Almost everyone I know hated 2016. It was the year that equally ticked off the populace. When the New Year’s Ball dropped, America collectively sighed with relief; we were ready for a new beginning. Resolutions in hand, January 1st arrived… and not a damn thing is changing. Sure, the New Year’s placebo effect hasn’t completely […]
effective teachers
Posted inInstruction & Curriculum
Are You a LUCKY Teacher? Take This Quick Quiz to Find Out
My students and co-workers probably get tired of hearing me say it year after year. But I mean every word of it: I am the luckiest teacher I know. Most days there is nowhere in the world where I would rather be than in my classroom with my students, teaching a subject that I revere, on […]
Posted inOpinion
Tracking is a Dirty Word
To track or not to track? Is that a question? Have I already lost you? Tracking has been a dirty word for decades. Mostly for good reason. But. Leveled classes might have a place. We all know that “tracking” happens when we offer advanced courses and co-taught sections. The limitations of scheduling mean groups of […]
Posted inTeacher Burnout
Teaching is Really all About Love
It took me years to embrace this truth: teaching really is all about love. To all those cynics who immediately say there is more to it: yes, of course, the skills of a teacher extend beyond the heart. But nothing matters without love. Why is this so hard to accept? Even those of us who […]
Posted inFrom the Front Lines
The Hardest Parts Of Teaching
These are the hard parts of teaching: Waking up from a nightmare where you’re out of breath and can’t find your classroom and are teaching in a foreign language to a group of kids who could care less about being there and you wonder, when you wake up, how that part of your fears will […]
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 inFeatured
15 Things My Toddler Taught Me This Year
A few weeks after my son was born in November 2015, I began waxing nostalgic. I had spent a lifetime and a career working with and teaching other people’s children – and now it was time for me to teach him. Or so I thought. Within a couple of weeks, I had picked up the […]
Posted inTeacher Leaders
Have You Hugged a First Year Teacher Today?
Surviving the First Year It was just weeks into my first year of teaching. I knew at age 22 that teaching would be the hardest undertaking of my life, but I didn’t realize how hard that would actually be. Now I was on my lunch break, and sitting in the small teacher’s lounge with my head hanging […]