Reshaping Learning with SchoolDay

Heather Eskridge, elementary school counselor in Franklin Tennessee, says that in her 23 years as a counselor she's never found a program more comprehensive, engaging and flexible than Quaver Social Emotional Learning.

 

Resources: 

You can learn more and connect with Quaver SEL at EdCuration.com

Angela Mangum, a 26 year veteran of both elementary and secondary music, share the ways Quaver music has increased student engagement, made advanced skills and concepts accessible, and increased the fun and joy in her classroom and life.  

 

Resources:

Connect with  Quaver Music

 

School counselor, Kelly Crowe, shares how the Axiom dashboard allows her to easily track and communicate personally with students and their families in their language of choice--addressing questions, needs and concerns. It's a system that leaves no student behind.

 

Resources:

Connect to the Axiom Dashboard

Students Lerato and Eliza, from Boulder Colorado share their experience learning with SPEAK's Vocal Empowerment Curriculum. SPEAK supports students to empower their voices for self-advocacy and civic participation. 

 

Resources:

Connect with SPEAK

Mary Bonnety shares how her students are able to build their own 3D, interactive digital spaces, integrate them with different academic content areas, collaborate, and share their spaces during both in-person and remote learning.

 

Veteran teacher Cindi Krebs explains how BoomWriter allows students to collaborate on a story which can then be published into a softcover book.  Students also love group writing activities, skills lessons and journal activities.

Benjamin Dancer, a teacher at the Jefferson County Open School (JCOS) and a 24 year veteran, shares his huge passion for fostering curiosity and connection through authentic relationship and experience. JCOS is a life changing alternative to conventional schooling.

 

Resources:

Connect to Jefferson County Open School

Grey Nakayama has been a High School math teacher, working with advanced levels of Math, for 26 years. She is an enthusiastic cheerleader for ClassCalc, saying that it has made both her and her students lives easier and learning better.

 

Resources:

Connect to ClassCalc

Elizabeth Yarnell devotes her passion for story, movie-making and engaging the most reluctant learners to a tool that can bring life and excitement into pretty much any content area and topic. 

 

Resources:

Connect to Digistars Make a Movie Workshop

See Digital Storytelling as a Tool for Inclusion

Tamara Speidel, principal of Buffalo Trail Elementary School in Cherry Creek Schools uses Class Composer to guarantee that every student has other students like them in their class each year.  She loves Class Composer for its ability to help guarantee demographic equity, as well as save her faculty and herself HOURS of work in balancing class lists for the upcoming academic year.

 

Resources:

Connect to Class Composer

Anita Landoll describes a methodology that she developed to help struggling readers learn to read, which she calls "The Sounds of Words."

Darnell Jenkins shares how he uses Figure Math to engage high school students with different learning styles as they become more proficient in not only solving equations, but also exploring, collaborating, creating and evaluating math together.

 

Resources:

Connect to Figure Math

Teresa Gonzalez shares how SEL Adventures supported the turn around of a challenging class, and helped students learn how they learn best through the motivation of this online game. 

 

Resources:

Connect to SEL Adventures

Brendon Jobs, Director of Diversity & Inclusion at The Haverford School in Haverford, Pennsylvania, shares how learning the Question Formulation Technique energized his teaching, and shares with us how to bring this technique into our classrooms to better engage students in challenging content.

David VanSicklen, Advanced Learning Specialist in the Middleton Cross Plains School District in Madison, WI, shares his affinity for the app Seesaw for younger elementary students.  He says Seesaw has "unlimited possibilities."

 

Resources:

Connect to Seesaw

Susan Connick from St. Benilde School in Metarie, Louisiana shares how she uses Lexia Core 5 to support her Tier II struggling readers in grades K-7.

 

Resources:

Connect to Lexia Core5 

Sonja Herring from Cresthill Middle School in Douglas County, Colorado shares how she uses TCI's Geography Alive's Map Labs to make geography learning active, relevant and engaging for middle school learners.

 

Resources:

Connect to TCI's Social Studies Resources

Jared Adamson from Cherokee Trail High School discusses how Big Ideas Math helps him increase student achievement through the curriculum's Investigations, Game Closet and other tools that provide students with immediate feedback.  

 

Resources:

Connect to Big Ideas Math

Kathy Zaleski shares how she uses Connection Circles to build community in her classroom, which she learned from the Longmont Community Justice Center.  She discusses how restorative practices are alternatives to traditional discipline, and shares the following resources for others looking to learn more about this powerful instructional practice:

• The little books:https://emu.edu/cjp/resources/little-books 
• Little Books of Justice and Peacebuilding: Restorative Discipline for Schools
• The Little Book of Race and Restorative Justice
• The Little Book of Circle Processes,
• Return to the Teachings: Exploring Aboriginal Justice,
• Not Light but Fire by Matthew R. Kay 
•  
  The Little Book of Restorative Teaching Tools https://www.amazon.com/Little-Book-Restorative-Teaching-Tools/dp/168099588X 
• Circle Forward - http://www.livingjusticepress.org/index.asp?Type=B_BASIC&SEC=%7B33EC0E83-CD69-4255-BCD5-298AD3846FF6%7D

Today on the show we veer away from discussion of a curriculum product to focus instead on a teaching strategy.  Learn from Emily Fields in Douglas County, Colorado, how and why she uses Socratic Seminar to teach critical reading & writing in her middle school classroom.