By far the most creative thing I did this year was the final exam I created for my leadership class–a cross between a virtual scavenger hunt/escape room and a test. I had done a lot of research into digital puzzles and creating escape rooms while helping a colleague earlier in the year, and although I […]
Yesterday evening I found myself in the pool, playing inner-tube-tossing games with my 11-year-old daughter. I didn’t want to go swimming. After one-week back at school, and one more to go before the students arrive, I have a multi-page to-do list that grows each time I talk to someone (including myself). As she modeled and […]
As we continue to shift to blended/distance learning, many of us have discovered how easy it is to take the worksheets we created in Word (designed for the copy machine) and upload them into Google Docs to assign them digitally to our students. That’s the easy part. What’s not so easy is the review/grading. Students […]
Whether we’re going back to school in person or virtually or some combination of the two, I think we can all agree that our job from the start is two-fold: not only do we need to teach our content, but we need to teach our students to use the technology. A few years ago, I […]
Regardless of where we are located, it’s looking like we should be prepared for some form of distance learning at some point next year. Last spring, one of the most frustrating aspects of my remote teaching experience was the constant barrage of emails and texts from students and parents asking how to log in to […]
Students in my district are still scheduled to start school in person on August 17–at least those students who don’t, or can’t, choose one of the e-learning options. As teachers, we need to plan to accommodate 25 to 30 kids in our classes because we have no idea how many kids will show up. It […]
Relationships will be more important than ever this school year. Last spring, we were sent home for the fourth quarter in my district–like teachers and students across the world, we tried our best to teach and learn from home. It was not a success, but it wasn’t a failure either. The main reason we didn’t […]
We need to help our students dig deeper into the text. We want them to understand–to make connections, to be able to explain what they’ve read, to use this knowledge after they’ve left our classrooms.
Every morning I get up a few hours before anyone else in my house. I use this quiet time to read, think, write, and drink coffee–it’s my time. It’s also a lonely time. Sometimes solitude is good, but other times I wish there was someone with whom to share the a-ha moments. Hence, I keep […]
