This blog post is dedicated to Javier Amir Rodriguez, who was the youngest victim of a mass shooting that was motivated by hatred and racism. Javier was preparing for the back to school season and was at Walmart picking up school supplies with his uncle. All of the deaths that day were unnecessary, but Javier’s story hit close to home because he was a young student getting ready for a new year. I think of the excitement that our students…
-
Phonological and phonemic awareness are not the same, yet I’ve heard many teachers use the terms interchangeably. It can be confusing because they sound very similar and after all, we’re talking…
-
Lots of people are under the impression that to check for reading fluency, one must whip out a timer and a passage and determine how many words are read in one…
-
When most people hear the words anti-bias education, they usually think about the act of going against biases associated with race. Race is only one piece of it. When engaging in…
-
What is the difference between formative and summative assessments? Why choose one over the other? When is it appropriate to implement each strategy? How do I use the information gathered from…
-
A language rich environment has been at the forefront of your mind all year long. You have a portable word wall, anchor charts, posters, etc… Now it’s almost Summer and you’re…
-
Getting students to keep writing up until the last day can be quite challenging. So many of our students begin to mentally check out and their stamina decreases. There are several…
-
Explaining summer slide to parents is extremely important, especially since they probably have never heard the term before. Summer Slide is very real. Studies show that students fall up to 2.5…
-
I’ll be honest, teaching kids about money is not my favorite thing in the world. I love math! Like, I LOVE math! Money lessons…not so much! I teach in MA where…
-
I absolutely love Instagram. I am able to find many ideas and inspiration while scrolling through the colorful pictures on my feed. Not everything I see on “The Gram” will be…
