Four years into teaching, I noticed an apathy among my students that was difficult to break. They were bored, cared very little about their work, and gave minimal effort. I wanted more for my students. I wanted them to be excited to be at school and to learn. I started researching how to get students … More Find Your Niche
As a young teacher, I would see my students struggle to make any academic achievements and then make excuses for why they didn’t make adequate growth. I liked to blame it on students’ lack of attention and work ethic, student medical diagnoses (504’s and IEPs), family life, stupid school policies, and many other nonsensical reasons. … More Stop Making Excuses!
The other day, our school had a field day consisting of morning activities and a movie in the afternoon. Students were sent home with permission slips so they could watch the movie. For students to participate in watching the movie, they needed to bring back their permission slips signed by their parents. A handful of … More Consistency and Consequences!
“Students are showing poor academic progress! (Whatever that means). “Students are behind!” “Students are not showing good academic achievement!” These are things that I hear all the time in education. What I find even more disturbing is how teachers and school districts propose they fix poor student achievement. I have heard it said that focusing … More Stop Fixing Academics With Academics
Reading, language arts, and math are the focus in lower and upper elementary grades. This doesn’t mean history and science are not taught but are not considered core subject matter. State and national assessments focus on the three core subjects. Science starts being assessed in fifth grade and then again every two years. Schools put … More The Key To Academic Success
We tell our students that failure is a step in learning, but how often do we explain to them the value of failure, or more importantly, the importance of making mistakes? We train our students to get problems right, rather than to learn from their mistakes. We give students assignments and mark off what is … More Mistakes Are A Necessity
There seems to be this attitude in America that education starts in the classroom at school with the start of preschool or kindergarten. I cannot express how inaccurate and devastating this belief is to children’s academic and emotional growth. Education starts the moment children enter into the world. That means that education starts at home … More Dear Parents, Education Starts With You!
The morning meeting was about to start, and everyone was involved in some kind of small talk. The administrator walked to the front of the room to get the group’s attention. As he called for everyone’s attention, some people kept on talking. As the noise started to subside, you could still hear side conversations happening … More Be The Example
“Five percent of the people think; ten percent of the people think they think; and the other eighty-five percent would rather die than think” (Thomas Edison). We live in a world where technology has taken over the mind of man. Thinking is no longer something we do, but rather something we avoid. We would rather … More ChatGPT Will Bankrupt Education
I walked into my Assistant Principal’s office the other day and waited patiently for her to finish her phone call before speaking with her. While I waited, I noticed the middle schooler sitting at a desk in the corner spending time for lunch detention. She was pounding away on her desk while the Assistant Principal … More You Don’t Know Me!
Welcome To The Classroom 