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Students developed persuasive speeches about a local issue that was based in biology research to speak at a city council meeting

Every Friday, Mr. Reading Pot would make a grand entrance into the classroom and be seated in the middle of a large circle of squirrely kids. Mr. Reading Pot was a bad-tempered and curmudgeonly fellow.

Teachers plan meaningfully and rigorously in ways that allow the synergy of soft and hard skills to interact

Here is a paradox of teaching: if you want your classroom to be full of conversation and self-directed learning, you need to be able to quickly capture everybody’s focus.

Following the COVID-19 pandemic, Ferdinand T. Day (FTD), a Title 1 elementary school in Alexandria, Virginia, noticed an alarming increase in chronic absenteeism rates that disproportionately impacted Hispanic students

Much like a movie’s opening scene, the launch of a lesson should grab everybody’s attention, spark curiosity, and get students asking questions.

Last spring I was standing in my fifth-grade classroom, mid-project, rearranging student groups when I realized we had a problem. My students were building scale models of dog houses and cat condos that they had designed—and would ultimately build—to donate to a pet-adoption event later that spring.

This collection is called “true project stories” because it’s all about teachers (and students) telling the stories of the projects they’ve done, from the heights of achievement to the depths of despair.

“Grading” for me means more than just marking mistakes and putting a number or letter on an assignment. This is because, for the last ten years, I have used specifications grading in all my classes.

Students explored personal and inspirational forms of power through reflection, research, and creative storytelling.