What happens when you study fractions with 5 boys, add some flour, butter, and chocolate chips to the mix? You get these amazing conversations about how we should have a baking club, unprompted. I was floored by these conversations and the legitimacy behind their thoughts. Our goal was to be able to convert a recipe…
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Encouraging Compassion
How do we encourage compassion within our day? What kind of questions might we ask that can drive our learning towards compassionate responses, better yet compassionate listening? I have a student who comes up to me each day and gives me a hug before they enter the building. This is a student who has struggled…
Color: Find Some Each Day
How do we see our students when they walk in the door, full of color or drab and grayscale? I enjoy photography and capturing different colors wherever I might be. Those colors are life giving to me, they give me energy to keep moving. The one thing I never thought about with color had to…
Imaginative Thinking….
I’m so inspired when I can work with students and I become a member of the conversation, compared to a leader. A main goal of mine is to help students to speak to each other and have diverse conversations that are driven by their questions. Today was one of those days where I took some…
The beginning……
Imagination…. Something that helps us to tell a story A way to get creative and explore something new. Growing up can take this opportunity away, but that’s where the beginning happens. Think about all the opportunities that are right at our fingertips, the chance to create something new, to imagine the impossible, to invent something…
Why I will never give up….
I had a conversation this week with a brand new teacher who expressed their thanks for talking to them about ideas to try, books to read with their children, and ways to collaborate. This teacher and I had a conversation when they first started about the importance of collaboration, simply because their teacher prep didn’t…
Speak Up and Reflect!
When was the last time you had students speak up? Not the type of speak up where you can’t hear a student, but speak up about a challenge, a success, a problem, a solution? We stand in front of students each day, yet who does most of the talking? What created that culture? As I…
Driving Interests and Passions
How do we drive our own learning? What’s the reason for finding out new knowledge? Is it because of someone telling us we have to learn it or is it because we want to learn? When someone tells us that we have to learn something, the chances of that knowledge staying in our brains is…
Dress Pants or Sweat Pants?
What kind of pants do you like to wear? Your comfort depends on those pants. Some really enjoy sweat pants, some enjoy dress pants. What happens when those type of pants are taken away and you have to wear something new? Do you choose to wear that new style, even if it is uncomfortable, and…
Want to start a conversation? Take a picture!
We are in a time where learning is so visual. Youtube videos, Photo Slideshows, Minecraft tutorials. These are just a few ways that we learn on our own time. How can we capture what our students are doing each day? Is it important to capture what they learn each day? I remember when our school…
“I’m just not good with technology.” Really??
Remember when twitter was something that people thumbed their noses at when it came up that it could be used as a learning tool? How about the time that you saw something new and pushed it to the side? We all have been at a place in our lives where something new has cropped up…
Curiosity, Exploration, Wonder 