During the summer, I work as a new teacher coach for TEACH Charlotte under the non-profit company The New Teacher Project. I love what I do. Just like students have the “aha” moment in a lesson, new teachers have the “aha” moment in the classroom while you’re coaching. It’s so rewarding to watch someone grow before…

One of my favorite past times is snuggling up on the couch and watching a feel-good movie. What is even more exciting is when a movie about education and/or an amazing teacher comes out and I can get re-inspired about my career choice. However, as numerous movies have been created and hit the big screen,…

I used to rack my brain for how I could reach my students better. There were times that I felt no matter what I did I wasn’t effective, or at least I thought. What I learned through much trial and error was that it had less to do with what I was doing and more…

I often get asked, “Gretchen, how do you do it all?” When I respond to this question, the person usually says “hmm…that makes sense.” Their response tells me that what I think is a logical solution or train of thought might not be as obvious to others as it was to me. Let me explain……

As a new teacher coach for TEACH Charlotte this summer, we often give feedback. My fellow coach and I felt like we continued to give the same feedback in the same area of lesson plans. This let us know that our expectations for what must be included in a lesson plan must be unclear to our…

It’s no secret that our nation is in need of quality teachers. We talk a lot about getting teachers, but rarely do we talk about keeping the ones we have. Out of the many years I have been mentoring and coaching new teachers, I always ask “why did you want to become a teacher?” The…

I had a double aha moment today…double! I’ve always said the best professional development for me as a teacher has come from Twitter (specifically Twitter chats). [See my previous posts on Twitter’s influence on teacher development here: Twitter Chat Firstie, Twitter Chat How-To, 5 Twitter Hashtags Worth Following .] I know you might think its…

I love blogging, but I realized I wasn’t able to help lots of teachers because their busy schedules meant less time to read a blog. Since we are constantly rushing to and from our many obligations, having a BLOG ON THE GO (aka a podcast) is a great way to continue to help more teachers.…

As a new teacher coach, I often forget to explain simple ideas because I assume adults know them already. This is often also true of a teacher making assumptions of students’ background knowledge. We realize in the moment that we made a horrible assumption and have to backtrack to fill in the knowledge gap. That…

I recently listened to a TEDx Youth Talk at Brooklyn Free School by Seth Godin called Stop Stealing Dreams. It was on the future of education & what we can do about it. I found it interesting for numerous reasons. But, quickly, let me share some insight Seth shared about “What is School For?” School used to…