Teachers

  • Developing Firmness Tools for Educators

    When we can respond to students in ways that are both connected and firm, both adults and students benefit. But how do we do that? Children need compassion and boundaries, connection and high expectations – at the same time. But many of us did not grow up with this model, or learn it in our…

  • Celebrating Black History Month with Tymmony Keegan

    Tymmony Keegan, 10th Grade Humanities and Black Studies Teacher, Cleveland High School What is your current position? I am a teacher at Cleveland STEM High School in Seattle Public Schools. Previously I was a teacher at Dimmitt Middle School in the Renton School District – which had been great and I wanted new challenges. I…

  • Lakeridge Elementary’s Journey

    What is it like to transform a school into a place where all young people feel they belong, they matter, and they can grow as learners? Lakeridge Elementary, in the Renton School District, has been on just such a journey. In the spring of 2020, while navigating remote learning during school closures, the skilled Lakeridge…

  • Celebrating Black History Month with Anthony Ase

    Anthony Ase, Secondary STEM Facilitator, Renton School District & Sound Discipline Board of Directors   What is your role in your school district? I am a Secondary STEM Facilitator for the Renton School District. Essentially, I spent a lot of time in my own classroom getting things together for some years, and now I get…

  • The Great Reset

    Priya Parker, author of The Art of Gathering, encourages us to enter into 2022 with conscious intention and in community. Recently, she discussed what she calls “the great reset” on Brené Brown’s podcast. What is the Great Reset? Parker describes it this way: “We are in a moment of creation. And that is something that few generations…

  • Specialists Find Special Time with Students

    Imagine you’re a librarian at an elementary school. You have the unique opportunity of getting to interact with EVERY student in your school community and hopefully instill in them a lifelong love of reading. Cool, right? Here’s the catch: unlike a classroom educator, your time with students is limited and spread out. So, how do…

  • Teachers Can Harness the Power of Ritual and Routine

    At this time of year, with heightened excitement and a looming break from school, the agreements you co-created with your class at the beginning of the school year and the everyday routines you have been establishing are things to lean on. Depend on that structure now, because it comforts them and helps them feel safe.…

  • Practice and Teach Kindness

    Educators are being encouraged to practice self-care more than ever before. This is not the solution to the many challenges and systems issues facing educators. However, it is helpful to practice those things that we can control, and that can improve our own mental and physical well-being. One of those things is to practice kindness…

  • Lunch time! How Bryn Mawr Elementary Creates Community in the Lunchroom

    We all have distant memories of a loud, chaotic lunchroom, where students often had their heads down for being too loud and left lunch a bit dysregulated and less ready to learn. At Bryn Mawr Elementary, the staff has creatively addressed one of the key sources of stress for all schools this year – how…

  • How Teachers can move from “What is Wrong with You?!” to “What Happened to You?”

    We now know that childhood trauma, including ongoing toxic stress, has a profound impact on brain development and behavior. In fact, behaviors teachers see in the classroom that seem to make no sense may actually be a student’s adaptive responses that show a brain’s capacity for prioritizing survival. When we blame the student or take…