choolRecently the United States Department of Education made a unique move regarding federal funds that had been awarded to the state of Ohio for expansion of charter schools. Here is part of the story. The summer of 2014 The Ohio State Board of Education began an investigation into the Horizon Science Academy High School in […]
From the Front Lines
Posted inCurrent Events in Education, Educational Apps, From the Front Lines, High School, Instructional Strategies, Literacy, Social Studies, Technology
E-Sub Plans for Educators
Writing sub plans is the task I dread most as a teacher. It is time-consuming and often the best-laid plans go awry. Substitutes misinterpret directions or students use that excuse to claim that they were led astray from a meaningful task. I have found a few digital applications that have changed the nature of the […]
Posted inCurrent Events in Education, Featured, Fine Arts, From the Front Lines, High School, Opinion, Social Justice
Why NYC Students Seeing 'Hamilton' Is a Big Deal
On October 27th, a joint collaboration of The Rockefeller Foundation, The Gilder Lehrman Foundation, producer Jeffrey Seller, creator (and star) Lin-Manuel Miranda, and New York City public schools announced that they will provide a means for more than 20,000 eleventh graders to not just watch Hamilton, the hottest, most ground-breaking musical in decades – but to actually go […]
Posted inCurrent Events in Education, Featured, From the Front Lines, High School, Literacy
Different Teachers, Different Pressures
There is a certain about of pressure that comes with being a high stakes teacher, okay, it is a ton of pressure. A high stakes teacher is a teacher whose class performance on a standardized test is directly tied to the School Performance Score. At a small school, this means there are only four or […]
Posted inCurrent Events in Education, From the Front Lines, Uncategorized
5 Ways to Flip the Parent-Teacher Conference Script
With a total of five hours to meet 20-something families, elementary school teachers in New York City have between 10 and 15 minutes for each conference. That doesn’t leave a lot of time to cover a child’s academic progress, social-emotional progress, areas for growth in these areas, and provide suggestions for supporting learning at home. […]
Posted inCurrent Events in Education, Featured, From the Front Lines
Rebels with a Clue: How Teenagers Give Respect to those that Earn it
By now most of us have seen the video(s) of Officer Ben Fields aggressively removing a student from a classroom at Spring Valley High School. Most likely, if you are like me, you’ve read 100 articles on the incident and perhaps even voiced your opinion through various social media outlets. As I read people’s responses […]
Posted inAsk a Teacher, From the Front Lines
My Mission to Create Successful Students
How can teachers create more success in the classroom? Teachers everywhere clamor for the answer to this question in the face of increasingly higher demands on state assessments. In interviews with various teachers, Nieto (2003) revealed that caring will change the behavior of students. Further, Kottler, Kottler, and Zehm (2005) note that the teachers who […]
Posted inCurrent Events in Education, From the Front Lines, Instruction & Curriculum, Opinion
When a Student Won’t Leave the Room
“Give me your phone now!” I demanded to the Lisette* as I attempted to quiet my noisy class after the first-period bell stopped ringing. Glaring at me over the rim of her glasses, Lisette* emphatically replied, “No”. Frustrated, I hit the buzzer to our discipline office. The other kids quieted down to witness the showdown- anything […]