The paradoxical truth about teaching is that you can be an excellent teacher to all students only by being an excellent teacher to one student at a time.
Category: Planning
Workshop Routines for Littles, Middles, and More (Part I)
In my first semester beat, I’m exploring the life-saving power of routines–but not just any routines. I’m talking about routines that make life easier, more efficient, and more familiar–even in the most daunting of times (cough, 2020, cough). I’m talking about routines that allow students to thrive whether you are teaching in person, virtually, hybrid, […]
Preventing ELLs’ Failure in Writing Workshop
“One of the burdens of privilege is the outsider’s perspective.”
Lesson Plans: a New Look at Data and Agency
In my first semester beat, I’m exploring the life-saving power of routines–but not just any routines. I’m talking about routines that make life easier, more efficient, and more familiar–even in the most daunting of times (cough, 2020, cough). I’m talking about routines that allow students to thrive whether you are teaching in person, virtually, hybrid, […]
Well, What are You Waiting For?: An End of Year Rant
Trigger Warning: this post opens with a possibly offensive rant. If you feel the need to skip said rant, I have inserted a subheading to indicate where it is safe to begin reading. When I first started this beat about starting over and about being more intentional with which practices we keep and which ones […]
Mapping Our Writing Identities
I’ve decided that structuring professional learning that supports teachers with strategies they can take back to the classroom just isn’t enough. I need to also build teachers’ own efficacy and identity as a writer.
Just Like Starting Over: “Sparking Joy”
Last Spring, my wife found out she’d been accepted to a PHd. program across the country. As we prepared to move, my mother-in-law introduced us to the work of “Tidying Consultant” and Netflix star, Marie Kondo. I am certainly no expert, having only read the pages of her book on how to best fold clothes […]
Moving Writers’ Top Ten: The PD Wars and Why We Must Fight Them
As is our habit, we are taking the summer away from the blog to read, write, and recharge. We’ll be back in late August with new content, but for the summer, let’s take a journey down memory lane as we visit our ten most-read posts from the previous school year! I finished reading the outstanding […]
Genius Hour + Writing Workshop: Finding, Developing, and Pitching Ideas
For the next few weeks, I am going to share about how my experiment with Genius Hour intersects writing workshop — and how giving kids choice and freedom to access their passion helps you do it all! If you need to get caught up, I gave an introduction and overview in my first post in […]
A Cute Argument Against Obtuse Argument
I promise the title is the last of the math-related humor in this piece. I’ve already profiled the big Narrative Journalism unit my PLC does every year, but I had an interesting experience today that made me think that maybe one element of that writing project is worth revisiting in a bit more detail. […]
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