Contributed by Tracy Alloway and Ross Alloway ‘Working memory’ is the brain’s post-it note. It allows you to hold information in mind and WORK with it. We make mental scribbles of what we need to remember. By understanding working memory you will be able to better
Contributed by Tracy Alloway I was surrounded by a sea of small and eager faces, the children all in neatly pressed uniforms. As part of a government-funded project, I was working with kindergarteners to understand what cognitive skills are important for academic success. I met Andrew
In our book The Collaborative Analysis of Student Learning, my co-authors and I explore many powerful protocols for analyzing student assessments. One of those is the Student Performance Grid, a powerful tool for looking deeply into a class set of assessments. The grid requires a
Contributed by Rita Janes and Elizabeth Strong After completing a Mathematics Investigation with my children, I always find it most important and extremely valuable to reflect back over and assess the entire Investigation implementation. Reflection provides me time to think consciously about the strengths and weaknesses
I did not know what I was doing when I decided to change the way I taught. I did not know that somewhere out in the education world there was already a term floating around for some of the ideas I had for change, a term
UDL: What it is UDL is based on the belief that traditional educational goals, materials, methods and assessments may create obstacles to learning for some students UDL is an educational approach to teaching, learning, and assessment that draws on brain research and technologies to respond
Let’s say that we have created a culture for student engagement (See posts #2 and #3 in this series). How do we structure the programmatic aspects of our classrooms? The curriculum? Our instruction? Assessment? The good news is that lots of models have demonstrated enhanced
This post was originally published on Finding Common Ground To “unwrap” or not to “unwrap”? – Actually, there is no question. In addition to the voluminous numbers of standards teachers must impart to their students each year, there is the added challenge of really understanding what the
Before my training sessions, I’ve made a habit of chatting up participants, asking them to name their primary student behavior concerns. Turns out, teachers rarely come to behavior management seminars because their students chew gum or call out without raising their hands. Sure, there’s always
Technology can help teachers “Ignite Learning” in the classroom by promoting literacy development and critical thinking. The ability to communicate and create is what sparks learning. Kids these days are just wired to operate in a digital environment, which enables them to take control of their