make, people to meet, programs to learn, and decorations to hang. The to-do list truly was endless. Thankfully, one of the veteran teachers came into my […]
Posted inTeacher Leaders
Back in School: Pre-Game
The anxiety dreams have begun. I have several, but here’s the basic plot of my most frequent night-terror: Some how it went unnoticed that I didn’t have enough credits to graduate from high school (in 1985) . . . a fact that was missed by my undergraduate college and the four subsequent graduate institutions which […]