B.Y.O.T Bring Your Own Thoughts
The latest on all student-centered models, leadership development, strategic planning, teacher retention, and all things innovation in K-12 education. We answer questions before you think to ask them.
Blended Learning | Education Elements | Personalized Learning | School Leadership | Teachers
More than three years after the onset of the global COVID-19 health pandemic, researchers are only beginning to scratch the surface of understanding how acute the long-term effects of the shuttering of schools and a shift to virtual and hybrid learning environments are having on students. Recent data suggests that the COVID-19 pandemic halted more than two decades of momentum in math and reading achievements. Another nationwide survey indicates that K-12 reading skills across the country have dropped to a thirty-year low on average. Educational inequalities were also exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly among students with limited access to financial, social, health, and technology resources, many of whom were already struggling academically before the pandemic. One effective method for combating learning loss created by the COVID-19 pandemic is for teachers to implement Personalized Learning in their schools and classrooms.
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Blended Learning | Classrooms | Education Elements | New School Design | Personalized Learning | School Leadership | Strategic Planning
The bright morning sun floods in through the yawning glass windows and casts long shadows in the front of the classroom. My colleague and I and about ten-odd teachers sit huddled at the desks near the back; some of them are poring over resources on their screens, others using markers, pens, and paper cutouts on small chart paper. INDEPENDENT PRACTICE, the text underneath one of these cutouts proclaims. The teacher draws an arrow to the right, as though to sequence the steps, and then draws a sort of three-step cycle that takes up most of the space. THREE STATION ROTATION, the teacher then proclaims in green marker and proceeds to describe in small writing what students are expected to do in each station during her 9th grade English class.
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District Leadership | Personalized Learning | School Leadership | Teachers
At Education Elements, we define personalized learning as an instructional approach that empowers students to build ownership of their learning. And, as students transitioned back into schools in the wake of remote and hybrid learning, our district partners across the country emphasize that this student-centered approach to teaching has never been more needed. With buzzwords floating around like “learning loss,” we are at risk of losing the full story of how educators have always endeavored to meet students where they are. At this moment, personalized learning is emerging as a critical process that equips educators with the practices to support students in getting the instruction they need, when they need it.
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Gaps. Learning loss. Interventions. All of those words represent important topics that existed pre-pandemic yet were magnified when students returned to in-person instruction. But in true educator fashion, resilience prevailed. Many districts and campuses found innovative ways to meet students where they were. We saw organizations revisiting their missions and visions to determine if what students now needed matched their organization’s statements. We saw tweets and posts of teachers sharing or seeking help in creating voice and choice in instruction. One key trend - an increase in the commitment to personalize learning. We saw districts investing more time and resources into developing their teams and aligning them on how to personalize learning for their students.
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Personalized Learning | Professional Development
To meet the needs of an ever-changing tomorrow, school districts must continue to grow and evolve. At its most desired state, a classroom is a laboratory of innovation and its teacher, a "mad" scientist - working everyday to make connections between students and the content. Unfortunately, the chaotic uncertainty of the last two years have left educators fighting to survive, leaving little time for experimentation. This reality leads us to an important question: how can we measure growth and innovation during these challenging times?
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Personalized Learning | Teachers
If you lead a district, school, or department, or if you are a teacher yourself, then you may have seen that civil discourse that relies on evidence is increasingly under attack. We might experience this, at times locally in our Board meetings, and nationally in the broader conversation.
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