Student-Centered Learning
Teaching
Opinion
Randy Ziegenfuss on Teacher Leadership and Student-Centered Learning
Tom chats with Randy Ziegenfuss about his journey as an educator, his time at Salisbury and his podcast, "Shift Your Paradigm."
School & District Management
Opinion
The Evolution of the Denver Public Schools Portfolio
Denver Public Schools is the district to watch when it comes to portfolios. Tom shares how the DPS portfolio model is the one to watch.
Teaching
Opinion
The Promise & Challenge of Student-Centered Learning
From the role of Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) to policy levers each state should have, Tom takes a deep look into the promise, and challenge, of student-centered learning.
Teaching
Opinion
Listening to Kids and Designing from Scratch for Timeless Learning
After 32 years as an Albemarle County educator, Pam Moran sat down with Tom Vander Ark to reflect on her career and discuss her latest book.
Teaching
Opinion
Why We Might Consider Teaching Less This Year
We really don't need to be in the front of the room talking--pointing at a slide, rapidly firing questions at students and cold calling to make sure they are paying attention--in order to be "teaching." We know this, yet we still do it so much of the time. Just take a quick walk through the halls of your school and peek into each classroom. Where is the teacher? Who's talking?
Teaching
Opinion
Tips For Selecting a Book For the Whole Class
There is little more difficult than trying to engage a whole class of students in reading a novel that is a poor match for the group. There are things teachers can do to influence the experience in one direction or another, but a great deal rests purely on the book itself...Once we have some possible titles in mind, we need to think through our decisions very carefully, going in with as clear an understanding of what might work really well about the book and what might be challenging or disappointing about it. Below is an excerpt adapted from Whole Novels For the Whole Class: A Student Centered Approach (2014) about five key factors I weigh when I select a book for my whole class to read.
Science
Opinion
What's Up With All the Design-Focused Schools?
Is the focus on design in schools a fad, a trend or something else? In this episode of the podcast, Tom and Emily explore the rise in popularity of design-focused schools.
Teaching
Opinion
ACT, Leader in Measurement, Shifts to Focus to Student Success
The nonprofit developer of the ACT test has been expanding beyond traditional measurement to new and broader ways to promote education and workplace success.
Teaching
Opinion
On Becoming Student-Centered and Mastery-Based
A discussion with Dr. Susan Bell, a look at the work of Windsor Locks Public Schools and their move to student-centered, mastery-based learning.
Reading & Literacy
Opinion
10 Tips For Helping Students Open Up to Poetry
Every year I have some students who arrive to my class with a fear or dislike of poetry. Spending some time away from deconstruction of meaning of poems has always worked to put these students at ease and allow them to open up to poetry anew.
Equity & Diversity
Opinion
Four Dichotomies in Education Worth Interrogating
Language can be limiting; it can also be liberating. With that in mind, I wanted to look at some of ways we categorize people and ideas in education, and how they might represent false dichotomies that need to be opened up.
Teaching
Opinion
Our Students Know More Than We Think
There's a strange power children and adolescents can derive from watching adults be clueless about something they know—it's the role reversal that makes it a novel event.
Teaching
Opinion
The Difference One Sentence Makes to a Student
I share these two stories for the chance they offer to think about the power of our words to students. What sentence will you say to a student--intentionally or not--that will stay with them for the rest of their lives? That might, for better or worse, reframe how they see themselves? How do we show students we see them?
School & District Management
Opinion
Leading A Student-Centered Agenda: 10 Lessons from Mark Benigni
Tom Vander Ark recently chatted with Supt. Of Meriden Public Schools, Mark Benigni about Meriden's shift to student-centered learning, more voice and choice through personalized learning and the creation of a highly collaborative leadership climate. Benigni also notes the 10 lessons that made him an EdWeek Leader to Learn From.
