April 20th, 2011
How may I serve you? This question is not being asked by educators, political reformers or parents. Yet, it is an integral question inside the arena of classroom culture and one worth pondering. With the ongoing heated debates over school reforms mimicking the likes of school bullying, cafeteria fights, and classroom brawls, those very blockages in school we are trying to eliminate, we must collaborate and stop competing. People are relational beings and we must nurture this aspect of human nature because early life for all of us begins inside classrooms. The question: “How may I serve you?” engages the mind and heart and opens up neural pathways inside the brain that are reflective while emitting positive emotion, instead of emotionally ignited reactive or impulsive responses. Continue reading →
April 13th, 2011
The cold and flu season can’t be finished soon enough for me. My family and I have caught every passing virus this season; I feel as if I live in the House of Plague. Hand sanitizer, tissues, and hot tea have been at an arm’s length for three months and I’m waiting impatiently for sun screen, beach towels, and iced tea to replace them.
As a teacher, you know that even if your fever is 101.3 degrees, the first bell still rings at 7:50. It’s not enough to call the school district’s substitute caller at dawn to request a teaching substitute. You have to have a lesson plan ready to go, too. When I taught, I’d craft my lesson plan the minute I left a message with our sub caller. I’d email everything to our high school secretary and, if I could, send any photocopies right to our English department’s printer for the sub to pick up on the way to my class. Continue reading →
April 11th, 2011
Brain-based teaching and learning is a necessity to effective teaching and learning. Over the past 25 years, research has exploded with studies that demonstrate the power of teaching to the unique needs, intelligences, strengths, and aptitudes of all students. Brain based teaching intersects, is integrated and is a compatible foundational component for differentiated instruction, assessment, behavior management and an intricate aspect of a holistic education.
When we meet the child or adolescent where they understand “how” they process, retain, and retrieve information, we are creating a successful platform for deeper learning and an extravagant mastery of knowledge. Author and educator Martha Kaufeldt said that neuroscience research may be in its infancy or specific to unique situations, but the new knowledge can provide teachers with insight into the behaviors, learning abilities, skill acquisition, and more importantly the emotional and social development of students. The research is confirming what great teachers know intuitively: Continue reading →
April 7th, 2011
When students enter the classroom, it’s the teacher who is in control. The teacher selects the learning objective, the teacher chooses the materials, and the teacher develops learning activities to match the objectives.
Students sit in rows, fill out worksheets, and take standardized tests. Or they resist and at best become disengaged, or at worst cause others to become disengaged.
Continue reading →
April 6th, 2011
As educators, we know all too well how prevalent Facebook has become in the lives of today’s students. While almost all students use Facebook, many have a love/hate relationship with it. They like staying constantly connected with their friends – and their friends of friends – but they also know how much time they waste on it. They might not be willing to admit it, but students actually want to get away from Facebook in order to study. At StudyBlue, we learned this lesson firsthand. Continue reading →
March 31st, 2011
If I were to ask where happy cows come from, would you answer “California” like my teenaged son and my husband both did? When I inquired about how they know that, their reply was, “from the commercial.” If you watch television at all, you’ve probably seen that advertisement. It’s rather engaging, actually, because the cows are conversing and truly seem content. Since I was raised on a dairy farm in America’s Dairyland, I wonder if Calif. has data to back up that claim. I think that our Wis. cows are happy, too. My brother, who still lives on the family farm, actually hired a cow psychologist some years back to advise him on ways to make the cows more comfortable. Happier cows, they figured, would produce more milk. I laughed, really, to think that such a job even existed and again, I have to ask for data. How can someone really support the claim that cows prefer to lie down on a slightly-elevated incline anyway? Continue reading →
March 23rd, 2011
The bus is late because the bitter cold kept the engine from turning over right away this morning. When the bus finally arrives, an irate parent complains to the driver than her child had to wait outside five minutes longer than usual.
A student is suspended for breaking a window, and his parent decides to take out his frustration on the principal’s secretary when she answers his phone call. Continue reading →
March 21st, 2011
I ran the first school newspaper that I advised on no budget. I begged for a cast-off computer and hoarded copy paper to run the issues. When my some of my students qualified for the state journalism writing competition, we were all really excited. However, we didn’t have money for a bus. Or a hotel. Or the entry fee. I managed to wrangle the hotel and entry fee, but transportation for my kids to the state capitol was the sticking point. Busses are expensive, especially busses for just four kids and an advisor. My car was to small and I was too young to rent a vehicle in our state. I thought that I would have to tell the students they couldn’t go to the competition. Continue reading →
March 16th, 2011
Teaching has given me a skill that I’ve found other people who haven’t been in the classroom don’t have: I can give bad news to good people. I can even give bad news to people I’m not fond of. Of course, I can deliver good news, too, but no one is very impressed with that skill.
Let me give you an example. I had a student newspaper editor who was slacking off his responsibilities. Alex was a basketball player, an actor in the one-act play, and AWOL in the school newspaper staffroom. When other editors tried to talk to him about his section and the edits, he would lose himself in a crowd, tell them that he’d be in the newspaper room later, or claim to have an urgent need to meet with his math teacher. Continue reading →
March 14th, 2011
The teachers at our middle school, much like those at other schools nationwide, are being introduced to the Common Core Standards in English Language Arts, Mathematics, and Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, and Technical Subjects. The paradigm shift envisioned in regard to these documents seems enormous, and if schools and districts only pay lip service to introducing these and then send teachers to figure out the logistics on their own, the results will likely be haphazard at best. While daunting, most educators will find, once they begin to unpack/unwrap the standards, that their fears and concerns are misguided and that they are already implementing many of the recommended strategies. By concentrating on the primary facets of the initial Common Core roll-out, we can alleviate our teachers’ fears and insure the transition goes as smoothly as possible. Continue reading →
