Inconsistent Quality of Teaching & How to Overcome It

The inconsistent quality of teaching among staff members is emerging as an obstacle in teacher leadership. The Common Core set out to ensure every classroom, regardless of state of residence, taught the same content at the same level. Now many states have replaced Common Core with their own state specific requirements for teaching. This means…

344: Stepping Out of the Comfort Zone with Robert Barnett

Often times teachers want to do what is comfortable for them, but what if the best way to help your students was to step out of your comfort zone and teach differently? Listen in as Robert Barnett tells his story about how he shifted his teaching style and stepped out of the norm for his…

Effective Ice Breaker Activities for Professional Development

Beginning professional development with an effective ice breaker activity is a popular opening activity. This helps warm up the audience to the learning experience as well as get to know each other better. An ice breaker tends to be unrelated to topic being presented at the learning session and is a common interest or skill…

4 Ways to Strengthen School Safety for all Students

School safety has become top priority for schools as of late due to the many tragedies our country has endured recently. This has caused many school districts to review their safety procedures so that all students are protected while learning at school. This post will cover 4 ways to strengthen school safety for all students.…

339: The Instructional Coaching Partnership

Coaching can be seen differently depending on your school and district, but it doesn’t have to be negative. By working side by side, the coach and the teacher can turn into a successful partnership where growth happens all around. Listen in as Gretchen explains different steps, tips, and tricks to make an instructional coaching partnership…

The Art of Teaching Adults (not Kids)

Teaching adults is different than teaching kids. Even though both are engaging in the process of learning, how they learn (and need to learn) are different. To ensure a successful and enjoyable experience, knowing how to teach each subgroup is important. In education, adults have to continue learning through professional development [PD] to keep their…

Ditch Learning Overwhelm with Right Size PD

Right size PD (professional development) refers to shortening the dose of learning for teachers. Often times, they need to spend more time in their classroom prepping for lessons and analyzing data to better support students. As a result, long learning sessions tend to be hard to schedule and ill received. It turns out that micro…

Infuse Joy into PD with Buzzword Bingo

Professional development [PD] can be a bore for teachers so infusing joy with Buzzword Bingo will keep them asking for more. Since educators have to attend a certain amount of learning hours to keep their licenses active, PD can not be avoided. However, PD can be enhanced and upgraded so that it is not only…

Inspire Students through Adhesive Wall Art

Adhesive wall art is a simple way to inspire students while learning in the classroom. Students spend at least six hours a day on average for 36 weeks learning in a classroom. Not everything students learn is from what their teachers say or do, but from the environment the teachers create. This can be in…

4 Ways to Improve Student Engagement

Student engagement in the classroom has a powerful ripple effect. When students are engaged at deep levels it means they have more opportunities to transfer, digest, and store knowledge. Student learning outcomes increase as well as their confidence to tackle challenging academics. This post will cover 4 aspects of student engagement to consider when designing…