Born Gritty
As I was pulling out of my driveway this morning, I looked over into the neighbor’s yard. Their little two-year old was right on the edge of a small, sloped retaining wall, about two feet high. The toddler concentrated [...]
Neurodiversity in the Classroom
I remember, early in my teaching career, sitting in a one-day workshop on Autism Spectrum Disorders. “Remember,” the lecturer was saying, “These kids need routine and structure. Interruptions in the usual schedule can cause them great anxiety. They need [...]
Quick and Easy Ways to Bring Choice to your Lessons
In Teaching with Love and Logic, Jim Fay and David Funk recount an amazing scene from a master teacher who opined that her kids did better with choice, no matter how trivial or superficial the choice was. To demonstrate [...]
Phonics Card Games
As readers of this blog know very well, games are great to incorporate in the classroom for many important, neuropsychological reasons. To summarize, kids learn best when they are having fun. So, we’ve talked about board games for reviewing [...]
Teachers: Who’s on Your Team?
This is a question for all the teachers out there. Who’s on your team? Other teachers? Check. The administration? If you’re lucky. Parents? If you’re smart. So…what about your students? Look, I taught in the classroom for ten years, [...]
Board Games Galore!
“The score never interested me, only the game,” Mae West A few weeks ago, I wrote about why games boost students’ learning. They soothe anxiety and calm the amygdala, making student brains receptive to learning. They make drill fun. [...]
It’s Not About You
When I was a teenager, my room was filled with unicorns and rainbows: posters, stickers framing the mirror, and my prized possession, a hanging rainbow, an ingenious decoration with thin strings threaded through a wooden circle, cascading from almost [...]
Games: Soothing the Amygdala
“Games give you a chance to excel, and if you're playing in good company you don't even mind if you lose because you had the enjoyment of the company during the course of the game.” ― Gary Gygax Sometimes I [...]
To Reward or Not to Reward
What harm could it do? To reward or not to reward, that is the question. At some point, all teachers, parents, educational therapists, and, well, pretty much anyone who works with kids, find themselves in a place [...]
Dissolving Writer’s Block
Some kids love nothing more than being told they are allowed to write about absolutely anything they want to for an assignment. Freedom! Choice! Stories of slumber parties on deserted islands and basketball games won in the last seconds [...]
Two Birds with One Stone: Adding Tens
Just recently I have had three older elementary school students come in for help with math, and I realize they need help on addition math facts and place value understanding. Always looking for work that gets the most bang [...]
In Defense of Pandering
I admit it; I pander. Scooby Doo, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, Power Puff Girls, Goosebumps, Baseball’s Biggest Bloopers, Rugrats, Captain Underpants, The Day My Butt Went Psycho, all have graced my bookshelves at one point or another. Diary of [...]