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"Teachers are notorious for taking care of everyone but ourselves. The coming summer provides a perfect chance to change that. Some of us will seek the luxury of a true physical, mental, and emotional break from the classroom. Others will leap directly into teaching summer school in order to cobble together a full salary. Or we'll attend more conferences and trainings in the next two months than in the last 10 put together. Every teacher, even those of us in the throes of summer school and professional development, should make time to answer an existential question: Who are we when we're not teaching? Here are four ideas for making the most of that oasis of time between the end of this school year and the beginning of the next."

"What is your most memorable math lesson? For me, it was when Mrs. Kaylor helped us visualize and understand place value by building straw men as we counted straws by units of one, ten, and a hundred. I struggle to come up with many more memories and there's a good chance I'm not alone. If I asked the same question for other subjects, like social studies or language arts, however, I bet your answers would come a lot more easily. The difference? These subjects include lessons that are often applicable to real life. Whether it's a mock trial, a school play, or a science experiment, project work deepens student learning by allowing them to explore the connections between content and real life. Math lessons, on the other hand, have historically focused less on real-life connections. Like many students, I excelled in math by memorizing rules and tricks. In college, I trained to teach social studies, but became a math teacher by accident because I had earned enough math credits to qualify for a math teaching certification. It wasn't until I returned to earn a master's in math education that I discovered that math can be so much more than memorization."

"Please, No More Professional Development! By Peter DeWitt on April 17, 2015 8:10 AM Today's guest blog is written by Kristine Fox (Ed.D), Senior Field Specialist/Research Associate at Quaglia Institute for Student Aspirations (QISA). She is a former teacher and administrator who has passion for teacher learning and student voice. Kris works directly with teachers and leaders across the country to help all learners reach their fullest potential. Peter DeWitt recently outlined why "faculty meetings are a waste of time." Furthering on his idea, most professional development opportunities don't offer optimal learning experiences and the rare teacher is sitting in her classroom thinking "I can't wait until my district's next PD day." When I inform a fellow educator that I am a PD provider, I can read her thoughts - boring, painful, waste of time, useless, irrelevant - one would think my job is equal to going to the dentist (sorry to my dentist friends). According to the Quaglia Institute and Teacher Voice and Aspirations International Center's National Teacher Voice Report only 54% percent of teachers agree "Meaningful staff development exists in my school." I can't imagine any other profession being satisfied with that number when it comes to employee learning and growth. What sense does it make for the science teacher to spend a day learning about upcoming English assessments? Or, for the veteran teacher to learn for the hundredth time how to use conceptual conflict as a hook. Why does education insist everyone attend the same type of training regardless of specialization, experience, or need? As a nod to the upcoming political campaigns and the inevitable introduction of plans with lots of points, here is my 5 Point Plan for revamping professional development. 5 Point Plan Point I - Change the Term: Semantics Matter We cannot reclaim the term Professional Development for teachers. It has a long, baggage-laden history of conformity that does not

"As the coronavirus continues to spread across the country, students are coming into class with misconceptions about the outbreak-and teachers are trying to figure out how best to explain the facts and debunk rumors.   Some teachers have made COVID-19 a focus of their lessons. Discussing the origin and effects of a new virus easily lends itself to science class. But teachers in other subjects-like algebra, statistics, and media literacy-have found ways to address the topic, too.  Designing a lesson around the outbreak could be a helpful way to answer students' questions and calm fears, said Stephen Brock, a professor and coordinator of the school psychology program at California State University, Sacramento.  And if students have misconceptions about the virus or how it spreads, providing more information could help kids more accurately gauge threat, he said. "

"Over the past several weeks, three headlines pertaining to education have dominated my social media news feeds: screen time, fake news/media literacy, and the ethical dilemmas associated with advances in technology. When considered together, these three topics represent the unintended consequences of innovation. The inventors of television, computers, mobile devices, and social media did not intend to unleash a slew of negative consequences for children. They did not consider the potential for shortened attention spans, lack of connection to nature, or a rising obesity rate; nor did they conceive of their tools as weapons for deploying fake news, unleashing bullying, or fueling hate groups. The Mark Zuckerberg/Biz Stone/Sergey Brin/Steve Jobs/Bill Gates of the world intended to build community, increase access to a global library of information, and provide every individual with a voice."

"With Computer Science in Education (CSED) Week and Hour of Code right around the corner, we have a simple request: Don't teach coding. Instead, we suggest that you introduce computational thinking and creative problem solving into your classroom. This way, you can get at the big ideas behind computer science rather than focus on a single activity or lesson involving "code.""

"It's all about perspective.  Too often when we hear the word "data" we assume that the person speaking is talking solely about summative test results and the plethora of possibilities for learning we can take away from those numbers.  But this is NOT the only kind of data that exists, it is just the kind that gets the brunt of our ire and frustration as it is a solitary indicator of teaching and learning. And that's what I struggle with. Test data is one single area for determining what kids know and can do and there are often many challenges with these standardized tests that skew the data on top of that. However, most classroom teachers and leaders are gathering data like masterful musicians in their classrooms every day and just don't realize that is what they are doing."

"A glimpse of student athletes in peak physical condition vaping just moments after competing in a football game led Stamford High School Principal Raymond Manka to reconsider his approach to the epidemic. His school traditionally has emphasized discipline for those caught with e-cigarettes. Punishments become increasingly severe with each offense, from in-school suspensions to out-of-school suspensions and, eventually, notification of law enforcement. But Manka began thinking about it more as an addiction problem, and less of a behavior issue, after seeing the two players from another school vaping near their bus. "It broke my heart," said Manka, whose school is now exploring how to offer cessation programs for students caught vaping or with vaping paraphernalia. "We've got to figure out how we can help these kids wean away from bad habits that might hurt their body or their mind or otherwise create behaviors that can create habits that will be harmful for the remainder of their lives," he said."

"Education researchers often worry that their work never catches the attention of policymakers and educators in the field. In 2012, however, research has been in the spotlight-and occasionally on the hot seat-as practitioners grapple with justifications for the Common Core State Standards, changing views on how children learn, and ways teachers can build responsive, boredom-free classrooms."