This past week an episode from the Innovator’s Mindset podcast came out that I was privileged to be a part of. The interview was from the very beginning of Illinois’ Stay at Home order that resulted in our school buildings shutting down and switching to remote learning. Listening to it has been a wonderful reflection tool
Click Here for the Audio Version of this Post Like the rest of the world, education has been deeply impacted by COVID-19. From the ways that we build classroom community to instructional practice itself, we are reinventing, experimenting, and remixing almost everything we do. Even the most technologically savvy of us weren’t prepared for the
Ever been to a data review meeting like this? Data is projected for everyone to see. You group students into those who are exceeding, meeting, and not meeting the target expectation. Everyone gives reasons for why students have reached varied levels of proficiency. In the last 5-10 minutes, you come up with some ideas for
So I used to think that there was some magical formula or a needed in-depth plan to building capacity and strengths of others as a leader, but the longer I am a principal (I know a whopping 6 months) the more I realize this isn’t necessarily true. This week my reading specialist came to me
Teach with Fidelity. If you want to get me riled up, tell me I need to do anything with this as the standard. I remember when I first started teaching almost 20 years ago, I was told by a colleague that the first year we implemented a new curriculum we had to, “teach it with
I’ve been reflecting this week a lot about some conversations I’ve had recently with staff about parent communication. In Elmhurst, we have something called, “Acceleration Block.” It is a time when we group students based on a specific learning standard or need and plan learning experiences to accelerate their growth in that area. In previous
Jeffery E. Frieden, an educator, and blogger I greatly admire put out this tweet in February: I have to admit the first time I read it I thought to myself, what on earth would cause an administrator to not support the efforts of a staff member to create meaningful change for students?? Since I began
Last year, I read this post by John Spencer about the importance of being in a “Mastermind Group” with other educators. It’s basically a group of teachers that meet regularly to explore and share ideas and also give one another feedback. Because the members get to know each other well they can push one another
I recently saw this tweet by Dr. Brad Johnson: I liked this post for several reasons, but mostly because it goes against what is frequently heard in education, that there is only one right way to teach children. I’m guessing this has stemmed from the No Child Left Behind era that we are all still
We’ve all been there. Sitting at a meeting or a grad school class where the agenda is ten miles long, broken up into either short little choppy increments or hour-long blocks without a break in sight. Half of the items on the list seem to come from out of nowhere or could easily have been
