As the school year begins, many of us are talking about how to build strong student to student partnerships in our classrooms. When students collaborate in effective partnerships, learning increases and a sense of belonging is nurtured. In this post, I want to share some partnership ideas.
Continue reading “Developing Strong Student to Student Partnerships”
Dr. Gholdy Muhammad’s book Cultivating Genius: An Equity Framework for Culturally and Historically Responsive Literacy offers many excellent ideas designed to learn about the identities of our students and plan for joyful learning experiences. In this post, I want to highlight some ideas, especially those experiences that are powerful to explore at the beginning of a new school year in order to create classrooms where students feel seen, heard, valued, and loved. When students feel belonging, they thrive and can engage in deep learning. In addition to Dr. Muhammad’s ideas, I will explore ideas I have used with students and that colleagues have shared with me.
“Knowing self prepares young people to live joyfully in the world…. Young people need to know themselves as well as others who may be different from them…. This knowledge teaches young people how to love and live with differences as they grow older.” ~Cultivating Genius
Continue reading “Understanding Students’ Identity: Starting the Year With a Student-Centered Focus”
Today my fifth article was published on Edutopia!
As a teacher and as an instructional coach, I’ve tried to improve my listening skills. It is such a gift when one feels deeply listened to and I strive to provide this for others. Deep listening continues to be a goal for me. I have always been intrigued by the power of telling stories. In classrooms making space for, and deeply listening to students’ stories, insight, and feedback is critical. In this blog I want to highlight some of the ideas in Chapter 4 of Street Data as they relate to listening. Continue reading “The Importance of Story and Deep Listening”
My fourth article was published last week!
Empowering Students by Cultivating Agency
Thank you to all of you who have taken time to read the article and provide feedback. If you want to comment on the article you can do so here on my personal blog… or find the article on Twitter (Twitter Link).
Over Spring Break, I flew to Edinburgh, Scotland to visit one of my sons, Jack, who is spending this semester at the University of Edinburgh. My sister, Colleen, joined me after flying in from her home in Oklahoma. Scotland exceeded my high expectations and traveling reminded me of some important life lessons. In this post, I want to share some of those lessons and how they connect to teaching.
In my previous post, I described several of my “go to” tools for planning and reflecting on coaching conversations. In this post, I want to share two of the language tools I use in partnership meetings. When I focus on language, I can ask more precise questions and model how intention to language is important when we work with students and colleagues. The more precise we are with language, the more impact our language can have!
As I engage in mid-year reflection on my goals as an instructional coach, I would like to share some of the tools I use to plan and engage in coaching meetings. I call these coaching meetings “partnership meetings” because both my colleague and I are learning together. It is my job, as a coach, to reflect on, and plan for the conversations. Intentional planning focuses on ensuring that conversations focus on my colleague’s goals and priorities, while centering students, especially our formerly marginalized students. In this post, and an upcoming part two, I want to summarize some useful coaching tools. Continue reading “Coaching Partnership Tools: Part I”