I was pretty stupid at the beginning of my teaching career. Not that I don’t occasionally do dumb things now, but I made enormously big mistakes back then that still make me cringe. One of them was to see parents as adversaries instead of partners. I particularly remember a conference with a parent during which … Read more
This week, I’ve decided to reblog some of my more popular posts with some updates. The post below has remained in the top 5 ever since I published it. Beneath it, I’ve decided to add a few other favorites. Yesterday, I published a list of Inspirational Videos for Students. Today, I am offering a list … Read more
This post is dedicated to my friend, Katri. She knows why 🙂 Every day I experience small failures in my classroom. Every day I question my teaching qualifications and wonder, after 24 years, when someone will finally discover that I don’t belong in this job. Every day I look at a frustrated student and think to … Read more
I was intrigued by a couple of blog posts yesterday that were titled, “5 Things We Need to Quit Pretending.” You can read them here and here. Since I like to steal ideas but modify them, I decided to flip the coin. What should we start pretending in education? Here are my 5 things (okay, … Read more
Our #neisdpln chat last night used internet memes to introduce each question. The clever participants cracked me up with their hilarious replies – many of them using their own memes. I seriously had tears in my eyes from laughing so hard by the end of the chat. Here was one of the questions: And one of the … Read more
Testing week. Ugh. Stressful. Depressing. NOT fun. So, why not join us in a light-hearted Twitter chat using memes to discuss education? Everyone is invited! It’s tonight (Tuesday, April 21st, 2015) at 8 PM CST. #NEISDPLN Here are the questions: 1. Haters gonna hate – what’s something you hear educators complain about too often? 2. … Read more