I think it would be painful to survey how many teachers make a habit of “relaxing” at night with a stack of student writing in their laps and a show they’ve been wanting to watch on Netflix. I’ve done this plenty of times myself. But here is the problem: grading and/or giving feedback on student […]
Instruction
Better and Saner Grading Tip: Get Out the Stopwatch
I don’t have all the answers when it comes to taming the beast that is grading student writing, but here’s something that I have found to help this year: using a stopwatch. Step One: Sit down with a stack of papers, a stack of rubrics, and a beverage. (Based on personal experimentation, stimulants tend to […]
Boiling Down Argument: Five Approaches to Teaching Argument
Last time, we examined the challenges of boiling down critical thinking into something manageable for teachers and students, ending with the conclusion that, if we teach argument well, we’re going to begin teaching the heart of critical thinking well. In short, we’re wise to “go big on argument” all across the content areas making disciplinary […]
Boiling Down Critical Thinking
Critical thinking is a problematically over-extended term. It’s sort of like close reading — we can all agree we want kids to be great at it, but if you put ten random educators in a room and have them each write down their clearest, most actionable definition of close reading, you’d get a wide range of […]
Simple Sub Plans that Work
Note from Dave, post-publication of this post: In this article, I share the Google Doc, Google Slideshow, and Youtube video (embedded in the slideshow) that I use whenever I’m gone. 95% of the time, that’s all the tech required, and my students know to politely help if the substitute has difficulties. However, in the examples that […]