Teaching is Intellectual

Recent Collaborations

Easy Read resource to help all k-12 students understand school shooting events, engage with their feelings, and create change

YouTube screenshot

CIDDL Research and Practice Brief 10 – Preparing teachers to address ableism through social media

The Envelope – Thought Provocations – Jordyn, Jen, Carol

Identity Talk 4 Educators LIVE – Fighting Ableism in our K-12 schools (Dr. Jen Newton & Dr. Mira Cole Williams)

Teachers in the Tiny Chairs – Inclusion with Dr. Jen Newton

Professional Development

Professional Development

Looking for professional development that doesn’t suck? Teaching is Intellectual will develop presentations for your needs!

Newsletter

Instagram

teachingisintellectual

Black Lives Matter
Anti-ableism🤍Anti-racism
Ungrading 🖤 Teacher Educators
PhDs

I teach college students at a PWI who want to be e

I teach college students at a PWI who want to be educators. The beginning of the semester always reminds me that no matter how we measure school success, every single one of us is carrying harm for our educational experience with us. It may be hurtful memories of clip charts, calls home, threats, sitting alone at lunch for talking during class, losing recess, that one specific teacher whose grading schema you could never decode. It may be traumatic - being physically held down and restrained by teachers, being secluded in a room alone, being sent to the office repeatedly, suspensions, detentions, fights, failures. We all have it - no one I have ever met does not immediately recall a painful school experience that sticks with them and shapes how they think about school.

It's so common and typical, that we expect it. Someone expresses a memory or experience and we can immediately match with one of our own. The systems, the carceral policies, the inherent racism and ableism, the emphasis on punishment and compliance, it harms all of us.

So what do we do about it?

We have to build something better. And we can. We can create spaces that are affirming and safe and value all the ways in which developing, growing humans show up each day AND the ways teachers as humans show up each day. We can build community. We can build belonging.

We can let go of absolute compliance, of carceral systems of punishment and shame and exclusion. We can divest from SROs and invest in community, in kids, in teachers, in affirmation, in belonging.

We can.

Imagine it and then (image ID) ask yourself . . .

what if school was safe and affirming?
what if all kids felt seen and valued?
what if schools were accepting and supportive?
what if all school experiences were positive?

Load More… Follow on Instagram

Click Here to Follow