Group items tagged

What student voice and parent engagement do NOT look like, and thoughts on what to do about it.

Teachers know that making lessons relevant helps motivate students. The most frequent approach is to link curriculum to learner interests. Two educators, Mario Fantini and Gerry Weinstein, in two now out-of-print books, Making Urban Schools Work and Towards Humanistic Education, pointed out that it would be more effective to link curriculum to the concerns of learners. (You can find used copies of both through Book Finder.) What do kids worry about? What anxieties sometimes keep them up at night? What peer interactions churn up their emotions? How do they deal with their fears about the future, college admissions, employment or bullying?

"One of the principles guiding the transformation work at Sammamish is that student achievement and engagement will increase when students have more ownership of their school community..."

The John W. Gardner Center for Youth and Their Communities (JGC) at Stanford University partners with communities to develop leadership, conduct research and effect change to improve the lives of youth.

Best quote: Where are the student-led ideas, the disruptive solutions and true innovation?  Article on brand-consciousness for schools.