Every adult who works in a school enters the building before the students arrive in the morning, each with a plan for the day. Teachers have their lessons ready; administrators have time set aside for essential meetings, working on the budget, or interviewing potential new staff; counselors and...

In today's educational spaces, group work is essential for students to thrive and succeed. By creating different spaces in your classroom where students can collaborate and explore learning at their own pace, they can benefit from a more dynamic and engaging learning experience....

Effective communication between schools and the community is essential for building strong relationships, fostering transparency, and ensuring that everyone is well-informed about school activities, events, and initiatives. We need to start building bridges and forge strong connections with our...

Our goal, as teachers, is to not just actively engage our students in learning but have them enjoy the experience and be motivated to continue learning. We strive to make our students want to learn and be passionate about education. Passion for learning is the driving force that can...

By nature, introverts prefer calm, minimally stimulating environments. Sooner or later, all introverts will experience the dreaded 'introvert hangover,’ which is the feeling of being completely wiped out from too much ‘people time’ or stimulation. This can mean feeling fatigued,...

In Preventing Polarization, Michelle Blanchet and Brian Deters explore ten skills and outline 50 strategies that any teacher could employ in the classroom that promote constructive dialogues, civic-mindedness, and (hopefully) engaged adults who can work together and find consensus to...

There are moments in every day life when we feel like we have reached the lowest point and there is no point in continuing. This is called the Quit Point: the moment when an individual's productive energy toward a specific goal drops, causing withdrawal or minimized effort.

As students...

Michelle Blanchet and Brian Deters on sense-making.

Let's say you are at the store and overhear a child talking to their mother. "Mom, can I have that toy?" The mother swiftly responds, "If you use your own money." 

The child looks to be about five, and you can see the confused look on their...

How can we, as educators, make an impact on student performance in our buildings? No one can be anywhere all at once, so schools adopt and create schoolwide policies that everyone in the building is to follow. The problem is that policies that address the entire school often miss individual...

Have you ever heard the saying from Ralph Waldo Emerson, "It's not the destination, it's the journey."? This quote is used to remind us that we should not be so focused on the outcome but what gets us their. The same is true for learning.

When students are presented with a new unit, their first...