Continuing to write when the rest of the world felt like it’s on fire helped me to feel a little more like me. It helped me to keep some normalcy. And it helped me to reflect on what it means to be a teacher writer these days.
Category: Professional Development
Unpolished Professional Learning: 3 Things That Are More Important Than Perfection
I’m finding that meaningful, unpolished support still looks awfully familiar to some of the same things I valued back when the world was normal.
No Small Thing: Squashing Impostor Syndrome and Publishing
Writing for an audience isn’t about having it all figured out. It’s about engaging in a community of thinkers and learning from the process.
Writing IS Professional Learning
When I started blogging for Moving Writers, I wrote mostly about my practice in the classroom. Since my role has shifted away from the classroom and toward supporting teachers, I spend a lot more time working on my own practice for adult learning. So most of what I blog about lately is about professional learning […]
Workshop + Don’t Drop: Resources from #NCTE19
One of my greatest NCTE joys have been the times members of the Moving Writers team have gotten to join forces at NCTE. I love these people — their deeply-felt philosophies about teaching writing to make a difference in children’s learning and lives, their practical, boots-on-the-ground, why-didn’t-I-think-of-that brilliance. Here are some of the resources from […]
Directing Thinking Traffic: A Protocol for Professional Learning
Whether I’m facilitating professional learning around mentor texts, grammar in context, or book clubs, something that has been especially impactful is sharing in classroom observations together. Whether we’re watching videos of ourselves, others, or we’re stepping into classrooms in real time, observations give us a chance to see the work in action, to breathe life […]
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.
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 […]
Navigating Vulnerability Part 3: The Coach and Consultant Balance
This semester, I’ve been writing a series of posts about the role of vulnerability in coaching. The idea is, if we’re not aware of the underlying vulnerabilities in our conversations and our practice, we’re not going to be able to grow. So far, I’ve written about two different vulnerabilities that I’ve recognized in teachers and […]
Navigating Vulnerability Part 2: De-Centering the Teacher
When we take on coaching or other leadership roles, we aren’t going to get anywhere with those we’re leading unless we recognize the vulnerabilities they’re facing. Last month, I started a mini-series of posts on this idea. Each post in the series will tackle a different vulnerability by exploring: How to recognize the vulnerability in […]
