When a caring teacher and child connect, we see how a significant adult can add greatly to the quality of how and what a child learns. Teaching fundamentally is caring about the adults children today will become in the future. Continue reading
Teach For Enduring and Expansive Learning Not Coverage. Know the Difference.
Coverage teaching is like the proverbial river that is a mile wide and an inch deep – it emphasizes breadth without depth. In my naivety as a young educator I believed that if something was worth teaching it was worth learning well and that meant deeper teaching and learning. Conversely, why waste time and energy on teaching things we did not plan for children to learn well? I still believe this. Continue reading
In an over-informationed world we are under-literate.
Is being literate critical to adult life? Given how much information adults are exposed to every day, can we expect adults with varying levels of literacy skills to effectively consider and understand the constant barrage of information? The answer is “no,” yet our world ultimately spins on the voices and decisions of under-literate adults. Continue reading
Teach Up to Cause Children to Meet Higher Expectations
The conversation about the actions needed to move achievement upward and the commitment to those actions is what bridges the distance between having high expectations and achieving high expectations. Continue reading
Rigor and Productive Struggle – “Kind of Hard” Causes Leaning
Children don’t learn from teaching that is too easy or too hard. Lesson design must find the “just right” spot where rigor and difficulty with appropriate teacher motivation engage children in new learning. Lesson design is not easy! Continue reading