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Backward Design: The Right Kind of Work
Someone saw me outside of school, shortly after leading a dozen of our school faculty in developing a content-based unit of study. “You look exhausted.” I nodded in agreement, even though the most...
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(Re)Defining Student Engagement
“The best evidence for student engagement is what students are saying and doing as a consequence of what the teacher does, or has done, or has planned.” – Charlotte Danielson This past week I conducted...
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School Leaders as Readers: Education for Outcome
The following passage is my most recent post I shared in our Goodreads community, School Leaders as Readers. This fall we are reading Mindfulness by Ellen Langer. If you are a school leader, I...
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The Promise and Perils of Technology in Education
Technology in schools is a neutral resource. It does not harm or help student learning when put into classrooms. Only when technology is employed by the teacher to serve as part of the learning...
View ArticleWhat Did You Do Today?
Every day for the past two weeks since starting my new coaching position my husband has asked me this question. Only knowing me as a classroom teacher for the past seventeen years, I think he is...
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Growing Teacher Leaders
As the new school year begins, I am entering my third year as an instructional coach. This year I will serve K-2 teachers at two elementary sites within our district. This is a new coaching model that...
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Teaching Literacy During the Holidays
It’s that time of year…the red and green butcher paper rolls are shrinking, the Grinch makes a school visit, and concerts have replaced athletics as the main evening events. The holidays offer...
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Literacy Instruction: Experiences Instead of Stuff
Photo by Marius Ott on Unsplash Our family tradition during Christmas, an idea we borrowed from somewhere else, is to have a “want”, “need”, “wear”, and “read” gift for each child. The idea is to...
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Preparing to Teach in the Middle
Photo by Tim Wright on Unsplash When I was a 5th- and 6th-grade classroom teacher, my lesson plans primarily consisted of the following: the learning objective and how I would assess student learning....
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A Simple Lesson Structure for Fostering Student Engagement #engaginglitminds
Beginning dialogic engagement in the classroom simply requires getting children invested in an issue they can relate to and on which they have different perspectives and helping them engage each...
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