Developmentally, seven and eight-year-olds are known to race through activities. Unsurprisingly, early in the school year, I noticed students rushed through their work in all academic areas and were quick to move on. I also noticed that while...
It’s that time of the day again: All BLOCK, when small groups of students rotate to do differentiated work with me while the rest work independently to complete five All BLOCK activities. To myself I...
As an English Language Development teacher, I want to empower students to understand how English works. In service of this goal, my students and I embarked on a year-long prefix-based vocabulary study to increase their Tier...
It was a cycle I had been through before; choose focal students and watch them slip like water through my fingers. In a school district that has become predominantly White in recent years, I felt it...
An Uncertain Return Summer readings for professional development always appear exciting at first — there is so much hope and promise for change and innovation in that nascent stage of planning. And throughout our extended year of distance...
When the 2021-2022 school year began, there seemed a palpable sense of cautious optimism that the new school year would remain challenging yet it would be “better” and more “normal” than the previous one disrupted by a global...
I opened my email one afternoon to find another message from an Instructional Assistant (IA) that read: “Jake* did a lousy work on Q3 book review. (l got a headache!!!!) He left...
At the beginning of another unprecedented year, the 2021-22 school year, for educators riddled with extreme changes and new guidance, it is a daunting task to lead capable and dedicated educators as an Expanded Learning Program Manager for...
Leadership seems to be constantly thrust upon me, often by others seeing something in me that I didn’t quite see in myself. As I progressed through my teaching career I would avoid leadership roles because I didn’t believe...
Building rapport with students was an experience I was looking forward to as a first year teacher. It was also completely unprecedented and not what I had expected. As we eased into the virtual school year, I had...
