I’m writing this while sitting up in bed, trying to rest and relax 48 hours after a positive COVID test. Yes, I was vaccinated. Yes, I was boosted. Yes, I wore a mask while out in public most of the time. And no, I probably didn’t get it during the first day of school. Considering […]
COVID-19
Posted inAsk a Teacher
A Teacher Lost in the Dust
I am sitting in the back of the school bus. Waves rock my body as we navigate the red sandy-washed roads. I’ve been riding in traditional yellow buses just about my whole life as a student, teacher, and chaperone. This time is different. Traditional Navajo songs echo through the bus, intermittent with the news Dine’ […]
Posted inAdult Learning
The A-Z’s of this Burned-Out Teacher
By: Lori Foxwell: Through hard work and determination, I was able to fulfill my childhood dream of becoming a teacher. I have my master’s degree in education and have taught young children for over twenty years. I am a proud mom, wife, and lover of all thing’s cats. Most of all, I am lucky to […]
Posted inAsk a Teacher
On Feeling Flat: Teachers in 2021
Bridgette Gallagher is a high school English teacher in Saratoga Springs, NY where she has worked for the past 20 years teaching grades 9,11, and Creative Writing. In addition to being a teacher leader, she also serves as the Vice President of Secondary for the New York State English Council. We’re here. We love kids. […]
Posted inInstruction & Curriculum
How This Teacher Healed from Racial Trauma
Kim Lee is a physics teacher at Pinole Valley High School in West Contra Costa Unified School District. She has been teaching for the last four years. She is the teacher sponsor of the Anti-Racism Club and helps run the Peer Tutoring Program. She is committed to promoting diversity and equity through STEM education, as […]
Posted inInstruction & Curriculum
Why I Microwaved My Strawberries: An Analogy for this Entire School Year
Setting the Stage It’s Tuesday and I’ve just closed my classroom door so I can eat my lunch. I have pulled apart students in two separate fights already in the first part of the morning and I’ve heard rumors of others happening through the building. My first-period lesson didn’t happen because the technology wasn’t working. […]
Posted inInstruction & Curriculum
Teachers Didn’t Sign Up for This
It’s 11:49 pm on Tuesday night at my house. The kitchen is clean. The house is locked up. The kids are asleep, my dog is asleep, and for once, I can sit down and hear the sounds of nothing in my house. Yet, as I finally sit down in my recliner to try and grade […]
Posted inCOVID-19
A Year Later After I Resigned From Teaching in a Pandemic
I’m one of those people who liked the app called Timehop that shows pictures and statuses from social media from prior years. This morning, there was one of my little dogs, Emerson, before we had to put him down due to health complications. The image was of him sitting in my garden, tilting his little […]