This is a tough time of year for me. The dates carry a lot of loss. They carry gratitude and joy and love for those who cannot meet me for coffee. And the dates carry losses that can feel weighty and hard to see through. But, along with the stuff of life, we teachers must…
We can easily forget that kids are kids, that kids are people. Our minds see lessons that must be planned and tests that must be graded instead of humans. Well, kids are kids, and, at our best, we are kids too. And, for kids, for us, there is nothing like 10 minutes of fresh air…
Okay- are you still with me? Are you beginning to write love letters to the number 10? I hope that even if you are a mathematician, you enjoy the brain exercises of trying to see things in a different way. It’s what teachers need to do all day, every day- brain calisthenics to try to…
Whether you’re actually loving math or not, it’s a really good statement to put in your back pocket: I LOVE MATH/S. Take it out, and say it in front of yourself, then in front of your friends. It’ll start to feel normal- and we can start a movement. I love math, and I am good…
If you’re teaching from the start with Ten Frames (appropriate exploration for pre-K to adult): 1st: Count the boxes in a blank ten frame a number of times with your students- from right to left, left to right, top to bottom, upside down. Prove that they can rely on there being ten spaces when they…
I was listening to an interview with Suleika Juoaud, best selling author and journalist- and wife of Jon Batiste. She was asked what she does on the middle days, the ones between the “exclamation points of life”. Suleika Juoaud is a force of immense and insanely varied talent, from musician to author to journalist to…
Take yourself back to that feeling of finding a seat in the school cafeteria. I remember walking out, holding my tray, looking up and looking down at the same time- really hoping I’d have a place to sit- someone who wanted to sit next to me or at least allow me to sit peacefully. It’s…
I tell my students that whispering is one of the secrets we learn in teaching school. It is such a beautiful thing. I am not a proponent of a silent classroom. But there are times when you need quiet to give a direction or redirect and return to focus. When the class needs quieting or…
Think about WHO you are teaching before you think about WHAT you are teaching. In graduate school, we learned to build the most beautiful lessons, designed to take the kids right to the spot. We would plan to work out their background knowledge, have them discover, be completely wowed, then implement this incredible new understanding….
You, the teacher, are the most important asset.