Blogs on Teacher Leadership

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Get support and guidance from change makers who are organizing and implementing real improvements to our educational system.

Bill SmootJuly 20, 2011

Bill Smoot teaches English at the Castilleja School in Palo Alto, California. He is the author of Conversations with Great Teachers.

 

Two roads have diverged in our national debate about education. Should we educate students for the 21st-century job market (with an emphasis on STEM -- science, technology, engineering, and math), or does a broad liberal arts education, preparing students for all of life -- work included -- still make sense?

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Rebecca AlberJuly 19, 2011

Learning progresses primarily from prior knowledge, and only secondarily from the materials we present to students, studies show. Think about that. We teachers spend so much time gathering materials -- important and necessary for good instruction -- but are we often enough using the greatest tools right there at our fingertips? All of those young minds, ready to go!

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Andrew MarcinekJuly 15, 2011

There is a growing buzz in the education community about the possibility of moving away from traditional textbooks. While the objective seems clear as to why we should be making this move, the question of how to transition this great shift remains. Educators creating their own digital resource for the classroom possesses great value, but at this point there are still more questions than answers. A group of Massachusetts educators got together and tried to answer some of the lingering questions.

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Ben JohnsonJuly 14, 2011

Our students don't always learn what we want them to learn, but they always learn something. Other than the curriculum, they may learn how to fight the system, or how to get the teacher mad, or how to avoid responsibility, or how to talk to friends without being noticed by the teacher. Working with the teacher or against the teacher, either way, learning takes place.

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Elena AguilarJuly 12, 2011

I am writing this post from the mountains of northern Thailand, ten days into a four-week adventure with my seven-year-old son and husband. This is the first serious travel we've done with our son -- the first time in a country where we don't speak the language, don't have family, and don't understand many of the customs. Pre-child, I was a traveler.

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Bob LenzJuly 5, 2011

The end of the school year presents us with an opportunity for reflection at Envision Schools. We take a final measure of students' progress throughout the school year, celebrate the many Envision graduates that will be heading off to college in the fall, and consider how we can incorporate those lessons into improving our own work to best enable, encourage, and ensure student learning.

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Patrick DolanJune 30, 2011

Patrick Dolan has been a labor consultant for 35 years and is also the president of Dolan Group. Today, June 30, the National Education Association (NEA) is meeting in Chicago to engage in an open discussion of the policy statement presented in this post. They are scheduled to vote on it sometime between July 1 and July 3 at the convention.

 

It hasn't been an exactly pleasant year for the public sector unions, especially those representing public school teachers.  In Ohio, Florida, and (perhaps you've heard) Wisconsin, the attacks have been far from subtle.  But summer is in the air, so maybe it was time for Dennis Van Roekel, the president of the NEA, to take a risk and cannonball right into the deep end of his organization's policy.

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Mary Beth HertzJune 25, 2011

If you're like most teachers, you look forward to the summer when you can reflect on the past year and begin compiling ideas and resources for next year. One question to ask yourself is how will you compile all of the links, articles and ideas so that they are easily accessible to both you and your students.

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Gaetan PappalardoJune 23, 2011

Writers write. They never say they're "going to write." They write here, there, and everywhere. Professional writers usually stick to a schedule. But most writers write when they can, when life doesn't get in the way. Some write on napkins at the local diner or on a receipt using the steering wheel as a desk.

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Anne OBrienJune 17, 2011

Few would disagree with the notion that low-income children face enormous challenges outside the traditional school system in achieving academic success. Research has confirmed the role of everything from health to summer learning opportunities, along with school-based factors including teacher and principal quality, in student achievement.

But tough budgets mean tough choices when it comes to serving children, and many communities are focusing the little money they have on in-school factors related to student performance, at the expense of the other components we know to be crucial to student success.

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