This article originally appeared on Bluff City Education on September 30th, 2014 This past week the Tennessee Consortium on Research, Evaluation and Development at Vanderbilt released the results of their 2014 First to the Top Survey of Tennessee Public School Teachers. Notably, their survey data revealed declining support among teachers for the Common Core State […]
Posted inClassroom Management, Current Events in Education, Featured, High School, Middle School
High School Classroom Management 101: Building Relationships
Trust is the glue of life. It’s the most essential ingredient in effective communication. It’s the foundational principle that holds all relationships. Stephen Covey from The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People [fusion_builder_container hundred_percent=”yes” overflow=”visible”][fusion_builder_row][fusion_builder_column type=”1_1″ background_position=”left top” background_color=”” border_size=”” border_color=”” border_style=”solid” spacing=”yes” background_image=”” background_repeat=”no-repeat” padding=”” margin_top=”0px” margin_bottom=”0px” class=”” id=”” animation_type=”” animation_speed=”0.3″ animation_direction=”left” hide_on_mobile=”no” […]
Posted inClassroom Management, Current Events in Education, Featured, How to Fix Education, Uncategorized
CA politician discusses willful defiance, educational priorities
[fusion_builder_container hundred_percent=”yes” overflow=”visible”][fusion_builder_row][fusion_builder_column type=”1_1″ background_position=”left top” background_color=”” border_size=”” border_color=”” border_style=”solid” spacing=”yes” background_image=”” background_repeat=”no-repeat” padding=”” margin_top=”0px” margin_bottom=”0px” class=”” id=”” animation_type=”” animation_speed=”0.3″ animation_direction=”left” hide_on_mobile=”no” center_content=”no” min_height=”none”] Recently California Governor Jerry Brown signed in to law AB 420, which limits suspensions and expulsions due to willful defiance in K-12. Last week I had the opportunity to sit down […]
Posted inElementary School, Instruction & Curriculum, Instructional Strategies, Literacy, Science
The Beauty of Science and Art
This year our district has been focusing on integrating science with ELA. This is not a new idea, but one that has been a joy to implement. We spent three days over the summer looking at our standards, resources and designing lessons for students. Focusing on keeping science alive with inquiry and hands on exploration while adding a […]
Posted inCurrent Events in Education, High School, Instruction & Curriculum, Instructional Strategies, Literacy, Uncategorized
Teachers Observing Teachers – A Closer Look
“How can we ask ourselves to go observe other teachers in other buildings, when we don’t even observe the teachers in our own building?” This question was recently thrown out by me at a PLC meeting where we were discussing teacher actions that we can take as part of our goal for our Professional Learning Community. When the […]
Posted inUncategorized
Let Teachers Teach
Teaching is a profession. Like doctors and lawyers, teachers have specialized training and are licensed by the state in which they teach. Unlike doctors, lawyers, and architects, teachers are constantly told by non-experts how they should do their job. No one would tell a surgeon how to operate, or a lawyer how to defend a client […]
Posted inElementary School, Featured, Instruction & Curriculum, Mathematics
Getting Your Hands On Math: Multiplication
I watched my three year-old, Monkey, coloring with colored pencils this morning. He was testing out the white pencil even though it was on white paper. I knew what was going to happen and I had to resist the urge to tell him not to do it. But I bit my tongue and watched him […]
Posted inEducational Apps, Uncategorized
Teacher-Saving Web Tools, Part I: Differentiate reading news with Newsela and Readability
Reading skills are critical to teach our students – but it’s such a stressor to find relevant, newsworthy materials that ALSO hit a variety of reading levels and ALSO are free of all the advertisements, sidebars, and distractions. I’ve spent (wasted) so much time adapting articles myself and copy-and-pasting them into Word docs so that […]