7 Ways to Make Teaching a More Sustainable Profession
This article offers school leaders general advice on how to create a supportive culture to nurture teachers. The author offers suggestions based on observations of factors that contribute to teacher burnout. School leaders of any grade levels will get inspiration from advice on creating belonging and trust, as well as modeling vulnerability and valuing wellness.… Read More ›
Competency-Based Transformation in Northern Cass School District Series
The three pieces in this series, look at the transformation of Northern Cass School District, a rural district in North Dakota, to a competency education model. The Evolution of Competency-Based Transformation in Northern Cass outlines how the district gained support and prepared to begin the transformation Framing Habits of Work and Capstone Skills in Northern… Read More ›
Better PD through Design Thinking
This article describes Martin County School District’s innovative professional development series, CampTEACH (Technology Empowering Academic Change), which helps teachers more effectively leverage technology to foster learning. During two-day workshops teacher teams redesign a specific lesson plan using a design thinking approach to empathize, define, ideate, prototype, and test their ideas. This engaging type of learner-centered… Read More ›
Involving Families: A Relationship-Centered Approach
This article describes the efforts to more fully include Latino parents at a school in Boulder Valley School District. While the featured school is an elementary school, the ideas in this article can be applied when working with families with students of any age. School leaders, community outreach specialists/parent coordinators, and teachers will all get… Read More ›
Ready for Take Off: Youth Action Researchers at the Intersection (YARI)
At the YARI Kick-Off Event last week, we welcomed into the Student-Centered Learning Research Collaborative family ten youth researchers who are “twice exceptional” — they possess both a learning difference and face marginalization connected to race, language, sexuality, and/or income. KnowledgeWorks is leading the project with our partners from the Center for Youth and Community… Read More ›
Bringing a Culturally Responsive Lens to Math Class
This article describes how a 7th-grade math teacher created a 3-week unit project to connect math to a real-world issue identified by students. The author outlines a simple 4 step process any math teacher could use to design a similar unit to build student engagement, including tips to ensure all students can demonstrate mastery through… Read More ›
In Support of the Black Lives Matter at School “Week of Action,” Feb. 3-7
The Black Lives Matter at School “Week of Action” is February 3-7. Among the goals of the project are these: End “zero tolerance” discipline and implement restorative justice Mandate Black history and ethnic studies in K-12 curriculum Hire more Black teachers Fund counselors, not cops When we began our work at Students at the Center… Read More ›
4 Questions to Ask About Multimedia Content
This short article provides advice on selecting the best multimedia resources. To ensure they will lead to deeper learning experiences, teachers can select multimedia resources with their end goals for the activity or project in mind. Building on interactions with hundreds of educators, the author suggests 4 probing questions teachers of any subject can use… Read More ›
Tapping Students’ Interests to Develop Literary Analysis Skills
This article introduces a strategy for increasing student voice in English Language Arts (ELA) classes. A veteran teacher shares how passion blogging on topics of their choice helped students develop key analytical skills such as argument design, and use of evidence. This exercise provided scaffolding before moving on to analysis of complex literary texts, while… Read More ›
6 Strategies to Support the Development of Self-Directed Learners
This article explores several strategies to help students build the skills needed to be self-directed learners. The author, an experienced teacher, explores the importance of helping students develop skills in 3 categories: executive functioning, metacognition, and social-emotional learning. Teachers in any subject can try out the concrete classroom activities suggested here. Source Organization: Education Reimagined… Read More ›
Advancing Equity by Building Development Relationships
This story looks at the importance of building developmental relationships in which adults and youth share power, especially for students from traditionally underserved communities. Developmental relationships are are purposeful relationships built on trust, designed to help young people: Discover who they are Cultivate the abilities needed for them to shape their own lives Learn how… Read More ›
Teaching Students to Think About Thinking
The articles in this issue of ASCDExpress explore metacognition, the ability to understand ones own mental processes and to monitor and influence them. The authors provide both general suggestions for promoting metacognitive awareness and regulation, as well as specific ideas tailored to particular subject areas. Read as a whole this collection of articles offers many… Read More ›