Throughout 2019, we told stories from our work across the country that you loved. Here are your favorites.
1. Learner Profiles: What Are They, Why Are They Important and How Can You Get Started Co-Creating Them
Each learner comes to school with strengths and challenges along with a set of interests, talents and aspirations. We often discover some of these qualities over the course of the school year by having conversations, observing how each learner responds in class or through a set of data that has been collected from standardized testing. How might we do this differently? Read more.
2. What Is the Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) Assessment and How Is It Used?
The Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) Assessment is a ten-question assessment that was developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Kaiser Permanente by collecting health information from more than 17,000 members in Southern California. Using data from the study they were able to predict health outcomes based on the frequency of answers to questions. Read more.
3. Frequently Asked Questions About Social-Emotional Learning
A high school graduate in 2020 must be prepared to navigate a changing economy. She’ll need to be resourceful, willing and able to take the initiative and work collaboratively with others. Throughout her career she may need to reskill, take calculated risks and learn to thrive in ambiguity. The key to her success will not only be a strong academic foundation, but also the development of core social-emotional learning skills that will prepare her for whatever path she chooses. Read more.
4. Four Strategies for the Successful Integration of Social-Emotional Learning and Personalized Learning
Education must respond as the traditionally perceived “soft” skills become increasingly critical to future success. Personalized, competency-based learning and social-emotional learning (SEL) go hand-in-hand in recognizing the unique skills, experiences and interests that a student brings with them into the classroom, and in supporting educators in helping students make meaningful connections to what they’re learning. Read more.
5. Student-Driven Restorative Justice
Students at Grand Mesa Middle School in Grand Junction, Colorado, are taking justice into their own hands – literally. When a design challenge during last school year asked students to come up with a solution to a problem, student council members surveyed the student body to find out what the problems were that they could develop solutions around. They discovered that student drama – student-to-student conflict, bullying and many of the traditional troubles that folks think of when they think of middle school – was on everyone’s mind. Read more.
6. When You Know Better, Do Better: Four Ways to Start Making Your Classroom Student-Centered
Making the move from a traditional teacher-centered classroom to a student-centered classroom can be daunting. But, when we do empower our students, their potential is unleashed. School and learning are no longer thing that are done to students; it’s done with them. Read more.
7. What Does a Rigorous Task Look Like?
The more complex a problem is and the more reasoning required to get to a solution, the deeper the level of thinking and learning. When it comes to designing assessments, if there’s only one way to do something, that’s less complex. While there’s certainly room for questions that have only one answer and test the foundational knowledge and skills we need students to master, we must focus on the level of rigor, too: providing students the opportunity to figure it out, not just look it up. Read more.
8. What Students Learn Versus What Teachers Teach
For more and more students, including the learners from Farmington Area Public Schools in Farmington, Minnesota, school has a new focus. With personalized, competency-based learning, the focus becomes on what students are learning instead of what teachers are teaching. Read more.
9. Cultivating Learner Agency Through Authentic Voice and Choice
As a teacher, we want to be the fixer. But when we do something for students, even when we’re just trying to help or maintain flow in the classroom, what are we keeping them from doing for themselves? Read more.
10. What Are Reading Advocates and How Do They Encourage Readers?
“Nobody reads to me anymore,” said a first grader at Pleasant Ridge Montessori School in Cincinnati, Ohio. “I read to them!” This unbridled declaration was emphatically blurted out by a first grader during a focus group discussion with students at Pleasant Ridge Montessori. The confidence evoked by the student in this statement is what early literacy champions strive to inspire in all students. But what does it take to help our children believe in their ability to read and enjoy reading, and what can we do to help them along the way? Read more.
2020 is sure to bring more great stories. Keep up with them by subscribing to our newsletter.
