What is this “real world” you speak of? Who defines it? Is it the same “real world” for everyone? I was recently in conversation with colleagues about class attendance. Now, full disclosure, I do not have an attendance policy. I know my class is not the only thing going on in the lives of my …
Yell and sit…sit and yell, get a little louder, be a little firmer…they’ll eventually listen-right? Wrong. I walked into a room recently where an educator was sitting on a bench demanding that the kids stop! She kept saying “I said stop, stop!…(a little louder) Stop it NOW!…(even louder) I said STOP STOP STOP!” Her face …
A little about me in the month before my first year begins To be perfectly honest, I’m nervous about my first year of teaching. I’ve spent the summer reviewing learning theory and teaching strategies, reading radical books about equity and power dynamics in the classroom, building an elaborate teacher emergency kit filled with everything from …
I posted a picture on our social media of a tweet from the 2006 MN Teacher of the Year Dr. Lee-Ann Stephens that read: Advice to a new elementary school teacher: never, every withhold recess from your students for any reason. They need the activity and you need them to have the activity. It shouldn’t …
Recently, after working with teachers on shifting our approach from punishing to teaching, a teacher in attendance emailed me saying, “At first, I wasn’t sure I was going to “buy in to it.”But the more I thought about it, the more compelled I felt.” Such a powerful statement and one I’ve thought about since. Let’s …
I am a big fan of mistake making. Well, not the making of the mistakes part so much but of the learning from mistakes, expecting mistakes, embracing mistakes. What if we flip the narrative on failure and, since we know mistakes happen, we anticipate them and respond to them with enthusiasm? Okay, stick with me …
As a teacher I want action. As a teacher I want to be able to tell my students that they are safe at school. I also want to tell my students they are safe at home. I want my students to BE SAFE. As a teacher I want this to be understood-gun violence is an …
In teacher education programs, we have a responsibility to prepare future teachers for the civic profession of education. For me, this means registering students to vote in my classes, advocating for political activism, and encouraging them to see themselves as agents of political change (and to act accordingly!). Teaching is political. I’m following the walk …
Scrolling through social media, as I often mindlessly do, I am repeatedly reminded of the powerful educators with whom I am in community. It is not my community. It is a community in which I am a learning, growing, contributing member. These educators inspire me, motivate me, encourage me, and remind me of the change …
There are many facets to the current debate over gun control, but a lot of focus has fallen on two extremes. One extreme is a call to ban all guns. On the opposite side, there is a call for teachers to be armed. As a teacher, I find the idea of arming teachers to be …
