Professional development is an interesting concept. When most of us hear it, undoubtedly our minds go straight to an all-day conference with a keynote speaker, breakout sessions, and a hopefully free lunch. Hastily grabbing the official paper on the way out the door so you can log these hours into your licensure system, and ensuring… Continue reading Redefining professional development
Tag: teaching
The Passion Project
This school year, much of my focus has been on student empowerment. My district has undergone some massive shifts, all centralized around the concept of personalized learning. It has been a powerful overhaul, and one that has involved a lot of time and effort from devoted teachers. A majority of us have taken huge steps… Continue reading The Passion Project
Being Human
Did you ever run into your teacher outside of school when you were a kid? It was weird, right? Like they had an actual life, outside of school, where they bought groceries and hung out with their friends and family. It was so hard to fathom then that my teachers were real, human people. As… Continue reading Being Human
Becoming a better writing teacher
These past couple years as a language arts teacher have been life changing. I have discovered my passion for teaching this subject area and am so glad I do. I love connecting with students over different books, discussing our reading preferences, and helping students discover the magic within writing. I speak to the beauties of… Continue reading Becoming a better writing teacher
Reading Motivation
English language arts teachers are faced with a myriad of challenging tasks, from critical literacy skills to grammatical understanding. A unique, yet equally difficult, undertaking involves motivating our students to read, which is complicated even further as students enter adolescence. By the middle grades, those students who have been consistently reluctant as readers often view… Continue reading Reading Motivation
#OneWord2019
The #OneWord2019 hashtag is something I first saw on Twitter right before the holiday. I know, I’m late to the game and living under a rock and all that. When I first saw it, it struck me as something interesting that I should probably do. I took a look at the hashtag, read a few… Continue reading #OneWord2019
They have a story
Empowering student voice Just this week we finished up one of my favorite units of the school year. The Library of Congress sponsors a national letter writing contest where students spend time considering books that have had a major influence on them, and then write to the authors of those very books.Even that stands to… Continue reading They have a story
Kids Need [uncensored] Books
I’ve been struggling with something recently. It’s been a recurring internal argument since I started to build my classroom library a few years ago. But, it’s been at the forefront more recently in the past month because this year I’ve made it my mission to build a reading community and read with my students. At… Continue reading Kids Need [uncensored] Books
On Compliance [Part 3: Assessment & Grading]
I’ve written about standards-based grading before (check it out here), so it’s no secret that I am supportive of this movement. In my recent reflection on the ways schools can promote compliance, it occurred to me that some of the traditional assessment and grading practices do just that. Our traditional grading systems tie an arbitrary… Continue reading On Compliance [Part 3: Assessment & Grading]
On Compliance [Part 2: Students Deserve Answers]
As teachers, reflecting on our why is commonplace. We often refer back to why we choose to spend our days surrounded by children, why we exhaust our resources and ourselves day in and day out, and why it is so worth it to help shape the educational experiences of our students. Lately, the push in… Continue reading On Compliance [Part 2: Students Deserve Answers]
