Category Archives: Teaching Memos

It’s Time For Teachers To Rethink Cheating on Tests

Posted on 2020/11/04 by

It hadn’t occurred to me until the question came up yesterday in an online discussion among teachers that student cheating on tests is still a thing. A few teachers were wondering and asking the community how teachers can prevent students … Continue reading →

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Schools Should Embrace Pluralism, not Neutrality

Posted on 2020/11/01 by

As with every federal election cycle, educators and administrators are once again engaging in conversations about neutrality in our schools. Should teachers discuss elections? Should they say anything that might seem to agree with one side or the other in … Continue reading →

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It’s Time to End Direct Instruction

Posted on 2020/10/26 by

Direct instruction. I’ll tell you what you need to know. You record it, train yourself to know it, and then repeat it back, apply it to something else, or synthesize that knowledge plus some other knowledge in producing original work. … Continue reading →

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Three Part Series on Story Structure

Posted on 2020/09/11 by

Okay, so this isn’t profound, brand new, or whatever. But it’s solid stuff, and I created it on the fly this week for students working from home. I thought maybe other folks – parents working with their students at home, … Continue reading →

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Nothing Went as Planned, and Everything Will Be Okay: A(nother) 2020 Experience

Posted on 2020/09/09 by

All we can do is the best we can do, and it’s okay not to be okay. This week, as is the case so many places across the country, our school had a surprise shutdown on the occasion of a … Continue reading →

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