Latest posts
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The Therapy Session Intake Form: What Your Students’ Favorite Subjects Really Need (Free Classroom Activity Template!)
I have a therapist. She is wonderful. She is patient. She is exactly the kind of calm, grounded professional that someone with an anxiety disorder and a panic disorder probably needs in their corner. She also spent the better part of two years trying to get me to find my mind palace. For those unfamiliar,…
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The Difference Between Tolerating a Perspective and Understanding One
I have spent the better part of my life constructing arguments. Since 1998, policy debate tournaments have been a large part of my life. Argument construction is my identity. Arguments are the air I breathe. Competitive debate does something to rewire the way you think about argumentation and the world that is genuinely difficult to…
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Year Zero: What Happens When a 20-Year Teacher Starts From Scratch?
I have been teaching for almost twenty years. That sentence used to feel like a credential. Lately, it has started to feel like a question. Not in a crisis-of-confidence way, I love this job as much as I ever have, maybe more! But in a genuinely curious way. What would I do differently if I…
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The Performative PD Problem: Why Professional Development Is Broken and What You Can Do About It
Let me tell you about three professional development experiences from my career. All different content, yet one common thread endures. My very first PD session as a first-year teacher was a video about working with special education students. It used language and terminology that had been considered outdated for years. Nobody in the room flagged…
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The Quieter the Room, the Louder the Thinking
We are eight posts into this series! What a wild ride it has been! Eight posts, somewhere north of twenty thinking routines. A Costco parking lot, a Tonic deep cut, This Old House, a soup can, and one very passionate argument about the Oxford comma. We have covered routines that teach students to observe carefully,…
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Before and After
I’ve always been fond of a good ‘ol home renovation show. It’s something that actually is deeply rooted in my childhood. Long before the days of brothers who had property or uppers that needed to be fixed, there was one show I would watch on the regular with my dad. This. Old. House. Not only…
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The Flight Safety Card Activity: What Stick Figures and Oxygen Masks Can Teach Your Students About What Actually Matters
Brief Update! Oh man, nothing like getting injured and sick as heck in the last 10 days of school. For the first time in AGES, I had to leave school last week because I fell physically ill (after making it to my second-floor classroom on crutches nonetheless! But, I’m back to about 90%, we’ve got…
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You Got Your Chocolate in My Peanut Butter: The Craigslist Missed Connections Classroom Activity
There is a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup commercial that lives rent-free in my brain. It is one of those commercial gems that then morphs into other shower-thought style derivations. You probably know the one. Two people walking toward each other, completely oblivious. One has chocolate. One has peanut butter. They collide. And the result is…
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The Difference Between Having a Thought and Owning One
Almost 30 years ago (in July, 1996)…(god I’m old)…one of the most underrated bands of all time released their debut album Lemon Parade. The third single, released in February of 97, is what created a core musical memory for me. The song opens with its title and perfect follow-up statement: If you could only see…
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Make Your Students Earn Their Investments with Jumpstarter and Teacheon (New Classroom Templates!)
Last Monday, I shared the GoFundMe in the Ditch That Textbook online community. (You should definitely join!!!) When I shared it, I described it as “an off-the-rails idea for a ‘social media’ template,” and a “shower thought meets asking Claude some questions meets Canva during my plan.” I expected some nice engagement. Maybe a few…