Blogs on California

In my last entry, I described a favorite experience from my short teaching career: the opportunity to use free and freely available science manipulatives and materials to enable hands-on discovery in the classroom. It reminded me of one of the most remarkable learning environments I have ever had the pleasure to spend time in.

While walking through my neighborhood recently, I noticed several large, colorful cardboard boxes in the back of a pickup truck parked in a driveway. Upon closer inspection, I recognized their labels: Each read "FOSS," the acronym for the Full Option Science System, a science curriculum developed about twenty years ago by staff at the Lawrence Hall of Science, a museum and learning center at the University of California at Berkeley.

Recently, a nationally recognized expert in classroom management visited the campuses of Envision Schools to help coach our teachers. Though he had plenty of advice about how we can make our learning environments more structured so student learning is accelerated, he was also effusive about the sense of respect he witnessed between students, between students and teachers, and between adults in the schools.

This is a guest posting from my colleague, Kyle Hartung, who has worked in small schools for ten years as a classroom teacher and instructional leader in New York City and the San Francisco Bay Area. As part of the Leadership and Instructional Team at Envision Schools, he coaches and facilitates professional development among school leaders and teachers.