Google has spent 1000s of hours trying to figure out how to make people work better in teams. The answer? Teams are most effective when there is “psychological safety” — in other words, everyone feels safe contributing ideas, questioning others (even the boss), and sharing problems. In the best teams, people feel free to offer…
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I have been teaching high school for 26 years, and I cannot tolerate bored, disengaged teenagers. I've spent my entire career developing student engagement strategies that work and abandoning lessons that don't work. As a result, my students frequently comment that they are "never bored" in my class. I'm proud of that -- and of my students' outstanding performance.
I'll use this blog to talk about engagement strategies as well as other issues facing teachers, students and everyone who cares about education today. I hope you find it interesting.
Do SMART goals limit teachers’ vision?
Writing SMART goals — “Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Timebound” — is now a fall rite of passage for public school teachers, right up there with crafting a syllabus, assigning seats and putting up bulletin boards. This process always strikes me as perfunctory. Do SMART goals really get us anywhere? Or is this just another…
Read MoreLet’s get serious about stereotype threat
It’s been 20 years since Steele and Aronson first published their work on “stereotype threat,” demonstrating that we are profoundly influenced by internalized cultural stereotypes about ourselves. Since then, more than 300 peer-reviewed experiments have found similar results. Time and time again, we find that individuals perform worse in school, limit their career options and…
Read MoreAre we ready for student speech?
“Do you think high school students have the same right to free speech as adults?” This warmup question, which I used for years as an introduction to teaching Tinker v. Des Moines to my Civil Liberties classes, sparked a heated discussion among teachers at a workshop I led earlier this week. No issue is more…
Read MoreA solution – or a new problem?
Yesterday, I received an email from “R” saying a parent was requesting that I join 55 other teachers at my school who are “already using Remind.” This struck me as odd. Was the request really from a parent? (“R” came with no last name or email address.) Are parents demanding this, or is it clever…
Read MoreIt’s tough to change our default setting
Did you ever notice how much we (teachers) love to talk? Recently, I was able to watch another instructor pilot some lessons I’d written. The curriculum was specifically designed to be student-driven and interactive — i.e. not a lecture — and I had planned a series of discovery-based activities that would let students do most…
Read MoreIt’s not about obedience anymore
What do puppy training and teaching have in common? More than you might imagine. A month ago, we adopted a new dog, Taffy, into our home. She’s two years old, a terrier-ish “rescue,” described by her foster family as “very high energy.” (We also have Star, another terrier-ish “rescue,” who is about five years old.)…
Read MoreLean Startup: Powerful for teachers
Last week, I had the opportunity to teach the Lean Startup/Design Thinking method of entrepreneurship to an inaugural group of Minnesota teachers. It was the most fun I’ve ever had leading a workshop. (The image above is from a pitch deck designed by several of the participants.) The feedback I got from teachers was similarly…
Read MoreAP test scores are out… So what?
I am one of those nerdy teachers who cannot wait to check her students’ AP scores in July. Pass rates, distributions, average scores — it’s all interesting data to me. I always want to know how my latest cohort of students compares to previous groups, whether I’m reaching my goal (93% with a 3 or…
Read MoreWhat we need – and don’t need – from PD
If I’m going to dedicate an hour of my life to professional development, I want one of two things: Insight into a challenging part of my course content, or New strategies I can use to help my students learn Anything else feels like a waste of my time, so I try to keep that in…
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MARTHA RUSH 