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Teaching to Thrive is a podcast committed to sharing ideas that strengthen the everyday lives of Black and Brown students within our schools and communities. Each episode is aimed at empowering our knowledge for collective liberation.

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Listen to ATN - Teaching To Thrive on Spotify. Teaching to Thrive is a podcast committed to sharing ideas that strengthen the everyday lives of Black and Brown students within our schools and communities. Each episode is aimed at empowering our knowledge for collective liberation.

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The impossible is becoming possible. As we all stand in the midst of a world crisis, those of us who can dream must dream. And after we dream, we must demand and act. I want to acknowledge my privilege from the onset of this essay. I am a tenured college professor with access to the internet, university resources, and a reliable income.

But I am not writing about dreaming oblivious to the crisis we are living in. As a Black woman, I am keenly aware of how this virus is disproportionately killing Black people because of environmental racism, medical and housing discrimination, and a racist educational school system that leads to low-wage jobs for Black and Brown Americans, which is why Black people are a large majority of the essential workers in this crisis and those dying on the front lines. In the face of that racism and resistance, it may seem pointless, but this is the perfect time to radically dream.

We must radically dream because before COVID-19 closed our schools and dismantled our way of life, schools were failing not only children of color but all children. High-stakes testing, large class sizes, and the disproportionate expulsion and suspension of Black and Brown students were the norm. Teachers had low expectations of Black and Brown children and high burnout. School shootings were disturbingly common. Schools lacked both adequate funding and inclusive classrooms for students with disabilities. Segregation and corporal punishment persisted. There was a scarcity of educators of color. There were more police in schools than counselors, and racism permeated every inch of our nation's school system.

We all knew it was happening, but it felt too big to take down, too big to rescue. This pitiful existence of the education system has become normalized to the point that many teachers are broken, fighting to just survive, and working to protect children from the very system that is intended to uplift them. This situation is what we have been given, but that does not mean it is what we have to take.

We cannot go back. We now have the opportunity not to just reimagine schooling or try to reform injustice but to start over. Starting over is hard but not impossible; we now have a skeleton of a playbook. It starts with creativity, teacher-student relationships, and teacher autonomy.

When schools reopen, they could be spaces of justice, high expectations, creativity, and processing the collective trauma of COVID-19. Some school leaders are stepping up. In my home state of Georgia, the state's school superintendent issued a letter to teachers and parents calling for "compassion over compliance" as we all try to reach students during a pandemic. In mid-April, Atlanta's superintendent moved the district to a four-day teaching schedule. Teachers are to use Fridays for professional development and to be available to students who are behind. We need that same energy, understanding, and creativity from our school leaders when schools reopen.

As I watch my wife-a 4th grade teacher-teach and my kids-two 4th graders-learn during this crisis, I see the possibilities for an education system now forced to trust teachers, give students autonomy, and rely on the ingenuity of parents. I also see the loss of schools as places of refuge, safety, family services, and invaluable social interactions.

My social-media timeline is filled with stories from teachers around the country finding innovative ways to reach their students. School districts are giving out laptops and books to students-items that were never allowed to leave the building before. Companies are offering free internet to families. Communities are rallying together to support families in need. Schools are relying on different indicators of achievement other than standardized testing to measure improvement, such as parent engagement, teacher-outreach levels, and interactive lessons. Teachers are making the social-emotional learning of their students their top priority. Students are having more time for physical activity and art. And they are researching and learning about things they feel passionate about but never had time to explore before.

The virus has made this new system the expectation of teachers, parents, and school districts. Asking teachers to be creative, react to the needs of students and families with resources backed by the district, and provide instruction driven by a teacher's pedagogy rather than a test is our new norm. However, this new normal will be short-lived if we do not fight to keep it when we return to school.

Educational testing companies stand ready to profit from this crisis. They will introduce tests to measure gaps in learning after school closures. They will market tests to close these gaps, even though those tests have never closed the so-called achievement gap before. Schools will insist on surveilling teachers to make sure they are getting students back on track instead of trusting teachers and their skill sets. Education technology companies will try to convince school districts that moving an entire nation's educational system online was beneficial and can continue in some variation.

Schools will expect parents to go back to homework duty and be less involved. The creativity of teachers and the trusting of students will be replaced with standardized testing, rote learning over critical thinking, and punitive school policies.

Our education system is allergic to change and comfortable with oppression, so if the system is not physically and theoretically pushed to stay in the direction of progress, it will revert back to its obsolete purpose.

We cannot go back. We must return to teaching in schools with a deeper understanding of how racism and capitalism limited our reach in offering all students the resources and instruction they needed and deserved before and after schools closed. This is more important than ever as COVID-19 exacerbates the educational opportunity gap.

The alternative ways educators are learning to exist in our new world cannot be lost when we reopen our society because that world only worked for some and was consumed by racism. What was said to be impossible in education is now here, and we must act for it to stay our reality.

Related Video
In 2016, Bettina L. Love, the author of this essay, spoke to Education Week about African-American girls and discipline. Here's what she had to say:

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Teachers, We Cannot Go Back to the Way Things Were (Opinion)

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The impossible is becoming possible. As we all stand in the midst of a world crisis, those of us who can dream must dream. And after we dream, we must demand and act. I want to acknowledge my privilege from the onset of this essay.

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For Black and Brown children in the United States, a major part of their schooling experience is associated with White female teachers who have no understanding of their culture. That was certainly my experience. My K-12 schooling was filled with White teachers who, at their core, were good people but unknowingly were murdering my spirit with their lack of knowledge, care, and love of my culture.

Fast forward 25 years. Now my job is teaching future educators about what it takes to teach beautiful Black children. No matter where I go, when I ask future teachers why they want to teach-especially White women, who make up the vast majority of all teachers-their first or second answer is always: "I love children," followed by, without taking a breath, "I love all children." The word "all" is meant to signal, "I am not racist; I am fit to be in the classroom with children of color." The statement is used to show that White teachers can be kind to every Black and Brown child that walks through their classroom doors. But how can you love or care for someone you know so little about?

A few years ago, a White student of mine wrote in a paper that traveling to South Africa for a missionary trip was the first time she had been around African-American students. I simply wrote on her paper, "See me after class." I informed her that she had not been interacting with African-American people but with South Africans. I told her African-Americans are right here in Georgia. I am one of them. Her face turned red. She was embarrassed and assured me that she knew the difference.

After our brief chat, one thing was clear: Yes, she knew the difference, but her interactions with African-Americans were clearly limited, and so much about our very existence was unknown to her.

As an interesting exercise, I ask my students to guess the percentage of Black people in the U.S. population. I am always blown away that their estimations are so high: guesses range from 20 to 40 percent. In reality, Black folks make up just less than 14 percent of the U.S. population. So, if you have limited interactions with Black folks, how can you think there are so many of us?

Black folks are highly visible and invisible at the same time in America-just look at Sunday and Monday night football. Former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick took a knee during the national anthem to bring attention to police brutality and the killings of Black and Brown people by law enforcement. Him taking a knee became highly visible; the Black deaths he took a knee to bring attention to were invisible in his fight to many White Americans. The sad truth is that White people can spend their entire lives dismissing dark people's existence and still be successful in life. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for us.

Let me be clear: I do not think White teachers enter the profession wanting to harm children of color, but they will hurt a child whose culture is viewed as an afterthought.

Teachers who disregard the impact of racism on Black children's schooling experiences, resources, communities, and parent interactions will do harm to children of color. This ignorance is not just a painful sign of a blatant lack of information-a function of racism is to erase the history and contributions of people of color-it is a dangerous situation as these teachers go on to take jobs in schools filled with Black and Brown children. This turns schools into places that mirror society instead of improving it. The hard truth is that racism functions as a "superpredator" of Black and Brown children within our schools.

There is no easy fix to this problem, but there are solutions. Future teachers should be required to take classes such as African studies, African-American studies, Latinx studies, Caribbean studies, Chicana/o studies, Asian and Southeast Asian studies, and Native American studies.

There also needs to be a push to recruit future teachers of color as early as high school, pay for their college education, and mentor them when they enter the classroom. Research consistently shows that teachers of color have higher expectations of students of color, which leads to more students of color referred to gifted programs. Moreover, having a teacher of color helps students confront issues of racism.

Before they ever step into a classroom, teachers need to work in urban school communities to understand the beauty and the difficulty of teaching in that environment and to examine how racism functions to allow schools to be underresourced and students labeled at-risk.

But, at the end of the day, White teachers need to want to address how they contribute to structural racism. They need to join the fight for education justice, racial justice, housing justice, immigration justice, food justice, queer and trans justice, labor justice, and, above all, the fight for humanity.

So, the question is not: Do you love all children? The question is: Will you fight for justice for Black and Brown children? And how will you fight? I argue that you must fight with the creativity, imagination, urgency, boldness, ingenuity, and rebellious spirit of abolitionists to advocate for an education system where all Black and Brown children are thriving. I call this abolitionist teaching. To love all children, we must struggle together to create the schools we are taught to believe are impossible: Schools built on justice, love, joy, and anti-racism.

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Dear White Teachers: You Can't Love Your Black Students If You Don't Know Them (Opinion)

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It isn't enough to "love all students," writes the University of Georgia's Bettina L. Love.

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Organizational Assessment Tools and Resources

Overview

Organizational assessment is similar to community assessment, though power dynamics around information are likely more concentrated, and perhaps more hierarchical - for example, there may be very little publicly available information and people asked to provide information may feel the stakes are higher in terms of job loss or other negative consequences. Confidentiality is important for both types of assessment. Promises made about who sees the data, in what form and with what types of identifying information have to be kept.

Organizational assessments are often looking at internal processes as much as outcomes. For example, it is often useful to look deeply at decision-making: What information do decision-makers get and from whom? Which voices or sources of information have credence? Whose perspectives have the most credence? What gets discounted or devalued in the process? How are decisions communicated? What are the impacts of current decision-making processes, and do they vary by racial/ethnic group within the organization or among the external groups whose lives the organization effects?

Similar assessments can be done for each of the major aspects an organizations work and its internal policies and practices. In doing these assessments, it is very useful to look at the existence and impact of white culture. And, people with different roles and identities within the organization should review each area of an organization's internal and external practices.

This section includes resources about the processes of organizational assessment, tools and examples of organizational assessments.

Tools

Resources

Also in this section:

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Organizational assessment is similar to community assessment, though power dynamics around information are likely more concentrated, and perhaps more hierarchical - for example, there may be very little publicly available information and people asked to provide information may feel the stakes are higher in terms of job loss or other negative consequences.

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Now more than ever, educators are being asked to speak up, take action, and educate themselves, their colleagues, and their students. I have learned so much over the past day how far I need to grow and learn. Here are some of the voices I am listening to and a roundup of some advice from social media along with some resources and guidance to read, watch, and act. This is not an exhaustive list but it is a place to start.

As a white person of privilege, I am committed to this work and will continue to learn and grow and listen as I explore.

Create time and space to attend to the interior lives of your Black students and allow them the space to process their Black pain and suffering.

Lutze B. Segu, Social Justice Doula, aka antiracist feminist coach / doctoral student studying Gender, Race, Sexuality. and Social Justice

Be real. Talk to our students about what they hear on the street, at the dinner table, and on the playground. And don't stop there, talk to them about their differences. We are not the same. The world has tricked us for far too long with sweet thoughts and words wrapped up in kindness boxes about us being the same. We need our children to recognize the differences and respect them. This is a lesson in humanity and a failure to talk about their own responsibility as a human being is not just a mere missed opportunity, but rather a disservice to humanity - itself.

Allison Matulli, J.D. l M.Ed aka Professor Ally, Executive Director, Legal Kid, Inc. , Dean of Legal Literacy, The Little Lawyers STEM-based Curriculum

We're not asking you to have the perfect response or the perfect words. We're not asking you to make everyone 100 percent comfortable or make everyone 100 percent uncomfortable. Every person has a role to play and we are just asking you to think about the impact of doing nothing and allow that to shake you to your core. We have to do something.
Mirko Chardin, Artist, Educator, Leader, Author, Friend

Openly discuss race, rather than avoid it, as it arises in the current news cycle, recent research or lived experiences, and ensure safe space for discussion and even healthy conflict with deep mutual respect for one another.
Seema Thomas, Adjunct Professor of Urban Sustainability at UDC

Racism is learned behavior. But so is Anti-Racism. Let's teach our kids to actively and vocally denounce inequality in our society. Here's some good books to get that conversation started. https://t.co/ImuWueaAMg
- Sen. Martín Quezada (@SenQuezada29) June 3, 2020

Educators can start by committing to educating themselves on the history of racism in the US, centering diverse voices in whatever they are teaching, and building authentic relationships outside their own racial group. The power of genuine inter-racial friendships can't be overstated.

Homa S. Tavangar, Author and Co-Founder, BigQuestions.institute, OnenessLab.com, GrowingUpGlobal.net

Recommend stories and poems that creatively explore the themes of racial prejudice.and social injustice. I particularly recommend beautifully-written books like Yaa Gyasi's Homegoing, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Americannah, Richard Wright's Black Boy, and Maya Angelou's I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings. People grasp ideas and concepts more easily when they are encapsulated in well-written stories. Because racism is such a sensitive subject, educators are more likely to draw the attention of their peers if they recognize and utilize the power of storytelling.
Chioma Iwunze-Ibiam, Remote Educator, tutor, and founder and editor of Creative Writing News.

What you do today dictates what tomorrow will look like. I am confident that racism will be fought with everything that we have because of the seeds we plant.

No spark is too small to start a wildfire. Andr a tesha Fritzgerald, Education Consultant, Online Course Instructor, Virtual Module Content Provider

Resources for you and to share with your communities:

Read

Watch

Take Action

We are on a continual journey to listen, grow, learn, and have hard conversations to help to push our UDL community forward. Questions/Feedback? Connect with us education@novakeducation.com

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Guiding Words to Help Educators Connect With Their Students and Peers

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Now more than ever, educators are being asked to speak up, take action, and educate themselves, their colleagues, and their students. I have learned so much over the past day how far I need to grow and learn.

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Opinion

Teachers play a key role in making Black students feel safe in school

One question that many school leaders and practitioners are grappling with is how they can best support Black students. A litany of data has highlighted disparate outcomes for them at the K-12 level. We must do better. Teachers can and must be part of efforts to improve classrooms for Black students. Teachers who make a difference are able to move beyond traditional classroom practices to ensure that they feel comfortable and safe in classrooms.

As a former classroom teacher and student, I can attest to the need for extra attention and care to help Black students feel comfortable in historically excluded spaces. Schools explicitly exclude them by way of suspensions and implicitly exclude them through curriculum, culture, and policy. Black students are not the only ones who suffer racial discrimination in school, but in light of the recent protest for Black liberation across the country, it is imperative that Black students receive particular emphasis and focus. School practices must account for their experiences and needs. When we find ways to demonstrate care for Black students, our empathic actions benefit all students.

Here are five suggestions for how we can show care for our Black students:
1. Make sure curricular materials are inclusive and positively represent all Black folks.
We must consider Black students when creating curriculum to ensure instructional materials are inclusive of all Black life. By "all," I mean men, women, LGBTQ+, mixed-raced folks, and those with disabilities. It is not enough to discuss Black people briefly during thematic units on marginalized groups. Their historical exclusion in instructional materials contributes to the lack of care Black students experience in school. Without curricular representation, the contributions of Black innovators, the examples of Black excellence, the struggle for Black liberation, and the diversity within Blackness are absent from curricular materials. Black people must be equally represented across all disciplines to ensure that Black students feel included in the learning environment. As educators, we should ask ourselves:

* Are any of my books written by Black authors?
* Do my books and curriculum materials illustrate the diversity that exists within the Black community?

2. Seek feedback from Black students.
It is impossible for any teacher, regardless of race, to understand the experiences of Black students in our classes, unless they ask their Black students directly. As teachers, we rarely seek feedback from our students, and this prevents us from understanding how Black students may be experiencing our class. Black people experience this country in unique ways based on structural disadvantages and systemic racism. Unfortunately, the experiences in classrooms are no different. It is important to listen to the voices of Black students because they are often those who suffer most in the learning environment.

To show care for them we must seek answers to questions such as:

* What does it feel like to be a Black student in my classroom or in this school?
* Do Black students feel safe in my classroom?
* How can I help Black students experience success in my classroom?

3. Educate ourselves and our students on the nature of racism.
* White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo
* No More Teaching Without Positive Relationships by Jaleel R. Howard, Tanya Milner-McCall, and Tyrone C. Howard
* Not Light, But Fire: How to Lead Meaningful Race Conversations in the Classroom by Matthew R. Kay
* How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi

It is difficult for anyone to combat racism, if they do not understand it. Racism is a complex, multifaceted issue that has permeated American society for centuries. Racism is so deeply embedded in American culture that it often goes ignored by those not directly affected. To psychologically and emotionally protect Black students in the classroom, we must develop our understanding of racism and the many ways it presents itself.

As teachers, we can learn more about racism by watching lectures on combating anti-Blackness, attending anti-racist workshops, and reading anti-racist literature. As we educate ourselves about racism, we must find ways to educate our students as well. We must engage in difficult conversations with our students that support the elimination of anti-Blackness in our classroom and school. And we should ask ourselves:

* Do my students understand the racial context of the text, lesson, and/or unit?
* Do my students see me discuss race- related issues?
* Do my students know how to interrupt racism by my example and by examples they've learned in class?

4. Believe Black students.
Many Black students go through school simply not being believed or constantly trying to prove their innocence. Blackness in school is often seen as a sign of guilt, which means that Black children are not often viewed as innocent in the same ways that other children are viewed. Far too often when Black students express themselves in school, they are ignored or not given the same attentiveness as their peers. Black students need teachers to believe them when they speak about how they experience schooling. The information students share should inform future policy around issues such as curriculum, discipline, and overall school climate. Black students need allies who will support them in times of turmoil and back them in conflicts with other adults on campus. Not only must we support them through conflicts, but we need to celebrate all of their successes and progress as well. Black students need to feel trusted, and teachers must show them that their thoughts, opinions, and experiences matter.

5. Build relationships with caregivers.
One of the best ways to show care for Black students is by building relationships with their families. As teachers, we must get to know Black caregivers in efforts to demonstrate our commitments to their children's success. In the book I recently co-authored, No More Teaching Without Positive Relationships, I wrote about the benefits that come along with teachers finding ways to build relationships and collaborate with caregivers. Caring for Black students requires an understanding of the way care is demonstrated in their home lives. It is important that Black students view their teachers and caregivers as members of the same team working hand in hand to ensure their success.

It is not enough for schools to release a formal statement about how they are supporting Black students. Black students should not have to wait until the murder of another unarmed Black person in order to feel like their educators care about Black life. As educators, we have a responsibility to take consistent actions and create environments that are safe for all Black students. What are we waiting for?

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5 Ways to Show You Care for Your Black Students

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Opinion One question that many school leaders and practitioners are grappling with is how they can best support Black students. A litany of data has highlighted disparate outcomes for them at the K-12 level. We must do better. Teachers can and must be part of efforts to improve classrooms for Black students.

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Teachers shaken by recent events and wondering how to work for change in our society and schools can start with these lesson plans, videos, and other resources.

John Minchillo / Associated Press

Protesting the killing of George Floyd, a crowd gathers for a rally at Cadman Plaza Park in New York City on June 4, 2020.

"I'm a White educator, where do I start?"

"How can I help?"

"What if I get it wrong?"

Recent events have shaken me to my core, and the nationwide protests over the killing of George Floyd suggest that people across the country are similarly shaken. These are dark times, but if there's anything that seems like a glimmer of light to me at the moment, it's the fact that so many teachers are reflecting on how to fight racism:

For me, a Black educator and mother to a Black 16-year-old who has reached the appearance if not the legal age of manhood, these questions stir hope. Folks who don't look like me are embracing the idea that the fight for equity has to be everyone's fight. But fighting racism is a big job, and when the fires of outrage cool, we teachers will be confronted with the reality of planning deadlines, testing schedules, and another hundred things that are all in a day's work. The difficult work of equity may become just another item on a desk crowded with to-do lists.

What Can Teachers Do?

The answer, an old joke: How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time, of course-and achieving equity is no different. Take small bites that can have big impact and don't worry about getting it wrong sometimes, as you inevitably will. If you keep going, you can do something that brings about change.

Reading: Even if you only have 10 minutes, you can learn something to help you create a more equitable classroom. Websites like Teaching Tolerance, the NEA's EdJustice, and KQED's Mindshift feature resources for lesson planning as well as lessons for you as a teacher. Teaching Tolerance is the perfect place to start, whether you want to use bias-free language to teach tolerance through reading with young learners or plan a social action campaign with high school students.

In addition to a rich collection of K-12 classroom resources, the website features self-guided PD, on-demand webinars, and podcasts that may enable you to earn a certificate-check with your administration first. Those can easily be broken up into small chunks of time. And note that many of the site's feature articles list recommended actions at the bottom.

If your goal is to understand the Black community better, sites designed for Black audiences like The Root, The Undefeated, and Huffington Post's Black Voices are good places to start. These non-mainstream media outlets feature content by minority and minority-supporting journalists. You'll find content on topics not covered in mainstream media, like coverage of historically Black colleges and universities, news about Black brands and influencers, and stories like this one on MIT's first Black female student body president in its 159-year history. If you're teaching Black children who are generally inundated by media that does not reflect them, these are priceless ways you can enrich your current events and show-and-tell circles.

Watching: You can improve your cultural competence and learn about Black Lives Matter by watching " 4 Black Lives Matter Myths Debunked" on YouTube, which will answer quite a few questions on social justice issues, probably including some you didn't even know you had. And if you want help in having real discussions on complex issues with young children, the YouTube show LivingRoomProtest will lead you through conversations on being Black, politics, pride, and even death and the afterlife-try the episode " Education Is a Human Right " for starters.

If you want entertainment with a cultural component, Netflix has a host of shows that cater to a Black audience, as well as original content that regularly features diverse character lineups. Hulu has not only a small curated selection of Black Stories but also six seasons of the binge-worthy, socially conscious Black-ish and its spin-off prequel Mixed-ish. While Black-ish might be a little campy, it tackles real issues surrounding racism, bias, and social justice issues that arise within the Black community.

Taking action: For the civic-minded, the Kellogg Foundation has put together a website that lets you create your own personal plan to support, donate, or volunteer in the way you find most relevant. This site can help you focus your attention on one or two civic tasks with broader impact.

Social action is also a great way to involve students, which multiplies your impact. You can teach students how to write emails or letters by asking them to write to your local government in favor of policy changes banning the eight most deadly policing strategies listed at 8 Can't Wait, which has ideas on how to call or email your government yourself-there's a script you can use or adapt.

Looking within: Finally, and perhaps most importantly, take inventory of your feelings. It's normal to be most comfortable around people who are like you. It's just not good when that makes you and those like you an "us" and those who aren't like you a "them." Use a journal to sort through your personal feelings on racism or read books that provide perspective on systemic inequities and bias. These long-haul strategies will produce change in you while you take more immediate action in other ways.

The devastating events of the last days have left me shaken. I have felt anger, fear, grief-so many emotions. But I have also felt buoyed by the great outpouring of support from my less melanated colleagues who want to listen, learn, and find out how to do better. So many of them are already doing amazing things with diverse students. This piece is dedicated to them. They give me hope that this time, we will fight racism together and bring about lasting change.

Don't stop now. How do you eat an elephant? One small bite at a time.

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A Guide to Equity and Antiracism for Educators

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Teachers shaken by recent events and wondering how to work for change in our society and schools can start with these lesson plans, videos, and other resources. John Minchillo / Associated Press Protesting the killing of George Floyd, a crowd gathers for a rally at Cadman Plaza Park in New York City on June 4, 2020.

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George Floyd. Ahmaud Arbery. Breonna Taylor. What do we tell our children?: These deaths are part of a more complex story, one some parents have been telling for generations, and others have long felt they've had the luxury to ignore. Experts in child psychology and race-based stress say these conversations are essential for all parents to have, and they underscore that there are developmentally appropriate ways to talk to children of all ages about racism and police brutality.

Teaching Tolerance: A Project of the Southern Poverty Law Center: Providing resources to help spur much-needed discussion around implicit bias and systemic racism as well as techniques to empower your students in enacting changes that will create a more just society.

How to talk to your child about race (ages 5 to 8): As with other tough topics, it helps to talk to your child early and often about race. Embarrassment or silence gives your child the impression that the topic is off-limits or that a bigoted remark is accurate and acceptable to you. Children look to their parents for moral cues, and they'll learn from your actions as well as your words.

How to talk about race with your kids: It'd be wonderful if you could just say to children, "People might look different and come from different places, but we're all equal and should be treated the same" and leave it at that. But if recent news has taught us anything, it's that reality is not so simple, and we need to face the topics of race and racism head-on

How to teach your kids about race: The world is made up of a beautiful blend of colors and races. Teaching our children about race doesn't need to be difficult or scary.

Teaching responsibility and Values | Discussing Racism: A resource providing information on how to discuss racism and tolerance with your kids. From strengthening understanding through personal experiences to charitable giving experiences, learn ways to instill social responsibility in our youth.

Picture Books that Teach Kids to Combat Racism: Books are a great teaching tool, especially when it comes to talking to kids about tough subjects. Many parents might struggle with talking to their kids about institutionalized racism and prejudice and I hope these picture books about racism will help, because an open and honest dialogue is the only way our kids can work to combat the problem so that they and their friends can live in a better society.

An Antiracist Reading List (Adults): A collection of books to help America transcend its racist heritage: a stepladder to antiracism, each step addressing a different stage of the journey toward destroying racism's insidious hold on all of us.

Philadelphia Anti-Defamation League: ADL is a leading anti-hate organization. Founded in 1913 in response to an escalating climate of anti-Semitism and bigotry, its timeless mission is to protect the Jewish people and to secure justice and fair treatment to all. Today, ADL continues to fight ALL forms of hate with the same vigor and passion.

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George Floyd. Ahmaud Arbery. Breonna Taylor. What do we tell our children?: These deaths are part of a more complex story, one some parents have been telling for generations, and others have long felt they've had the luxury to ignore.

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Parents and other caregivers are seeking resources to help them hold children through the current, terrible wave of racialized violence, which is exacerbated by the tensions and vulnerabilities exposed by the COVID-19 pandemic. As scholars, writers, and parents who use books to connect with our children and spark conversations with them, we've developed this book list to help engage the broad range of emotions and needs of diverse children in our multiracial society. In some cases, we've highlighted worthy, albeit lesser-known titles. Some are older books, some are newer, and a few will publish later this year but are available for pre-order now. This list skews heavily towards #ownvoices books and is arranged alphabetically by title.

Please use these books to help you do the work of making the world a safer, more equitable place for all children.

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20 Picture Books for 2020: Readings to Embrace Race, Provide Solace &...

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As scholars, writers, and parents who use books to connect with our children and spark conversations with them, we've developed this book list to help engage the broad range of emotions and needs of diverse children in our multiracial society.

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Resources - Black Lives Matter Week of Action In Schools - D.C. Area Educators for Social Justice

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Links to suggested lessons, films, books, readings, and general teaching guides.

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We present this list for all who would like to gain a deeper understanding of historical and present-day manifestations of racism in the United States. This list of guides and resources is just a small sample of the abundance of resources available online. In the coming days and weeks, we will continue to add resources. We hope these resources will serve to both affirm and support you if you belong to a group that has been impacted by racism and a place to deepen your knowledge of the issues as you take action against racism.

Articles

Websites

Resources for parents

Reading lists

Videos

Podcasts

Books and publications

Adams, M. (Ed.). (2000). Readings for diversity and social justice. Psychology Press.

Feagin, J. (2013). Systemic racism: A theory of oppression. Routledge.

Linder, C., Harris, J. C., Allen, E. L., & Hubain, B. (2015). Building inclusive pedagogy: Recommendations from a national study of students of color in higher education and student affairs graduate programs. Equity & Excellence in Education, 48, 178-194.doi:10.1080/10665684.2014.959270

Johnson, A. G. (2001). Power, privilege, and difference. Mountain View, CA: Mayfield.

Lau, M. Y., & Williams, C. D. (2010). Microaggressionsresearch: Methodological review and recommendations. In: D. W. Sue (Ed.). Microaggressions and marginality: Manifestation, dynamics and impact (pp. 313-336). New York, NY: Wiley

Nadal, K. L., Wong, Y., Griffin, K. E., Davidoff, K., & Sriken, J. (2014). The adverse impact of racial microaggressionson college students' self-esteem. Journal of College Student Development, 55, 461-474. doi:10.1353/csd.2014.0051

Ross, L. (2016). Blackballed: The Black and White Politics of Race on America's Campuses. Macmillan.

Sue, D. W. (2003). Overcoming our racism: The journey to liberation. John Wiley & Sons.

Black Lives Matter Syllabus 2016

Marc Lamont Hill, Nobody: Casualties of America's War on the Vulnerable, from Ferguson to Flint and Beyond (Simon & Schuster, 2016)

Michelle Alexander, The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness (New Press, 2012)

Angela Davis, Are Prisons Obsolete? (7 Stories Press, 2003)

African American Policy Forum, Say Her Name: Resisting Police Brutality Against Black Women (African American Policy Forum Report, 2015)

Movement for Black Lives, A Vision for Black Lives: Policy Demands for Black Power, Freedom, and Justice (Movement for Black Lives Policy Platform, 2016)

Assorted essays by Cornel West, Alicia Garza, Audre Lorde, Kimberle Williams Crenshaw, Shaun King, and more available at BlackLivesMatterSyllabus.com

If you have any questions comments or additions to this list, please contact Leilani Lewis, lanil@uw.edu

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We present this list for all who would like to gain a deeper understanding of historical and present-day manifestations of racism in the United States. This list of guides and resources is just a...

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National Museum of African American History and Culture

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Research shows that many people feel they do not have the information needed to discuss race in a way that is candid, safe and respectful of other viewpoints and experiences.

"The portal offers a wealth of resources to inform and guide discussions-videos, role-playing exercises, targeted questions and more, said Crew." "We hope that people will use this site to become more comfortable about engaging in honest dialogue and self-reflection."

Talking About Race builds upon decades of work by the museum's educators. It is the result of extensive research, studies, consultations, and educational resources from these fields: history, education, psychology and human development. It includes published research from leading experts, activists, historians, and thought leaders on race, equity, and inclusion, including Brené Brown, Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw, Robin DiAngelo, Julie Olsen Edwards, Jerry Kang, Ibram X Kendi, Enid Lee, Audre Lorde, Beverly Daniel Tatum, Bishop Desmond Tutu, and Tim Wise.

Phase one of the portal features eight foundational subjects including:

Being Anti-Racist: a conscious decision to make frequent, consistent, equitable choices daily.

Bias: the inclination or prejudice toward or against something or someone.

Community Building: connecting and engaging with others doing anti-racism work and exploring issues of race.

Historical Foundations of Race: how race, white privilege, and anti-blackness are woven into the very fabric of American society.

Race and Racial Identity: how societies use race to establish and justify systems of power, privilege, disenfranchisement, and oppression.

Self-Care: caring for one's mental, emotional, and physical health to sustain the work of dismantling racism.

Social Identities and Systems of Oppression: systems built around the ideology that some groups are superior to others.

Whiteness: an ideology that reinforces power at the expense of others.

Explore Talking About Race at nmaahc.si.edu/talkingaboutrace. The portal is free and does not require a registration or sign-up to use. Talking About Race is generously supported by The Atlantic Philanthropies.
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About the National Museum of African American History and Culture
Since opening September 24, 2016, the National Museum of African American History and Culture has welcomed more than 7 million visitors. Occupying a prominent location next to the Washington Monument on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., the nearly 400,000 square-foot museum is the nation's largest and most comprehensive cultural destination devoted exclusively to exploring, documenting and showcasing the African American story and its impact on American and world history. For more information about the museum, visit, follow @NMAAHC on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram or call Smithsonian information at (202) 633-1000.

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National Museum of African American History and Culture Releases "Talking About Race" Web Portal

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The Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture today launched Talking About Race, a new online portal designed to empower individuals, families, and communities discuss racism, racial identity and the way these forces shape every aspect of society, from the economy and politics to the broader American culture.

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Excellent collection of books, podcasts, videos, articles.

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This page is intended to serve as a resource to people and parents to deepen our anti-racism work. if you haven't engaged in anti-racism work in the past, start now. Feel free to circulate this document on social media and with your friends, family and colleagues.

Compiled by Sarah Sophie Flicker, Alyssa Klein (May 2020) and The University Office for Diversity & Inclusion

Books

Podcasts

Articles

Social Media

The Conscious Kid: follow them on Instagram and consider signing up for their Patreon

Additional Articles:

10 Documentaries to Watch About Race Instead of Asking a Person of Colour to Explain Things for You by Ben Clay | DocPlay.com (June 3, 2020)

The 1619 Project (all the articles) | The New York Times Magazine

29 Movies, Shows, and Documentaries to Watch to Educate yourself on Racial Injustice by Ashley Selleke | Theeverygirl.com (June 4, 2020)

America's Racial Contract Is Killing Us by Adam Serwer | Atlantic (May 8, 2020)

Code of Ethics for White Anti-Racists by Tim Wise | Medium.com (June 16, 2020)

The Combahee River Collective Statement

Ella Baker and the Black Freedom Movement (Mentoring a New Generation of Activists

For Our White Friends Desiring to Be Allies by Courtney Ariel | Sojo.net (August 16, 2017)

How Did We Get Here? by Gillian B. White | The Atlantic (June 16, 2020)

How to Talk to Relatives Who Care More About Looting Than Black Lives by Rachel Miller | Vice.com (June 3, 2020)

How to Talk to your Children About Protests and Racism by Sandee LaMotte | CNN.com (June 2, 2020)

How to Turn White Privilege Into Antiracist Allyship | WGPH.org (June 5, 2020)

How White People Can Hold Each Other Accountable to Stop Institutional Racism by Elly Belle | teenvogue.com (August 2, 2019)

How White Women Can Use their Privilege to End Racism by Tikia K. Hamilton, PhD | Zora.medium.com (May 28, 2020)

The Intersectionality Wars by Jane Coaston | Vox (May 28, 20 19)

Is Your Company Actually Fighting Racism, or Just Talking About It? by Kira Hudson Banks and Richard Harvey | Harvard Business Review (June 11, 2020)

Message to White Allies from a Black Racial Dialogue Expert: You're Doing it Wrong by Dr. David Kempt | Medium.com (April 27, 2020)

My Life as an Undocumented Immigrant by Jose Antonio Vargas | NYT Mag (June 22, 2011)

Racial Equity at Work Isn't Rocket Science by Dorianne St. Fleur | Medium.com (June 14, 2020)

Racial Microaggressions: Examples and Phrases for Productive Dialogue by Kristen Rogers | CNN (June 6, 2020)

Tips for Creating Effective White Caucus Groups developed by Craig Elliott PhD

What Black Scientists Want From Colleagues and their Institutions by Virginia Gewin | Nature (June 22, 2020)

White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack by Knapsack Peggy McIntosh

Who Gets to Be Afraid in America? by Dr. Ibram X. Kendi | Atlantic (May 12, 2020)

Why You Should Stop Saying, "I Don't See Color" by Dawn Porter | msn.com (June 7, 2020)

Videos to watch:

Podcasts to subscribe to:

Books to read:

Websites to Visit:

Films and TV series to watch:

13th (Ava DuVernay) - Netflix

American Son (Kenny Leon) - Netflix

The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution - Available to rent

Black Power Mixtape: 1967-1975 - Available to rent

Clemency (Chinonye Chukwu) - Available to rent

Dear White People (Justin Simien) - Netflix

Fruitvale Station (Ryan Coogler) - Available to rent

I Am Not Your Negro (James Baldwin doc) - Available to rent or on Kanopy

If Beale Street Could Talk (Barry Jenkins) - Hulu

Just Mercy (Destin Daniel Cretton) - Available to rent

King In The Wilderness - HBO

See You Yesterday (Stefon Bristol) - Netflix

Selma (Ava DuVernay) - Available to rent

The Hate U Give (George Tillman Jr.) - Hulu with Cinemax

When They See Us (Ava DuVernay) - Netflix

Organizations to follow on social media:

More anti-racism resources to check out:

Care for Black People:

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This page is intended to serve as a resource to people and parents to deepen our anti-racism work. if you haven't engaged in anti-racism work in the past, start now. Feel free to circulate this document on social media and with your friends, family and colleagues.

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Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is a set of curriculum design and delivery principles aimed at creating an inclusive and accessible learning experience for students.

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Read Universal Design for Learning: Theory and Practice for Free in Clusive! - CAST

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Our flagship publication is now available at no cost on our flexible and customizable digital reading tool.

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UDL, CRT, and Growth Mindset

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Resources & LMS Examples

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UDL Talk: Culturally Responsive Teaching and the UDL Connection.

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UDL Talk: Culturally Responsive Teaching and the UDL Connection.

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UDL Talk: Culturally Responsive Teaching and the UDL Connection

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This is Not a Fable: Using Storytelling in the College Classroom

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This is Not a Fable: Using Storytelling in the College Classroom

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The Neuroscience of Narrative and Memory

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Delivering content—in any class—through a story has positive effects on your students’ information retention.

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On this page:

Alt text can be read by assistive technologies, which helps make sure more of your audience can access your content.

Alt text has a secondary purpose, too: it can help you, the author, make sure that the image you've selected communicates your intended purpose, which can help improve the overall quality of your content.

You do not need to include alt text for images and graphics that are purely decorative. However, you should include an empty alt attribute, which we'll discuss below.

Examples of alt text descriptions

Alt text should answer this question: What is the content conveyed by the image?

The content of the image is not simply a description of the surface features of the image or graphic. Instead, describe what additional content the graphic contains. What information do you want the reader to gain from looking at the image? What is the main idea being expressed by the graphic? Write in simple, precise language, and keep the explanation brief. Typically no more than a few words are necessary, though rarely a short sentence or two may be appropriate.

Here are some examples of alternative text for images:

Alt text = "Goldy Gopher"

If the context is general - for example, the U's Spirit Squad website - this is sufficient. If the context is a "Mascots of the Big 10" page, then better alt text might be "Goldy Gopher of the University of Minnesota". Or if the page is full of pictures of Goldy in different uniforms, the alt text might be "Spirit Squad Goldy in white uniform with maroon headband".

You don't need to write full alt text if the information about the graphic is located elsewhere in the document, for example if the description of the image is already part of the body text or image caption. Longer descriptions (more than about 125 characters) should be included in the body text of your document, rather than as alt text.

Alt text in Moodle

Adding alt text in Moodle is easy. Here is the dialog box you will see when you add an image to any page or label in Moodle:

Depending what version of Moodle you're using, this dialog box may look a bit different. Notice the field labeled, "Describe this image for someone who cannot see it." Place the alt text in this field. If you check the box below it, labeled "Description not necessary", Moodle will insert a empty alt attribute (discussed below).

Alt text in Microsoft Word and PowerPoint

Add your image to the Word or PowerPoint document. Now, choose Format > Picture from the dropdown menu (or right click on the image and select "Format picture" from the menu). Click "Alt text", one of the options on the side bar. Here is the dialog box you will see:

This is a picture of the dialog box from Microsoft Word 2011. Depending on what version of the application you have on your computer, this may look slightly different. In any case, you will want to add the full alt text in the Description field and a shorter title in the Title field. The title can help the reader decide whether or not they want to read the full description.

Alt text in Google Docs and Slides

After adding an image to a Google document, slide, or spreadsheet, navigate to the menu: Format > Alt Text. The dialog box looks like this:

Add the full alt text in the Description field and a shorter title in the Title field. The title can help the reader decide whether or not they want to read the full description.

Empty alt attribute

Web-based content is marked up with HTML code that tells your web browser how to display text and images. The HTML image tag looks like this:

<img src="mammoth.jpg">

The empty attribute (also called "null") looks like this:

<img src="mammoth.jpg" alt=" ">

This attribute lets the screen reader user know that there is an image but that there is no description for it. The attribute is useful where the image is purely decorative but should not be used when the image conveys meaning.

If you're working with images in a Moodle course web page, you don't need to worry about this as long as you remember to click the box next to "Description not necessary" (Moodle adds the attribute for you in the HTML view). However, you do need to make sure to include the null attribute for decorative images in any other web context, including Drupal, Drupal Lite, Google Sites, Blogger, WordPress and the like.

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Alt text can be read by assistive technologies, which helps make sure more of your audience can access your content. Alt text has a secondary purpose, too: it can help you, the author, make sure that the image you've selected communicates your intended purpose, which can help improve the overall quality of your content.

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e-Toolbox | [Universal Design for Instruction in Postsecondary Education]

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AEM: About Accessible Educational Materials

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Accessible educational materials, or AEM, are materials and technologies usable for learning across the widest range of individual variability, regardless of format or features. Whether a material or technology is designed from the start to be accessible for all learners or is made accessible for learners with disabilities, it is considered AEM.

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LibGuides: UDL-Universe: A Comprehensive Faculty Development Guide: Course Accessibility Checklists

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Checklists developed by CSU campuses to enable faculty to create more accessible courses.

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How To Improve College Reading Skills in Ten Steps

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How To Improve College Reading Skills in Ten Steps

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Learning Strategies Handouts for College Students.

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Learning Strategies Handouts for College Students.

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Resources, Handouts, and Advice for Undergraduates | McGraw Center for Teaching and Learning

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This page is currently under construction. Most, but not all, links are active. The Learning Library General Topics McGraw for Undergraduates [PDF] 7 Strategies for Success [PDF]

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Kurzweil 3000 is an educational technology which provides a reading, writing, and study platform for people with learning disabilities or other disabilities that make reading or writing difficult.

Read&Write is a literacy support tool that offers help with everyday tasks like reading text out loud, understanding unfamiliar words, researching assignments and proofing written work.

SensusAccess is a self-service, computer automated document conversion tool that allows students, faculty, and staff to convert documents into a variety of alternative formats including audio books (mp3, and DAISY), e-books (ePub, ePub3, Mobi), and digital Braille.

For additional information about each platform and download instructions, please visit the Self-Service Technologies & Resources page on the Student Accessibility Services website.

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Kurzweil 3000 is an educational technology which provides a reading, writing, and study platform for people with learning disabilities or other disabilities that make reading or writing difficult. Read&Write is a literacy support tool that offers help with everyday tasks like reading text out loud, understanding unfamiliar words, researching assignments and proofing written work.

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When students go to read an article online, it can be helpful to start with a simpler, shorter, summarized version.

Having a summarized version of an article can help student comprehension in several ways:

It can serve as an advanced organizer to help the students know the main ideas to look for in the full article.

It can provide the student with the key points of the article, if they struggle with pulling out this information themselves.

It can be a replacement for the full article for a struggling student who wants to read the same article as other students but would benefit from a shorter version.

Thankfully there are many summarization tools available online for students to use. Most all of these tools work by analyzing the full article, using algorithms to weigh the relative importance of each word and sentence in the text, and then pulling out what is determined to be the most critical information.
See below for a list of seven such tools. Most of these are Chrome Web Extensions, but the list also includes a bookmark tool and a website.

1) SMMRY
Bookmark Widget - Resource Link

SMMRY is one of the tools in this list that is not a Chrome Web Extension. Instead SMMRY is what's called a Bookmark Widget. To get the tool, go to the SMMRY website at http://smmry.com/bookmark and drag and drop the widget onto your bookmarks bar. Now you will have the tool to use on any website you visit.

To use SMMRY:

Visit a website with an article to read.

Click the SMMRY bookmark widget which will read "One-click Summary".

You will now get an abridged version of the article with 7 sentences by default.

If you want more or fewer sentence, enter a new number in the sentence summary box at the top of the page.

Optionally you can click the "Settings" button at the bottom to make adjustments such as excluding questions, exclamations, and quotations.

2) TLDR
Chrome Web Extension - Resource Link

TLDR stands for "Too Long Didn't Read". This was a great summarization tool that went away for several years, but recently came back. With the extension installed, simply open an article online, and click the extension to get a summary.

By default TLDR will open a pop-up with a short version of the article. However, you can use the toolbar on the side to switch from the short version to medium length, long length, or full size for the article. When done, simply close out of the TLDR window.

3) Resoomer
Chrome Web Extension - Resource Link

Resoomer is another Chrome Web Extension for summarizing articles. When you view an article online and click on the extension, a new tab will open up with the summarization. Resoomer offers three levels of summarizing, from short to medium to long. By default the article will open up in the long version, but you can use the slider to reduce it further to the other levels.

In addition to summarizing the article, Resoomer also cleans up the page in the new tab by removing ads and other non-article content, and displays the text with simple black words on a white background.

4) Internet Abridged
Chrome Web Extension - Resource Link

Another option for summarization is the Chrome Web Extension called Internet Abridged. Clicking on this extension will open a pop-up window with a bullet list of the most important sentences from the article. This tool does not have an options to change how long the summary is, but longer articles will have more bullet points in their summary.

One thing feature that is different about Internet Abridged is the option to get a summary for just a portion of text, rather than the entire page. Simply highlight the text you wish to summarize, then right-click on it and choose " Summarize Selected Text". The shortened text will now be inserted into the webpage above your selection.

5) Auto Highlight
Chrome Web Extension - Resource Link

The Auto Highlight extension takes a different approach to summarizing. Instead of removing the non-essential portions of the text, it highlights what is most important. Simply click the extension when reading an article online, and the most important sentences will be highlighted yellow. You can click the extension again to get more sentences highlighted, and a third time to get the most sentences highlighted. Clicking it again will turn off the highlights and let you start over if you wish.

This approach of highlighting, rather than removing, allows the reader to still look at the rest of the article if needed. They can read through the highlights first, and then as needed can read the other unhighlighted sentences from the original article.

6) Read&Write for Google Chrome
Chrome Web Extension - Resource Link

As I have mentioned in many previous blog posts, Read&Write for Google Chrome is an excellent extension for accessibility and accommodations. Among the many features it has, Read&Write can also summarize web pages. This features is, however, part of the premium paid version of Read&Write. I am including that here though, because many schools do purchase Read&Write, and I want to make sure they are aware of this option.

To summarize with Read&Write, open a web article, click the Read&Write extension to open its toolbar, and then click the "Simplify page" icon on the toolbar. A new tab will open with just the text of the article, in black text on a white background. At the top of the article you can click the minus "-" button to summarize the article and reduce its length. Each time you click the minus button the text will be reduced further. Clicking the plus "+" button will increase the length of the article.

7) Online Summarize Tool
Website - Resource Link

This final summarization is not a Chrome Web Extension, but instead is a website. Although this may not be as convenient as just clicking an extension, it is still a valuable tool that is worth checking out. To use this tool you will want to copy the web address for the article you wish to summarize, then go to the " Online Summarize Tool" website and paste in that link. Finally click the " Summarize It" button to get the summary.

If you want more details you can click the " Show options" link which will let you adjust several settings including:

Threshold - How high a sentence must score to be included in the summary. A higher threshold will mean fewer sentences get included.

Number of lines - Instead of setting a threshold score, you can specifically indicate how many sentences to include in the summary.

Show best words - This will add a list of the most important words from the article.

Keyword highlighting - This option will display the summary, and will increase the font size for the keywords based on their importance to make them more visible.

Conclusion

Summarization tools can be a valuable resource for students to improve their comprehension of online text, help them understand the key points of an article, and even serve as a useful pre-reading summary of what they are going to read. If you know of other tools that can help with this, please include them in the comment below.

Also, if you are interested in other tools to help with accessibility and accommodations, be sure to check out my earlier post of " Chrome Web Extensions for Struggling Students".

Post by Eric Curts. Bring me to your school, organization, or conference with over 50 PD sessions to choose from. Connect with me on Twitter at twitter.com/ericcurts and on Google+ at plus.google.com/+EricCurts1

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When students go to read an article online, it can be helpful to start with a simpler, shorter, summarized version. Having a summarized version of an article can help student comprehension in several ways: It can serve as an advanced organizer to help the students know the main ideas to look for in the full article.

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Writing is a skill that crosses all subject areas and all grade levels. No matter what you teach, it is critical for your students to be able to express their ideas clearly when writing.

There are a multitude of ways for students to improve their writing, including many technology tools that come from Google or that work with G Suite. With these technology tools, the writing process can be improved at all stages from planning to writing to self editing to peer editing to assessment to revising to publishing.

Over the years I have done many blog posts on tech tools for the various stages of the writing process. To make it more convenient, I have pulled together all of those different resources into this one post. See below for an overview of Google tools that can be used to help students and teachers through the writing process.

For each portion of the writing process I have listed some key resources and ideas, but have also linked to my earlier blog posts for each. Be sure to click the links for the related blog posts in each section to get all of the directions, examples, and resources for each.

The Writing Process

For this collection of resources, I have organized the information into eight stages of writing:

Stage #1 - Inspiration

Stage #2 - Planning

Stage #3 - Writing Tools

Stage #4 - Self-editing

Stage #5 - Peer and Teacher Feedback

Stage #6 - Revising

Stage #7 - Assessing

Stage #8 - Publishing

Session Resources Document (for training) - Google Doc link
The first step in writing is coming up with an idea to write about. For stories, poems, or journal entries, Google Sheets can be used as a fun way to generate random writing prompts. See below for my templates and directions for random writing prompt generators using words or emoji images.

Blog post - "Emoji Writing Prompt Generator with Google Sheets" - Website link

Spreadsheet Template - "Emoji Writing Prompt Generator" - Google Sheets link

Blog post - "Random Writing Prompt Generator with Google Sheets" - Website link

Spreadsheet Template - "Random Writing Prompt Generator" - Google Sheets link

Before students write the first word of their report or essay or story, it helps to begin with a plan. One way to do this is to have students use a graphic organizer to collect and arrange their ideas. There are many digital tools for creating graphic organizers, however, an excellent option from the Google suite is Google Drawings. With Drawings you can provide pre-made templates for students to fill in, or the students can create their own graphic organizers.

See below for access to my graphic organizers templates you can copy, as well as additional resources and directions for creating your own.

Blog post - "30 Free Google Drawings Graphic Organizers" - Website link

Blog post - "Language Arts Graphic Organizers with Google Drawings" - Website link

Help Guide - "Google Drawings for Graphic Organizers" - Google Document link

Training video - "Google Drawings for Graphic Organizers" - YouTube Video

Stage #3 - Writing Tools

Once a student begins their actual writing, there are several tools they can use to help get their words on the page.

With this tool students can simply speak to Google Docs and what they say will be converted into text.

This can be a fantastic way to help students get all their thoughts out, especially for those who are still learning to type, or struggle with spelling.

To use this tool in Google Docs click "Tools" then "Voice typing".

Click on the microphone button to dictate to Docs!

For more details on Voice Typing, see the first part of my post on "Self-Editing Tools for Student Writing" - Website link

Explore Tool

This tool can be used to search for information from within a Google Document.

The student can search for websites, images, and more.

Information found can then be added to their writing in Google Docs, including citations for the source.

To access this tool in Google Docs click "Tools" then "Explore".

Rhyme Finder Add-on

If the student is working on poetry, The Rhyme Finder Add-on for Google Docs can be a helpful tool.

This add-on provides a list of rhyming words for any word you select in a Google Document.

You can install the Rhyme Finder Add-on here: Google Docs Add-on link

Stage #4 - Self-editing

After students have started their writing, they will want to review what they have written and make improvements. There are loads of useful tools that can help students to self-edit their writing, including text-to-speech, grammar checkers, dictionaries, and more. With these resources students can take ownership of the editing process to improve their writing.

See below for directions and resources for student self-editing.

Blog post - "Self-Editing Tools for Student Writing in Google Docs" - Website link

Slideshow - "Self-Editing Tools for Student Writing in Google Docs" - Google Slides link

Text-to-Speech

With the text-to-speech feature of the Read&Write extension, students can have their writing read back aloud to them.

Having a text-to-speech tool read the document aloud provides an accurate rendition of what was really written, helping the student catch incorrect terms, accidentally repeated words, and sections that do not flow well.

Read&Write for Google Chrome - Chrome Web Store link

Grammar and Style Checkers
Thesaurus Tools

Google Docs "Define" feature - Select a word, click "Tools" then "Define"

Writefull Thesaurus add-on: Google Docs Add-on link

Stage #5 - Peer and Teacher Feedback

In addition to self-editing, students can benefit greatly from feedback from their peers and teachers. With Google Docs there are many ways for others to view student works and provide helpful input, including text, voice, video, and handwritten feedback.

See below for resources and directions for different feedback options.

Blog post - "Four Fantastic Feedback Tools for Google Docs" - Website link

Training video - "Fantastic Feedback Tools for Google Docs" - YouTube Video

Slideshow - "Feedback Tools for Google Docs" - Google Slides link

Sharing for Feedback

To allow others to leave feedback on a Google Doc, the file needs to be shared properly.

Sharing with "Can comment" rights - This allows peer review and teacher feedback on writing

Sharing with "Can edit" rights - This allows student group work, as well as detailed feedback from teachers

For more details on sharing see my post "Sharing and Collaborating with Google Drive" - Website link

Text Feedback

Simple text feedback can be provided with the Insert Comment feature

You can use the Voice Typing feature to speak your text comments by saying "Insert Comment" followed by the comment

You can use Google Keep integration to insert text comments from comment lists - Website link

Sample comment banks - Website link

Sample Docs Stickers - Website link

You can use the "Checkmark" extension to insert frequently used text comments quickly - Extension link

Voice Feedback

The Read&Write for Google Chrome web extension can be used to record voice comments and insert them into a Google Doc. This can be a great way to provide personalized feedback to students on their work.

Read&Write Chrome extension - Chrome web store link

Register as a teacher to get the full version at no cost - Website link

Use the Voice Note feature to record your voice and insert into the document.

Video Feedback

The Screencastify Chrome web extension can be used to make a video recording of your screen so you can record video and audio feedback of the student's work, such as their Google Document.

You can record 10 minutes at a time for free, the recorded video is saved to your drive, and the link to the video can easily be shared with the student for them to watch.

Screencastify Chrome extension: Chrome web store link

Blog post - "Super Screencasting Activities for Students" - Website link

Handwritten Feedback

The mobile version of the Classroom app allows teachers and students to handwrite annotated notes on top of documents. This is a great way to provide more natural written feedback to students on their work.

Android App - Mobile app link

Open the student's Google Doc.

Click the pencil icon in the top right corner to switch to annotation mode.

Click the save icon in the top right when done

Stage #6 - Revising

As students edit and improve their writing, it can be very useful to be able to see what changes they have made over time. There are several tools available to help provide you with this insight into the student's writing process.

Version History

With Google Docs (and Slides, Sheets, Drawings) you can view the version history to see all the changes ever made to the document as well as who made the change. This can be valuable information for the writing and revision process.

Blog post - "6 awesome uses for Revision History" - Website link

Blog post - "Using Named Versions in Docs to Track Writing Drafts" - Website link

Draftback

This extension allows you to view the revision history of a document like a movie, so you can see the order in which the document was written and edited.

Draftback Chrome Extension - Chrome web store link

Revision History Analytics

This tool collects all of the Revision History data and then creates pie charts and tables showing data for each person who edited the Doc.

These include totals for each person's interactions, edits, comments, and words.

It is a simple way to get a visual and numeric representation of how much each person contributed to the work.

Revision History Analytics - Google Doc Add-on link

Stage #7 - Assessing

One part of the writing process is providing an assessment of the product. Rather than just giving a simple grade, a rubric can be used to give detailed feedback to students on their writing. There are several tools you can use to grade Google Documents with rubrics.

See below for directions on how to use several different rubric tools.

Rubric Tools:

Stage #8 - Publishing

Rather than have the student writing process end with their grade, we can extend it by sharing their writing with a broader, authentic audience. This provides motivation for students to write their best and to continue to revise and improve their work.

Because Google Docs are digital, it is easy for student writing to be shared with family, community, others students, and people around the world.

Documents can be shared as a link, and then the link can be posted on websites, blogs, social media, emails, newsletters, and more.

Documents can be exported into other formats including PDF's and EPUB to be shared through other services.

For details on how to share student writing online see my blog post linked below:

Blog Post - "Why and How to Share Student Writing with the World" - Website link

Conclusion
Writing is a complex process made of many parts, not just the act of putting words on a page. All along this process there are many technology tools that can help students and teachers to improve the writing.

I am sure you know other technology tools to add to this list, and I would love to hear your suggestions in the comment section. Hopefully though you have picked up some new ideas and inspiration from the resources above.

Post by Eric Curts. Bring me to your school, organization, or conference with over 50 PD sessions to choose from. Connect with me on Twitter at twitter.com/ericcurts and on Google+ at plus.google.com/+EricCurts1

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Writing is a skill that crosses all subject areas and all grade levels. No matter what you teach, it is critical for your students to be able to express their ideas clearly when writing. There are a multitude of ways for students to improve their writing, including many technology tools that come from Google or that work with G Suite.

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Microsoft Learning Tools are free tools that implement proven techniques to improve reading and writing for people regardless of their age or ability.

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Photo Credit: Antoine Gady via Compfight
'Growth Mindset Starts With Us, Not With Them' is the first post in a two-part series at my Education Week Teacher column. Also check out Here Are The Movie Scenes That Readers Have Said Demonstrate A Growth Mindset - & I'm Still Looking For More My Growth Mindset Lesson s Usually Go Well, But What I Did Today Was The Best Yet (Student Hand-Outs Included)
The "question of the week" at my Education Week Teacher column this week is " How Can We Help Our Students Develop a Growth Mindset?" (NOTE: You can now read Carol Dweck's guest response to that question here). As part of the response, which will be published on Tuesday, I thought a "The Best..." list would be useful.

Carol Dweck, who identified the concept, will be one of the guests responding to that question, and several readers have already shared their ideas. There's still time to contribute yours....

You can find a specific lesson in my book, Helping Students Motivate Themselves, on how I incorporate the idea of a growth mindset in my classroom, and some of my other related ideas in my article in this month's edition of ASCD Educational Leadership, Eight Things Skilled Teachers Think, Say, and Do.

Here are my choices for The Best Resources On Helping Our Students Develop A "Growth Mindset":

I've got to start with Professor Dweck's own website, Mindset Online. Other resources by her are included in all "The Best..." lists in this post.

Here are a few previous related "The Best..." lists:
The Best Posts, Articles & Videos About Learning From Mistakes & Failures The Best Resources For Showing Students That They Make Their Brain Stronger By Learning The Best Resources For Learning How To Best Give Feedback To Students The Best Resources For Learning About The Importance Of "Grit"
Here is a fabulous infographic on the concept.

The Pajaro Valley School District has an excellent collection of resources, Carol Dweck's Important Work on Mindsets.

Montgomery Schools also have a useful online packet.

Eduardo Briceño is the Co-Founder, with Dr. Carol Dweck, of Mindset Works:
Here's The "Growth Mindset" Article & Prompt We're Using As Part Of Our Semester Final Useful "Fixed" vs. "Growth" Mindset Worksheet For Students
read two excellent posts today on giving effective feedback, and I'm adding both of them to The Best Resources For Learning How To Best Give Feedback To Students:

How To Give Good Feedback is by Annie Murphy Paul.

Here's an excellent interview with Carol Dweck. I learn from all of her work, but I found this one particularly interesting because she shared some thoughts I hadn't heard her say before. Here's one particularly useful excerpt:
Our Students Are Not Supermen & Superwomen
Changing Teens' Mindsets on Social Aggression is a useful Ed Week article.

Promoting Equity Through Teaching For A Growth Mindset

Quote Of The Day AND Video: "We'll Score Goals When We Grow Old"
Interesting New Study By Carol Dweck

Quote Of The Day: "Your Thoughts Can Release Abilities Beyond Normal Limits"

'Growth Mindset' Gaining Traction as School Improvement Strategy is from Education Week.

Daniel Coyle shared this video on Twitter. Even though it has a sports focus, it can very easily be applied to any area of learning:

Studies Offer Practical Ways to Bring 'Growth Mindset' Research to Schools is an Ed Week post about some recent studies. One of them featured having students read about the struggles experienced by famous scientists, as opposed by focusing solely on their achievements, and resulted in higher student motivation and academic achievement. Here's an earlier study done by the same researchers with Taiwanese students (the most recent research was with classes in New York) that reached similar conclusions and has a lot of interesting background information.

Teachers told: use 'not yet' in place of 'fail' when marking is from The Telegraph. It's about a new guide for UK teachers on how to help students develop a growth mindset.
Two Good Videos On How We Learn & How I Plan To Use Them In Class
New Research: Students Benefit from Learning That Intelligence Is Not Fixed is from MindShift.
Two New Sesame Street Videos On Social Emotional Learning Researchers See What A Growth Mindset Does To The Brain

Growth mindset and the educator. pic.twitter.com/6cn6JA3VmZ #Satchat #sunchat #edchat #edtech

- Teacher (@Primary_Ed) November 9, 2014

Video: New TEDx Talk By Carol Dweck Study Finds That Bilingualism Supports A Growth Mindset Quote Of The Day: I Think This Is The Best Article Carol Dweck Has Written Good Videos On A Growth Mindset, The Importance Of Learning From Mistakes & A Lot More Khan Develops Decent Lesson On Growth Mindset But, Come On, Can't They Create An Engaging Video? New Study Shows That Teaching About "Growth Mindset" Works At Large Scale - Or Does It? Three Useful Growth Mindset Resources The Limits To The Power Of A Growth Mindset (& The Dangers When We Don't Recognize Them)
The Educator and the Growth Mindset is from Jackie Gerstein and Metacognition Curriculum is an older post from Frank Noschese.

Test Your Mindset is an online interactive from Carol Dweck that I think would be useful to offer to students.

Helping Students Reach Their Full Potential with the Growth Mindset is by Dan Winkler and provides a pretty good, and short, definition of a growth mindset.

Here's a TED-Ed lesson using the above video.

Growth Mindset - More Evidence is from Alex Quigley.

There was a recent conference in the UK which featured Carol Dweck. It sounds like she made some interesting points, particularly around what she called a "False Growth Mindset." Here are some reports on that talk, along with other resources:

Praise the taking on of challenge, perseverance, new strategies, recovery from setbacks, says Dweck. Also praise improvement and learning.

- David Weston (@informed_edu) June 19, 2015

Why the 'false growth mindset' explains so much is from The Learning Spy. The Mindset Journey is from Drowning in the Shallow.

Very useful for anyone interested in Growth Mindsets https://t.co/h0YJpu8WcY

- Carl Hendrick (@C_Hendrick) June 14, 2015

Math educators! @joboaler has developed a week of math lessons and #growthmindset videos: https://t.co/3mrdndn0pB https://t.co/S5HaESKAZ6 - PERTS (@pertslab) June 1, 2015

- David Dockterman (@dockterman) May 11, 2015

Quote Of The Day: Carol Dweck On "Nagging"

5 tips for instilling a growth mindset culture in your classroom. #growthmindset pic.twitter.com/lL1OrhmaKT #edchat #edtech #EYTalking #SLTchat - Teacher (@Primary_Ed) June 23, 2015

Guest Post: Growth Mindset Memes
Shaun Allison has written an exceptional post and created a great slideshow about the growth mindset. He graciously gave me permission to share his slideshow here:

Carol Dweck and Growth Mindset is a well-done and interesting thirty minute BBC interview with Carol Dweck and her associates

Why a 'Growth Mindset' Won't Work is a very good column by Peter DeWitt.

Growth Mindset and Testing/The Hunger Games. http://t.co/eVcabNJYjG #hungergames #mindsets #PBIS #charactered #SEL #schoolclimate #climate

- Learning Solutions (@CollabLearnSol) July 22, 2015

Quote Of The Day: "What Does This Experience Make Possible?" Growth Mindset - Don't Throw The Baby Out With The Bathwater Research Study On Humility Perfect For Students (& Useful For All Of Us)
When Pupils Talk in Absolutes: Understanding Mindset though Self-Narrative is by Sarah Donarski.

Four questions that encourage growth mindset among students https://t.co/5yABKYoEIG < well worth a read

- Guardian Education (@GuardianEdu) November 15, 2015

Carol Dweck: "Keep trying, you can do it" is nagging, Instead ask "What have you tried, what strategy shall we try next?" #ewaMotivation - Stanford Education (@StanfordEd) November 11, 2015

The Golden State Warriors & Social Emotional Learning
Be a Mirror: Give Readers Feedback That Fosters a Growth Mindset is from The International Literacy Association.

Positive Mindset May Prime Students' Brains for Math is from Ed Week.

Why Growth Mindsets Are Necessary to Save Math Class is from The Atlantic.

Carol Dweck has recently written several pieces on the dangers of a "false growth mindset." Here are a few:

Recognizing and Overcoming False Growth Mindset is from Edutopia.

What Having a "Growth Mindset" Actually Means appeared in the Harvard Business Review.

The Stanford professor who pioneered praising kids for effort says we've totally missed the point is from Quartz.

I Did My Best Job Teaching A "Growth Mindset" Today - Here's The Lesson Plan

Here's What My Students Think Of A Growth Mindset
Study: Learning About Failures Of Famous Scientists Improves Student Achievement
Amazon, Ed. Organizations Launch Blitz for "Growth Mindset" in Math is from Ed Week.

What I Learned About Growth Mindset When Students Taught Me is from Ed Week.

Grow Your Mindset! is an accessible article with audio support.

- Brainology (@Brainology) February 13, 2016

New Study Finds A New Twist On Growth Mindset - Overconfident People Don't Have It Carol Dweck Makes Strongest Statement Yet On Growth Mindset Misuse
Nurturing Growth Mindsets: Six Tips From Carol Dweck is from Ed Week.
Quote Of The Day: "Effort Is Not The Only Thing" - Carol Dweck On A Growth Mindset Mindset Scholars Network Website Is Key New Resource For Social Emotional Learning Does Your Principal Support Teachers Developing A Growth Mindset?
Carol Dweck talks about a growth mindset. You can read her contribution to my Ed Week column at Classroom Strategies to Foster a Growth Mindset
Quote Of The Day: LeBron James On A Growth Mindset We Did A Great 'Growth Mindset' Lesson With Our ELLs This Week - Here's The Lesson Plan Study: "you want to speak to the brilliance, but you also need to speak to the struggle"
3 Myths of Mindset is by Dan Haesler.
Opportunities & Dangers Of Big New Growth Mindset Study
Mindset Works has a great list of feedback examples that promote a growth mindset.

Teaching kids to struggle #GrowthMindset is an excellent and simple lesson from Class Creator.

Growth Mindset vs Fixed Mindset: An Introduction is a useful TED-Ed lesson.

Mindset Works has unveiled a redesigned website and lots of free resources.

I love this! We talked about using the word "yet" at our teacher in service last week too! pic.twitter.com/OgTUv0CTqN

- Stacy Sedory (@SedoryAP) September 4, 2016

Seven Common Growth Mindset Scenarios and Responses is from The Mindset Kit.

Ed Week has published a special report on a growth mindset:
Mindset in the Classroom: A National Study of K-12 Teachers Teachers Seize On 'Growth Mindset,' But Crave More Training Quiz Yourself: Does This Classroom Feedback Promote a Growth Mindset?
Introducing Growth Mindset in Math is from Runde's Room.

How Microsoft Uses a Growth Mindset to Develop Leaders is by Carol Dweck.

How to Integrate Growth Mindset Messages Into Every Part of Math Class is from MindShift.
New Carol Dweck Interview On Having A "False Growth Mindset"
Growth mindset: practical tips you may not have tried yet is from The Guardian.
New Study Connects Growth Mindset & "Bouncing Back" From Mistakes
PERTS from Stanford is offering a free two-hour online program to promote a growth mindset to all ninth-graders. It's definitely worth a look.

Growth mindset is on a firm foundation, but we're still building the house is by Carol Dweck.

Is Mindset Theory Really In Trouble? is from New York Magazine.

Young Adult Novels That Teach a Growth Mindset is by Robert Ward.

Four Teaching Moves That Promote A Growth Mindset In All Readers is from MindShift.

Growth mindset, performance avoidance, and academic behaviors in Clark County School District is a long report worth a quick review.

Growth mindset: teaching panacea or classroom pitfall? is from TES.

I Want to get Better at... Growth Mindset Next Year is from The Teaching Channel.

Are You Getting Growth Mindset Wrong? is from The HuffPost.

I love this poster on developing a growth mindset community from @joboaler, @FeldsteinShelah, and @mathschristine.
https://t.co/9BuR6JURF9 pic.twitter.com/GA3nO8PKLG

- Robert Kaplinsky (@robertkaplinsky) June 17, 2017

Misinterpreting the Growth Mindset: Why We're Doing Students a Disservice is by John Hattie.

An Introduction to Growth Mindset from Character Lab on Vimeo.

What If Students Have More Confidence in Growth Mindsets Than Their Teachers? is from Ed Surge.
New Study Suggests That Motivation & Growth Mindset Are Most Important Factors For Student Success
Reduce Bullying by Cultivating Growth Mindsets is from Mindset Works.

Research every teacher should know: growth mindset is from The Guardian.

Praise the effort, not the outcome? Think again is by Carol Dweck.

Bruce Lee is a cult hero to many students, so the article Bruce Lee Used This Ancient Philosophy to Break Through His Limits (and Find Remarkable Success) could be a hit. It appears in Inc., and focuses his having a growth mindset.
Elmo Teaches The Power Of "Yet"
What Do Schools Fostering A Teacher "Growth Mindset" Look Like? is from The Shanker Institute.

New Stanford Study: A Positive Attitude Literally Makes Your Brain Work Better is from Inc.
Results Just Unveiled Of Big New Growth Mindset Study Co-Authored By A Ton Of Well-Known SEL Researchers
How to Integrate Growth Mindset Messages Into Every Part of Math Class is from MindShift.
Important Reminder That We Need To Praise Process To Support A Growth Mindset Carol Dweck's New Response To Critiques Of Growth Mindset New Study Shows Learning About Growth Mindset At Start Of Ninth-Grade Increases Resilience New Study Finds A Growth Mindset Intervention Effective When It Highlights Impact On Brain
Got Growth Mindset? 5 Pinterest-worthy Ways to Make It Visible in Your Classroom is from Teach Learn Grow.

Study: Promoting growth mindset in teachers may pay dividends for students is from Education Dive.

Growth Mindset In Learning Neglects "Fixed" Mindset In K-12 Math Curriculum Design is from Sunil Singh.

A growth mindset will help you handle setbacks - of any size is from The Seattle Times.

Is Growth Mindset the Missing Piece in the Equity Discussion? is from Ed Surge.

#Teachers, are you looking for #growthmindset videos to share with your #students? Check out @MindsetWorks video library at https://t.co/f4eHYISGY1 #BackToSchool2018 #educators #learn #edchat #edchatie pic.twitter.com/9GRujK5fyL

- Mindset Works (@MindsetWorks) August 29, 2018

Having a Growth Mindset Makes It Easier to Develop New Interests is from The Harvard Business Review.

But as the authors themselves point out, small effects may be educationally important if they cost little to achieve. Moreover, the meta-analysis did not consider important moderators of effect such as age, and the sensitivity of outcome measures to the effects of instruction...

- Dylan Wiliam (@dylanwiliam) November 8, 2018

STUDENT-WRITTEN GROWTH MINDSET STORIES HERE ARE EXAMPLES OF WHAT STUDENTS WROTE ABOUT A GROWTH MINDSET GROWTH MINDSET IN ACTION
STEM faculty who believe ability is fixed have larger racial achievement gaps and inspire less student motivation in their classes is from Science Magazine.
THIS QUOTE IS A GREAT ONE FOR SHOWING THE IMPORTANCE OF A GROWTH MINDSET

When we praise children for their intelligence, we tell them that this is the name of the game: Look smart, don't risk making mistakes.

- willunfollowforfood (@iunfollowanyway) April 2, 2019

Nurturing a Culture of Growth is from Psychology Today.

Building Growth Mindset in the Classroom: Assignments From Carol Dweck is from Ed Week.
TWO FREE ONLINE PROGRAMS FOR TEACHERS & STUDENTS - ONE ON STUDENT ENGAGEMENT & THE OTHER ON GROWTH MINDSET
If you've found this list helpful, you might want to consider subscribing to this blog for free.

Great way to show the differences in a short and sweet display! Thanks for contributing to the growth mindset community! https://t.co/luTSUru1sc

- Mindset Works (@MindsetWorks) July 11, 2019

RESULTS OF BIGGEST MINDSET STUDY FINDS POSITIVE IMPACT

IN DEFENSE OF CAROL DWECK (a thread):

Given the current discussion about Carol Dweck and growth mindsets, I'd like to add my two cents. Of course, I'm COMPLETELY unbiased, since she has been my mentor and friend for almost 15 years. (1/12) pic.twitter.com/8UVpEytDZk

- Dr. Allison Master (@AllisonMaster) August 9, 2019

A Proof Point for the Value of Growth Mindsets is from FutureEd.
VERY INTERESTING VIDEO: "HOW TO STAY MOTIVATED - THE LOCUS RULE" THIS IS PROBABLY THE BEST & MOST ACCESSIBLE REVIEW OF GROWTH MINDSET RESEARCH THAT YOU'RE GOING TO FIND
Growth Mindset for Mentors is from Mindset Kit.

MindsetWorks offers a number of useful free resources.

Psychologist Carol Dweck: 'Everyone is a work in progress' is from The Financial Times.

Here's how a new study titled "False growth mindsets" is described:
This research snapshot summarizes a project led by Nicholas Buttrick as part of the National Study of Learning Mindsets Early Career Fellowship. In a sample of 9th grade mathematics teachers, the project explores the concept of false growth mindset - a belief that effort alone can lead to improvement regardless of other factors like effective learning strategies and help-seeking. NOT ONLY CAN IT BE MOTIVATING TO HAVE A GROWTH MINDSET, BUT NEW STUDIES FIND LEARNING ABOUT OTHERS WHO HAVE IT CAN BE MOTIVATING, TOO
Growth Mindset vs. Fixed + Key Takeaways From Dweck's Book is from Positive Psychology.
HIGHLIGHTING SCIENTISTS WHO SUCCEEDED MORE THROUGH EFFORT THAN BRILLIANCE ENHANCES STUDENT MOTIVATION IN SCIENCE YOU WON'T FIND A BETTER GROWTH MINDSET QUOTE THAN THIS ONE FROM A RUGBY STAR
6 Ways a Crisis Can Help You Cultivate a Growth Mindset is from the Harvard Business Review.

You might want to also view the over nine hundred other "The Best..." lists.

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The Best Resources On Helping Our Students Develop A "Growth Mindset"

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Photo Credit: Antoine Gady via Compfight 'Growth Mindset Starts With Us, Not With Them' is the first post in a two-part series at my Education Week Teacher column.

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Cultural Diversity Images, Stock Photos & Vectors | Shutterstock

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Find cultural diversity Stock Images in HD and millions of other royalty-free stock photos, illustrations, and vectors in the Shutterstock collection. Thousands of new, high-quality pictures added every day.

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"We initially chose IRIS because of the past experiences and their credible research-based, high-quality modules that align with specific areas of growth and need to support a state-directed corrective action plan in our region."

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"We initially chose IRIS because of the past experiences and their credible research-based, high-quality modules that align with specific areas of growth and need to support a state-directed corrective action plan in our region."

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Making a TED-Ed Lesson: Visualizing complex ideas

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How can animation convey complex, intangible concepts? A visual metaphor, or an idea represented through imagery, can take an idea as massive as Big Data and tie it to the familiar depiction of a growing tree. TED-Ed animators explain how to make an abstract idea come alive visually.

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Flip is a video discussion and sharing app, free from Microsoft.

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Flip (formerly Flipgrid) is a video discussion and video sharing app, free from Microsoft, built for classrooms and beyond. Learn more.

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Easily create beautiful interactive video lessons for your students you can integrate right into your LMS. Track students' progress with hassle-free analytics as you flip your classroom!

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didactic and useful. After reading some quite dense posts on , I've enjoyed this a lot. You have now convinced me to use ! THANK YOU Jenny and CONGRATS!!! Maruzzela Beltran SINGLE-POINT Amanda I have not seen or heard of single point . I'm really excited to try that out. Less wordy and easier for students to see what is expected of them and get meaningful feedback. Sariah Pearson Oooh! I never thought I'd like a post on rubrics, but this was awesome! Thanks for your great explanations. I'm currently working my way through your Teacher's Guide to Tech/Jumpstart...
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wholly focusing their attention on what I want them to strive for and attain. I love the open-ended areas provided to comment on areas of concern and areas where a child has excelled. Using regular rubrics, I find that often I am trying to jam in comments regarding a student's' performance that are not outlined in my rigid prescribed rubrics; the single point rubrics provides me with open-ended areas to comment on these clearly and without limiting by thoughts to items only described in the rubrics. The single point rubrics is definitely a tool that I will be implementing in...
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...does it differ from a language-based assignment? Michael Eppolito First, I love your blog. I have been using rudimentary forms of single point rubrics for years now. In my old rubrics I gave more space to the points that to the feedback. I have now shifted that. I did not get exposed to this format until I left the classroom. Now that I am working as a Professional Learning Coordinator I have been both using this to give feedback to teachers on their curriculum work and have been pushing it as the format we should use for rubrics district wide....
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...that are merely easy to see or score" (173). This is SO crucial, and I'm sure if we're all honest with ourselves, we'll admit to sometimes assessing for things that are simply easy to measure, regardless of how vital those things are to a deep understanding of our content. We need to be sure our criteria come directly from our goals. * For performance assessments, we need to develop rubrics that clearly outline our criteria. (To learn more about the different types of rubrics and download free templates, see our article on holistic, analytic, and single-point rubrics). We are urged...
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...the grade processing that seems to be happening in the background is still a traditional setup and not really Standards-Based Grading. While it's true that Kiddom allows for assignments to be aligned with learning standards and connected to rubrics for grading, in the end each assignment gets a certain number of points and these points are the basis of an overall grade. Standards-Based Grading isn't just about using rubrics to assess work. The approach includes a rejection of points-based grading as carrying with it all sorts of issues that have gone largely undetected and run antithetically to the mastery-based focus...
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Do you have a mountain of student writing to grade? A pile of extended responses that have been sitting in your passenger seat for a week? Do you wish you had more time to give students better feedback? This video shows you how to use rubric codes-a small twist on grading student writing that keeps the feedback but cuts way down on the time. If you're getting way behind on your grading, this may be just what you need. Need Ready-Made Rubrics? My Rubric Pack gives you four different designs in Microsoft Word and Google Docs formats. It...
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...he has created an amazing pool of resources for teachers of all subjects. Every week he comes to our school and works with us in creating a curriculum that fosters critical thinking skills. Check out his website http://argumentcenterededucation.com/ Sarah Cooper Can't wait to read Erik's new book! And keep in mind that his "Well Spoken: Teaching Speaking to All Students" is similarly game changing and digestible. I've been using its techniques for years, and his PVLEGS acronym informs all of my oral presentation rubrics. Kristy Louden I recently found this website and used some resources to get my argument essay...
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...and resubmit to their editors until it's ready for publication, and I want to replicate that. Any assignment like a test where the writing is done once and turned in needs to be treated as a first draft, which I think many teachers forget.) We use Google Docs which let me easily post comments and paste in rubrics. Many students receive grades they don't like the first time around, because I tailor the rubrics to look for specific things that we're working on in class. A typical first-time-around grade will be something like 20%. My students will resubmit revised writing...
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Listen to my interview with Lisa Highfill, Kelly Hilton, and Sarah Landis, authors of The HyperDoc Handbook (transcript): In many classrooms, a learning cycle looks something like this: First, we write plans for a series of lessons and a final assessment. We gather materials-handouts, websites, rubrics, video clips. Then we teach the lessons one at a time, to the whole class, at the same pace, distributing materials as needed. Finally, we end with a project, test, or other assessment. It's a very teacher-directed model, which can limit learning in a number of ways: Students don't feel much ownership...
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didactic and useful. After reading some quite dense posts on , I've enjoyed this a lot. You have now convinced me to use ! THANK YOU Jenny and CONGRATS!!! Maruzzela Beltran SINGLE-POINT Amanda I have not seen or heard of single point . I'm really excited to try that out.

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On Educating Culturally Sustaining Teachers

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On Educating Culturally Sustaining Teachers

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Culturally Responsive Teaching in the ELL Classroom is an excerpt from our book.
'Culturally Responsive Teaching Is Not a Quick Fix' is a series in my Education Week Teacher column.
Excerpt From Our New Book: "Culturally Responsive and Sustaining Teaching" Help Language Learners Lead Their Own Learning is another excerpt from our new book, the second edition of The ESL/ELL Teacher's Survival Guide.
The majority of students in U.S. schools are students of color, and the vast majority of educators who teach them are white.

Two of the most common strategies/philosophies guiding how teachers of all races can be better teachers to students of color are "culturally responsive teaching" and "culturally sustaining pedagogy."

Here are how well-known advocates of each describe them:

Zaretta Hammond:
In a nutshell, culturally responsive teaching is about helping culturally and linguistically diverse students who have been marginalized in schools build their skill and capacity to do rigorous work. The focus isn't on motivation but on improving their brainpower and information processing skills.
Django Paris:
A few years ago, I introduced CSP as teaching and learning that seeks to perpetuate and foster linguistic, literate, and cultural pluralism as part of the democratic project of schooling and as a needed response to demographic and social change. I was building off the foundational work of Gloria Ladson-Billings, work that continues to lead our visions of educational equity. CSP asks us to imagine and enact teaching and learning that forwards multiple ways with language, literacy, and culture against the backdrop of an educational system that continues to be centered largely on White, middle class, monolingual, cis-heteropatriarchal, and abliest norms of achievement.
You might also be interested in A Collection Of Useful Posts, Articles & Videos On Race & Racism - Help Me Find More, which contains a number of related links, including quite a few on the need for more teachers of color.

This list is a beginning one, and I'll be adding far more - including suggestions from readers:

'Culturally Responsive Teaching': An Interview With Zaretta Hammond is an interview that appeared in my Education Week Teacher column.

Making Connections: Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain is an interview with Zaretta that appeared in Edutopia. Thanks to Akilah Ellison for the tip.

3 Tips to Make Any Lesson More Culturally Responsive (and it's not what you think!) is by Zaretta Hammond and appeared at Cult of Pedagogy.

No, DeAndre. It's Not Your Imagination: What the DOJ Report Tells Us about Implicit Bias and Validation is by Zaretta Hammond.

'It is Long Past Time to Meet the Needs of Students of Color' is Part One of a series co-hosted by Django and Travis Bristol at my Ed Week Teacher column.

Culturally Sustaining Pedagogy 'Increases Student Engagement & Learning' is Part Two of that series.

Teachable Moments and Academic Rigor: A Mini-Unit is by Travis Bristol and Claude Goldenberg.

Here are additional posts that are related, though I'm not sure if they specifically fit into either of the earlier two categories:

'For White Folks Who Teach in the Hood...': An Interview With Chris Emdin is another recent post at my Ed Week Teacher column.

On the Importance of Mirrors for Students (and Teachers) appeared in The Huffington Post.

Teachers undo personal biases to help students of color engage is from Colorado Public Radio.

Read This: "Teachers More Likely to Label Black Students as Troublemakers" is by Renee Moore.

Educate to Liberate: Build an Anti-Racist Classroom is from Edutopia.

10 Ways Well-Meaning White Teachers Bring Racism Into Our Schools is from Everyday Feminism.

Understanding Implicit Bias: What Educators Should Know is from the AFT.

How to Change White Teachers' Lenses is from Slate.

@BU_SED's @chriscmartell wrk w/ @bostonschooIs tchers on culturally relevant argumentation writing https://t.co/ivRD1ZtvYw @Larryferlazzo

- Dr. Travis.Bristol (@TJacksonBristol) June 13, 2016

Hyped to share my @Teachingworks paper, "On Educating Culturally Sustaining Teachers." Hope it's useful in the work! https://t.co/0DXnDFZgvX

- Django Paris (@django_paris) June 27, 2016

Three teachers in my BPS Workshop on culturally relevant argumentation have posted their unit plans. Check them out: https://t.co/RWoNHwsFCI

- Christopher Martell (@chriscmartell) July 22, 2016

Relationship Building Through Culturally Responsive Classroom Management is by Todd Finley.
The National Association for Multicultural Education
What Is 'Culturally Competent' Teaching? (Videos) is from Ed Week.

Matching Student Resources With Student Experiences is by Jordan Lanfair.

Reading Your Way to a Culturally Responsive Classroom is from NAEYC. I'm adding to the same list.

#CRTandtheBrain What's the difference between CRT and multicultural education? See @Ready4rigor definitions here #anewkindofPD pic.twitter.com/rGn88YnGlZ

- Teaching Channel (@TeachingChannel) October 6, 2016

But That's Just Good Teaching! The Case for Culturally Relevant Pedagogy is by Gloria Ladson-Billings.

This is a useful infographic on culturally responsive teaching.

Culturally Responsive Teaching & The Brain is by Zaretta Hammond.

Working to Build a Multicultural Classroom is from Middleweb.

7 Tips to Implement Culturally Responsive Teaching is geared specifically for ELLs.

Culturally Responsive Classrooms is from Scholastic.

Equity and Cultural Responsiveness is from Just Ask Publications. I'm adding it to Rick Wormeli shared it on Twitter.

Four Ways Teachers Can Support Students of Color is by Jennifer Gonzalez.

9 THINGS EVERY EDUCATOR NEEDS TO KNOW WHEN TEACHING BLACK STUDENTS is from Philly's 7th Ward.

3 Lessons Learned When Bringing to Life Culturally Responsive Practices is by DR. YEMI STEMBRIDGE.

Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain: An Interview With Zaretta Hammond is from Corwin.

How Leaders Can Improve Their Schools' Cultural Competence is by Chris Lehmann.

Are You Practicing Culturally Responsive Teaching? is from Valentina Gonzalez.

Author Interview: 'Culturally Sustaining Pedagogies' is the headline of one of my Education Week Teacher columns. In it, Django Paris and H. Samy Alim agreed to answer a few questions about their new book, "Culturally Sustaining Pedagogies: Teaching and Learning for Justice in a Changing World."

What Culturally Responsive Teaching Sounds Like is by Sean Riley.

Culturally Responsive Teaching: 4 Misconceptions appeared in Cult of Pedagogy.

How to Create Culturally Responsive Classrooms is by Valentina Gonzalez and appeared at Middleweb.
Nice Ed Week Interview With Glorida Ladson-Billings
Culturally Responsive Education:Facing Pushback is from The Coalition For Educational Justice.

Cultural Responsiveness Starts in the Principal's Office is by Joseph Ellison.

Courtesy of @sonianieto

What Culturally Responsive Pedagogy IS and IS NOT: pic.twitter.com/D3IdM4BaMe

- Adeyemi Stembridge (@DrYemiS) May 13, 2018

Culturally Responsive Instruction is a collection from Cornelius Minor.

A Culturally Responsive Guide to Understanding Immigrant-Origin Children is from UCLA.

How to avoid known pitfalls associated with culturally responsive instruction is from STEM Teaching Tools.

Our presentation "Countering Culture Loss" for #ELLs in schools #CLRteaching #CSPjustice w/Culturally Sustaining Pedagogies (CSP). Check out our materials at https://t.co/y8euJJZMoF & look 4 our list of CSP practices. Thanks @LCIColloquium @django_paris @HSamyAlim @mynamemyid_ pic.twitter.com/P1FzbHodMA

- Mat Espinosa (@matheworyan) July 18, 2018

Three Principles for Culturally Relevant Teaching is from Ed Week.

Building A Culturally Responsive Classroom is from Achieve The Core.

Three Research-based Culturally Responsive Teaching Strategies is from Teach Learn Grow.

CULTURALLY RESPONSIVE TEACHING PUTS RIGOR AT THE CENTER is by Zaretta Hammond.

Culturally Responsive Instruction for Native American Students. Video series and tasks! What is culturally responsive instruction?Why is it important for Native American students?What does it look like for Native American students? https://t.co/KwdPBys78N @WestEd @UCLA_CRESST pic.twitter.com/bXJLlRN5oT

- ELL Stanford (@ELLStanford) November 20, 2018

We're Still Here - Why Aren't You Teaching To or About Us? is by Susan C. Faircloth, Ph.D.

Creating a More Welcoming and Culturally Responsive School Community to Engage American Indian and Alaska Native Families is a three-part series by Mandy Smoker Broaddus.

The Culturally Responsive Curriculum Scorecard was designed by The NYU Metro Center.

The Board of Regents is hearing from SED staff and the Advisory Panel for the Culturally-Responsive-Sustaining Framework. Presenters are reviewing the importance of the framework and the steps taken to date.
Framework: https://t.co/ctDiqXkna7
Presentation: https://t.co/4LD9NL9ufj pic.twitter.com/RyxhCOyr34

- NYS Education Dept (@NYSEDNews) January 14, 2019

States' Standards for Teachers Don't Define Culturally Responsive Teaching, Study Argues is from Ed Week.

These are good to use! I took some of my #pln feedback and included my twitter handle for ownership! Feel free to share now! 😉 Thanks to my awesome #pln for always giving the best consejo! #Ellchat_BkClub pic.twitter.com/pyGnojMVG7

- Carlota Holder (@carlota_holder) May 2, 2019

Sustaining Readers Through Culturally Responsive Literacy Instruction is by Lisa Stringfellow.

A Culturally Responsive Guide to Fostering the Inclusion of Immigrant Origin Students is from Re-imagining Migration.

Culturally Responsive Teaching Checklist is from Re-Imagining Migration.

Creating a welcoming environment for ELs is by Tan Huynh.

You don't want to miss this interview with Gloria Ladson Billings that appeared in The 74. Here's an excerpt:

ACESSE Resource C: Making Science Instruction Compelling for All Students: Using Cultural Formative Assessment to Build on Learner Interest and Experience is from STEM Teaching Tools.

This is my favorite tool to start building some background knowledge for teachers. I use it as a row sort. So I have them at table groups sort the categories at the top from left-right most destructive to most constructive. Then we go down and repeat row-by-row and discuss. pic.twitter.com/T2ZCFqcSY2

- James Tuck - ESOL Teacher (@MrTuckESOL) August 18, 2019

That is something to think about. You are as culturally responsive as each new group of students enters your classroom.

Your cultural responsiveness starts over every year.

New students = New needs https://t.co/BPYUBovEqp

- Dr. Janice Wyatt-Ross (@JaniceWyattRoss) August 30, 2019

Jenny Muñiz has written a good - and short - piece over at New America reviewing the benefits of culturally responsive teaching. 5 Ways Culturally Responsive Teaching Benefits Learners contains lots of links to research, and is the perfect piece to share with administrators and colleagues who have questions about it and are open to learning.
"SCIENCE IN THE CITY" LOOKS LIKE AN EXCELLENT SOURCE OF CULTURALLY RESPONSIVE LESSONS

Instructional equity requires skilled coaching in order to close student learning gaps, which reduces opportunity gaps and, eventually, eliminates achievement gaps. But what does that look like? Listen to my interview w/ @ajjuliani https://t.co/QHLL6ACMx2

- Zaretta Hammond (@Ready4rigor) November 11, 2019

How Our Language Feeds Inequity is from ASCD.

Like they say, "If you want to know, ask somebody." Here's some answers about CRT from @DingleTeach. Please give it a listen. Excellent!
[LISTEN] Teaching Math to Students of Color? Do This, Not That with@rosaIsiah @bamradionetwork @DingleTeach https://t.co/fTfOI35LzB

- Annette Hilts (@imcalled2teach) November 25, 2019

Mathematician Alphabet (Not Just Dead White Dudes) is from VIE Math.

Bringing a Culturally Responsive Lens to Math Class is from Edutopia.

How the #DisruptTexts Movement Can Help English Teachers Be More Inclusive is from MindShift.

A Conversation About Instructional Equity with Zaretta Hammond, Part 1 is from The Center For The Collaborative Classroom.

Zaretta Hammond on Coaching and Culturally Responsive Teaching is from ASCD.

How Culturally Responsive Lessons Teach Critical Thinking is from Teaching Tolerance.

Bringing a Culturally Responsive Lens to Math Class is from Edutopia.

Culturally Responsive Teaching: A Guide for Urban Educators is from the Smithsonian.

A Cultural Lens Leads to More Effective Teaching is from ASCD.

Online Teaching Can Be Culturally Responsive is from Teaching Tolerance.

Leading Together / Retraining the Brain is by Jill Harrison Berg.

How to Develop Culturally Responsive Teaching for Distance Learning is from MindShift.

The Remote DEI Toolkit offers ideas for applying culturally responsive teaching online.

Teaching Math Isn't Just About Numbers. It's About Us. is from Better Lesson.

How To Begin Bringing Rich and Inclusive Math History Resources Inside K to 12 Classrooms is from Sunil Singh.

The Underrepresentation Curriculum Project is a new and free STEM curriculum.

A Trauma-Informed Approach to Teaching the Colonization of the Americas is from Edutopia.

How The Navajo Nation Is Transforming Math Education is from Forbes.

The "Is Your U.S. History Text Racist" tool seems useful, and forced me to reflect on some questions that I am embarrassed to say I had not done before.

Creating a Culturally Responsive Math Curriculum for the Elementary Grades appeared in Edutopia.

❤️ this example of a culturally responsive word problem! The content is aligned to the standards, but the context is familiar to Ss. #MathforElls #pisdell #pisdmathchat #ellchat #elemmathchat https://t.co/kuZfiphj7V

- 🅲🅸🅽🅳🆈 (@CindyGarciaTX) June 18, 2021

Resources for Culturally Responsive Teaching is from Mathematica.
This Interview With Zaretta Hammond Is Well-Worth Your Time To Read/Listen To... It Is Worth Your Time To Listen To Or Read Part Two Of This Zaretta Hammond Interview
Check out 5 Strides on the Path to Math Equity.

This one is less cropped at the bottom but it has the Z Hammond copyright. pic.twitter.com/oRPG828bKd

- EveryWoman (@smilingvision08) July 31, 2021

Three Decades of Culturally Relevant, Responsive, & Sustaining Pedagogy: What Lies Ahead? is chockful of interesting research. It's behind a paywall, but there are ways to still access it.

3 Ways to Enhance Culturally Responsive Teaching is from Edutopia.
Excerpt From Our New Book: "Culturally Responsive and Sustaining Teaching"
What Is Culturally Responsive Teaching? is from Ed Week.

What Should Culturally Relevant Teaching Look Like Today? Gloria Ladson-Billings Explains is from Ed Week.

You Don't Have to Be a Critical Race Scholar to Apply a Critical Race Lens to Your Practice appeared in EdPost.

Culturally Centered Education: A Primer is from Ed Reports.

5 Tips for Culturally Responsive Teaching in the Math Classroom is from Edutopia.

Learning About Students' Identities is from Reading To Belong.

From Learning Loss to a Liberatory Mindset is by Sonja Cherry-Paul.
NEW HELPFUL - & PRACTICAL - STUDY ON "ASSET-BASED PEDAGOGY"

Culturally and Historically Responsive Science @ScholasticTeach #cultivatingGenius https://t.co/2WiR0rHgau

- Gholdy Muhammad (@GholdyM) March 16, 2023

5 Ways to Make Your Science Classroom More Culturally Responsive is from Edutopia.

I, too, am a big fan, and you can find her brief here: https://t.co/TQAVTi8Apx https://t.co/7Bzzq2pCJs

- Larry Ferlazzo (@Larryferlazzo) June 1, 2023

How to Teach History in a Culturally Responsive Way is from Edutopia.

Again, this is just a beginning of a list, and I will be adding more. I look forward to your suggestions!

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The Best Resources About "Culturally Responsive Teaching" & "Culturally Sustaining Pedagogy" - Please Share More!

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Culturally Responsive Teaching in the ELL Classroom is an excerpt from our book. 'Culturally Responsive Teaching Is Not a Quick Fix' is a series in my Education Week Teacher column. Excerpt From Our New Book: "Culturally Responsive and Sustaining Teaching" Help Language Learners Lead Their Own Learning is another excerpt from our new book, the second edition of The ESL/ELL Teacher's Survival Guide.

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I saw a video a few months ago that I haven't been able to get out of my head. In the video, a high school student named Jeff Bliss stood up in the middle of class and basically expressed his frustration to the teacher in the room:

Okay, now let's get something out of the way: Yes, this student was disrupting class and his behavior is disrespectful. I will acknowledge that. On the other hand, we don't know exactly what happened before the camera was turned on. Based on what he says in the video, my guess is that Bliss had just voiced some kind of concern, the teacher told him to quit complaining, and at that point, I guess he'd had enough.

What I have gleaned about Jeff Bliss from the internet is that at the time of the video, he was an 18-year-old sophomore. So apparently, at some point, he had not been successful in school. For some people, this takes away his credibility. For me, it makes him an even better source of information about why school isn't working for some students.

Disruptive behavior aside, the content of Bliss's outburst tells me that his teacher's primary mode of instruction is through packets. This was what got me. This is what made me watch this video six, seven, eight times over. Because I just believe him.

I believe him because I've seen it. I've seen classrooms where teachers deliver instruction overwhelmingly through worksheets, or packets of worksheets. I have seen my own kids' schoolwork come home, and I have asked friends, other parents with school-age kids, and colleagues who consult in lots of schools, and nearly all of them tell me that a lot of our students' instructional time is being spent hunched over some kind of worksheet.

That's a problem.

I want to spend some time looking at this problem from all sides: What distinguishes a "busywork" worksheet from something that delivers real value, why teaching with worksheets is usually not the best choice for learning, the reasons teachers default to worksheet teaching, and what other learning experiences would be better for our students.

Not all Worksheets are Created Equal

Let's start by agreeing on some terms.

First we need to define what we mean by "worksheet." Technically, a worksheet is anything printed on copier paper and given to students to write on. And since you can print just about anything on a piece of paper, we really can't say that worksheets per se are good or bad. That would be like saying "books" or "movies" are good or bad. It's a medium. A delivery system.

And there are plenty of instructionally rich things you can do with a worksheet: A graphic organizer is a wonderful tool for research, pre-writing, and notetaking. An excerpt from a primary source can be printed on a worksheet for close study and annotation. Worksheets can be used for analyzing data (like this collection from Maria Andersen), as scaffolds for notetaking, as tools for reflection, or as formative assessments. They can also be used as recording tools alongside more active experiences: data sheets for labs, planning sheets for group projects, and so on.

In my experience, when people criticize worksheets, they are referring to a specific type of worksheet, what I will call a busysheet, the kind where students are either doing work that's fairly low-level recall stuff-filling in blanks with words, choosing from multiple-choice questions, labeling things-or work that has no educational value at all, like word searches, word scrambles, or coloring stuff in cases where coloring adds no extra layer of understanding.

Sometimes the difference between a busysheet and a quality learning tool is obvious, and other times it's a judgment call. After talking to lots of educators about how they use worksheets in their classrooms, I think it's most accurate to say that every worksheet falls somewhere on a continuum: Some worksheets are clearly nothing but busysheets, while others, like note-taking sheets or data collection tools, directly support student learning; I'll call these powersheets. I think a lot of worksheets fall somewhere between the two. Because there is such a range, the only person who can really make the call is you.

Packets, to be clear, are simply a bunch of worksheets stapled together. They could contain a lot of powersheets, but when a student refers to them as frickin' packets, it's highly likely that they are mostly made up of busysheets.

Possible Busysheets in Disguise

Some formats have come along recently that have the potential to deliver the same kind of work we find in busysheets, only they don't always look like it. While each of these certainly could offer instructional value, they could also be just another way to keep kids still:

Computer programs or apps that have students performing the exact same activities we see on busysheets.

Interactive notebooks: These vary widely in quality, with some offering true interactivity and others just offering the same value of a worksheet, just colored, cut, and pasted into a notebook.

HyperDocs: If these are thoughtfully designed, they have the potential to offer wonderful variety, exploration, and differentiation, but they could also just be a new way to organize busywork.

The Problem with "Busysheet Teaching"

"Busysheet teaching" is when we use busysheets in place of other, better forms of instruction. This type of teaching might take the form of bell-ringers, homework, early finisher work, classroom centers, or even the main learning activity during regular class time.

So what's wrong with teaching this way?

It's disconnected from anything meaningful.
Busysheets isolate skills so much that students have trouble connecting them to real life. When a student sees little value in an activity, he is not truly engaged. Take this reading worksheet, which has students read a short passage about Maya Angelou, then answer four fill-in-the-blank questions about the passage.

This type of busysheet would most likely be used to teach reading comprehension or serve as a Black History Month activity.

Let's unpack these one by one.

Reading comprehension: Having students answer low-level recall questions about a passage of writing that offers no meaningful context doesn't do a lot to make them better readers. If the questions were more challenging, if they asked students to choose which textual evidence supports some particular idea, for example, that might move it up the continuum a bit more toward the power end, but is this the best way to give students reading practice? If students do this kind of work day after day, with passages instead of real books, they won't be reading enough. So much of what we call "reading instruction" is far inferior to having students read real books.

Black History Month: Giving students a packet of these types of busysheets-where the work and contributions of significant African Americans are reduced to one-page blurbs followed by some cute activity-is inadequate in so many ways. This article from Teaching Tolerance lists much more comprehensive and authentic ways to honor Black history in your classroom all year round.

It often misses the standards.
Even if they are labeled as addressing certain standards, the kind of work we see on busysheets often misses the mark. Take, for example, this typical grammar worksheet:

This type of worksheet, where students are asked to label or identify various grammatical constructions, has thrived for decades, and in the days before worksheets, it existed in the form of exercises from grammar books.

Apart from the well-established fact that teaching grammar outside the context of meaningful writing does nothing to help students become better writers, and in many cases makes them worse, the skills being practiced in this kind of worksheet don't actually teach or reinforce the goals set by our academic standards.

Here's what I mean: For convenience, I'll use the Common Core Standards as a reference. There is no mention anywhere in the standards of students being able to identify or label these verb tenses. Nothing. It does, however, require students to use them correctly in their writing. So it would make a lot more sense to show students these different constructions, then have them find places in their writing where they are using them. If they aren't using them anywhere, have them try it. They never ever have to actually know the names of the verb tenses or a whole lot of other grammatical constructions. Despite this, tens of thousands of students are required to complete busysheets like this every day. And I bet they get tested on the same kind of information, too. Meanwhile, little to no time is being spent giving them opportunities to use these constructions in their real writing.

It often has no instructional value.
By definition, a busysheet's goal is to keep students busy, not necessarily teach them anything. The most egregious types of busysheets are word searches, word scrambles, and and crossword puzzles, which might as well be a list of definitions with blanks next to them.

I have watched my own children do word searches for homework and stress out about not finding every single word because they would lose points. If there is any pedagogical justification for that, I certainly haven't found it.

It requires lots and lots of sitting still.
The more teachers use busysheets, the more students will sit and sit and sit. Yes, it's possible that there are teachers who use a lot of busysheets but have great alternative seating options in their classrooms, but my guess is that in most of the classrooms where busysheets are abundant, students are basically sitting in desks. This is far from ideal. In 2014, teacher Alexis Wiggins spent two days shadowing her students and was shocked to discover just how much time they spent sitting, and how exhausting that was. And we hear all the time about the studies that are confirming how dangerous it can be to sit for extended periods of time. So planning for extended periods of sitting, all day long, just isn't good for our kids.

It requires a ton of copying.
Anyone who has ever had to wait in line for a copy machine or found themselves staring desperately at a cryptic error message on the copier knows that relying heavily on worksheets wastes a lot of time and paper.

It gives you more stuff to grade.
Many teachers who use a lot of worksheets also grade them, calculating those points as part of a student's overall grade in a course. This approach creates two problems. One, it erases the value of formative assessment: If worksheets are meant to be used to teach students something or give them practice on skills they are learning, then why would students be penalized for making mistakes on them? I can see why teachers might give points for completion, but going through and marking wrong answers, then taking off points for something students are still actively learning is really missing the point: That's what summative assessments are for. The other problem is that this system creates a ridiculous amount of grading for the teacher. If you are going home with piles and piles of papers to grade, you're assigning too many things to be graded. If you can shift some of these activities from graded to "practice," you'll be giving students the practice they need without creating a lot of extra paperwork for yourself.

Why We Do It, and What to Do Instead

Teachers have a lot of reasons for leaning heavily on busysheets, and some of these may seem unavoidable. Let's look at the most common reasons, along with some ideas for what we can do instead.

1. No Textbooks, No Tech

If your school is short on materials and technology, it may be necessary to use printables to build your curriculum. Much of what we learn comes from reading things, so if you don't have good science textbooks, for example, worksheets and handouts can serve the same purpose. What's important is that we do this thoughtfully.

Even if you download a whole unit or curriculum, only use the parts that are going to provide value to your students, rather than just marching students through the whole thing.

Beware of cute: Some materials are so beautifully designed, they may make it hard to notice if they're thin on quality learning. If you can get both at once, awesome, but always scrutinize for the learning first.

Not all students need the same materials: Consider making some handouts and worksheets available to students as resources, rather than giving everyone the same stuff. Show them how to select the materials they need and where to store them for future reference.

2. Skills Practice

Many teachers use worksheets to give students practice in required skills. This seems to be most common in math (or, in the later grades, with things like chemistry equations). While this method obviously gives teachers some of the results they're hoping for, if you take a few things into consideration, you can probably refine the practice. Here are some questions to consider when heading to the copy machine:

How much practice is really needed? Does every student need the same amount of practice? Can they stop when they've had enough?

Would other activities be just as beneficial-or more beneficial-than practice problems? In this youcubed article, professor Jo Boaler describes four other ways to develop number facts and number sense. She also shared a strategy in a recent tweet where a problem is placed in the center of a paper and students use the corners of the page to show four different ways of solving the problem. These kinds of activities get kids to actually think and talk about the math they're doing, rather than just completing problem after problem.

I'm going to bring this up again: If you're recording a grade on practice work, especially if that grade is based on accuracy, it's not practice!! Keep this in mind when deciding how many problems are really necessary to give students the practice they need.

3. Differentiation

Teachers often find that creating leveled packets of work is a simple way to personalize learning for each student. But again, does that have to mean each child gets one of three large, comprehensive packets? Let's look again at the suggestion I made earlier, where handouts (containing information) and worksheets (offering practice) are offered as resources, and students decide which they need. To see this idea fully developed, check out Natalie McCutchen's self-paced math classroom: Students work through units on their own, and they decide how much practice they need before taking the assessments, so some students do a lot, while others do very little.

4. Grade-level Alignment

In some schools, teachers are required to teach the same thing as their grade-level counterparts, on the same day, and document the whole process in detailed, standards-aligned lesson plans. When I talk to teachers about why they're burned out, it's policies like these that they often cite as completely draining them. This type of requirement also causes many of them to resort to teaching entirely with packets: Find a workbook that says it's standards-aligned, then everyone use the same set of pages every week. Done.

This makes for incredibly dry, uninspired learning, and unfortunately, I don't have a good solution for it. My best advice is to share this post with your administrator so they can see the impact that this type of policy is having. I would also urge you to question the integrity of the standards label: Is the packet really getting kids to do what the standard says, or is it a "lighter" version of that? These packets may act as a stopgap for now, but if your team has been using the same set for several years, now may be the time to look more closely at them to see if some pages could be removed and replaced with other activities.

5. Sub Work

When we have substitute teachers, sometimes packets seem to be the only option. This is another tricky one. If you really have no other option, at least do everything you can to make sure the worksheets lean more toward the "powersheet" end of the continuum. Another option that can work if you know you're going to be out ahead of time is to train a few students to lead the class in an actual lesson, then let the sub know that the plan is to let these students teach. This would obviously require a lot of work up front, and you need to have built a classroom culture where students want to behave while you're gone, but I do think it can be done.

6. Crowd Control

In overcrowded classrooms it seems impossible to do anything hands-on, any kind of group work, anything interactive. Worksheets keep everyone in their seat and under control. This, again, is more of a systemic issue that could only truly be solved at the policy level. With that said, I still don't believe worksheets are the only option. Sure, you might not be able to do big, sweeping hands-on stuff, but you can do paired work, set up tasks around the room in stations, or even split the class in half so that only some are doing the "active" work while others are seated and calm, then switch. More than anything, just don't throw in the towel on this.

7. Bell-Ringers & Morning Work

In order to maximize instructional time, we are advised to make sure students have meaningful work to do from the moment they walk into class; hence the birth of the bell-ringer. I have definitely seen the value of a good bell-ringer, and saw a huge difference between the year that I didn't use these and the years that I did. But if that work isn't really meaningful or isn't helping most kids learn, it's a waste. Here are some other options:

Have students do self-selected reading for the first 10 minutes of class.

Give students a great anticipatory set to introduce the day's learning. There are so many options for these, like the thought-provoking images that Christina DeCarbo-Wagners now uses instead of morning work, or the "appetizers" recommended by math teachers Matt Vaudrey and John Stevens in their book, The Classroom Chef.

Establish morning choice: Why not offer students a variety of choices for morning work? In this fantastic post, principal Adam Dovico describes how one teacher made this shift, allowing students to choose between artistic expression, problem solving, computer time, leadership, collaboration, and game time. The big key in making this successful was that she rolled it out slowly, giving students experience with each station first before giving them more freedom to choose later on.

8. Some Kids Like Worksheets

For some students, busysheets give them a nice, calm, quiet activity to pass the time. But this alone is no reason to make them standard fare in your classroom. What you can do is make busysheets an option for free time, as something to do to decompress, or as one of several options students might choose to practice a set of skills or test themselves on some aspect of your content-not for a grade, but for practice.

9. Students Need Fine Motor Practice

Early childhood educators sometimes rely on worksheets for handwriting practice or to have students color, cut, and glue items to develop fine motor skills.

Although worksheets offer one way to give students fine motor practice, there are lots of other ways to do it, too. This post offers 40 ideas for fine motor practice, and this one offers 30 more.

Once a child has gotten to a certain level of fine motor development, do they still need to keep practicing it the same amount as other students?

More Ideas

If you're going to cut down or eliminate your use of packets and worksheets, you'll have a lot more instructional time, and that's a good thing. Here are some things you can do with that time:

The Challenge: Do a Worksheet Audit

Everyone teaches differently, and as we have established, all worksheets are not created equal. There is no single prescription for what kind or how many worksheets you should be using with your students. Only you and your students can know that for sure.

So my challenge to you is simple: From now on, every time you're about to use a worksheet, ask yourself if it's contributing to student learning or if it's actually just keeping them busy. If it's the latter, start replacing your worksheets with better, richer alternatives. Your students will learn better, school will be more fun, and you'll waste a whole lot less time in line at the copy machine. ♦

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Are your worksheets contributing to meaningful learning, or just keeping students busy?

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Last month, I reviewed Zaretta Hammond's fantastic book, Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain. Now I'm proud to have Zaretta here as a guest writer to share some specific strategies with us.

Culturally responsive teaching. Everybody is talking about it. The big question is: How do you actually make lessons culturally responsive? That comes up regularly when I am working with groups of teachers to improve outcomes for diverse students who are struggling. I remember working with a group of sixth grade teachers on improving learning for their at-risk students. These teachers were frustrated that their students, 95 percent of them students of color and English language learners, were not applying themselves to learning.

I suggested that we explore making lessons more culturally relevant in order to accelerate student learning. I remember the reaction of Janice, the science teacher. "I am not going to be rappin' about the periodic table," she said defiantly as she crossed her arms and sat back in her chair.

I couldn't blame her. Google "culturally responsive teaching" and you can find a dozen videos of well-meaning teachers leading some call-and-response chant about exponents or rapping about the Boston Tea Party while students sit back and giggle. That's because we usually talk about culturally responsive teaching only as an engagement strategy designed to motivate at-risk students to take learning seriously. Or we try to find a race-based connection to the content to make it "relevant" to minority students.

One of the biggest misconceptions about culturally responsive teaching is thinking you have to tie the lesson's content to African American or Latino students' racial background. The common belief is if you mention Africa, Mexico, or famous black and brown high achievers, it will spark students' attention. Then they will be motivated to participate.

In reality, culturally responsive teaching is less about using racial pride as a motivator and more about mimicking students' cultural learning styles and tools. These are the strategies their moms, dads, grandmas, and other community folks use to teach them life skills and basic concepts long before they come to school and during out-of-school time.

Culturally responsive teaching leverages the brain's memory systems and information processing structures. Why? Many diverse students come from oral cultural traditions. This means their primary ways of knowledge transfer and meaning-making are oral and active. It's a common cultural tradition that cuts across racial groups: African American, Latino, Southeast Asian, and Pacific Islander communities all have strong oral cultures. Each of these cultural groups uses the brain's memory systems for turning inert information into useable knowledge. They use memory strategies to make learning sticky, like connecting what needs to be remembered to a rhythm or music (that's why we still know the ABC song) or by reciting it in fun ways like a poem, riddle, or limerick.

I asked Janice what area of learning she wanted to help her kids improve. She said science vocabulary; they weren't learning the weekly words and it was getting in the way of their understanding of key concepts. She was frustrated and at the end of her rope. I asked how she was teaching it. She used the typical approach: On Monday, she listed the words on the board. Students copied them down and were required to look each word up and use it in a sentence. On Wednesday, there was a vocabulary test.

I suggested that we design word study to be more culturally responsive by making it more like the students' own cultural learning process. She was open for trying something different.

I offered her these three tips for transforming any lesson into something that looked and felt more culturally responsive to diverse students, something that would allow them to engage more and process the content effectively.

Games are the power strategy for culturally-grounded learning because they get the brain's attention and require active processing. Attention is the first step in learning. We cannot learn, remember, or understand what we don't first pay attention to. Call and response is just a way to get the brain's attention. Most games employ a lot of the cultural tools you'd find in oral traditions - repetition, solving a puzzle, making connections between things that don't seem to be related (Ever play Taboo or Apples to Apples?).

Organizing learning so that students rely on each other will build on diverse students' communal orientation. This communal orientation can be summed up in the African proverb, "I am because we are." Even making learning slightly competitive in a good-natured way increases students' level of attention and engagement. It's why the T.V. show Survivor has been around for so many years; it's a social-based game.

The brain is wired to remember stories and to use the story structure to make sense of the world. That's why every culture has creation stories. In oral traditions, stories play a bigger role in teaching lessons about manners, morality, or simply what plants to eat or not eat in the wilderness because it's the way content is remembered. Diverse students (and all students, really) learn content more effectively if they can create a coherent narrative about the topic or process presented. That's the brain's way of weaving it all together. (Bonus: It also offers a great way to check for understanding and correct misconceptions.)

So Janice took her weekly list of science vocabulary and created a variety of sorting and matching games for students. She built a set of simple card games based on Go Fish or Old Maid. In addition she created some team games. Each week students had different active ways to learn the vocabulary. For 10-15 minutes a couple of times during the week, students got to play these learning games rather than look up words in a dictionary. She gave them instructions for making the games at home if they wanted to.

Instead of the traditional weekly vocab test, she asked them to "storify" their understanding of key concept words like metamorphosis, using vocabulary from past weeks.

When I checked in with the group a few weeks later, she was the first one to share. She said student engagement was like night and day. Now all students were participating. She said she knew they were learning the vocabulary at a deeper level because they were actually using the new science terms during discussions and in their writing with no prompting from her.

The big A-ha's for the group that day were that (1) Culturally responsive teaching doesn't have to be some performance the teacher does to entertain students and (2) It doesn't have to mention race or reference culture at all. Instead, what makes a practice culturally responsive is that it mimics students' own cultural learning tools. They all realized that these practices are helpful for all students, not targeted at minority students.

The real trick is to use these strategies regularly as part of your instructional routine rather than doing them randomly every now and then. Consistency is the key. ♦

Learn more about how to improve diverse students' information processing skills and actually grow their brains in Zaretta Hammond's book, Culturally Responsive Teaching and The Brain: Promoting Authentic Engagement and Rigor Among Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Students .

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3 Tips to Make Any Lesson More Culturally Responsive

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Google "culturally responsive teaching" and you can find a dozen videos of well-meaning teachers leading some call-and-response chant about exponents or rapping about the Boston Tea Party while students sit back and giggle.

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Enhancing Your Face to Face Course with a LMS

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Enhancing Your Face to Face Course with a LMS

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Innospire Education - But Is it Rigorous? 

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Innospire Education - But Is it Rigorous? 

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When speaking to faculty about implementing UDL, one concern often presented is that faculty do not wish to reduce the rigor of their course and content and are afraid that implementing UDL may do so.

This is such an important concern.

Higher education is intended to be a place in which learners come to greatly expand and enhance their knowledge and skills on their way to being professionals. Any intervention that includes more people simply by lowering the standard should absolutely be challenged and most likely dismissed as a poor fit for the context of higher education.

The good news is: UDL absolutely does not reduce the rigor of curriculum. In fact, the implementation of UDL is intended to enable and encourage greater rigor than what is afforded by traditional instruction. Let's explore this claim. Consider this Scenario:

A professor of biology, Dr. Xavier (fictitious), starts a new course on molecular biology with high hopes in terms of the kind of content mastery she expects of her students. She carefully arranges the curriculum, structuring from foundational content to advanced concepts. Then she arranges these content through selecting textbook chapter reading order, and develops associated lectures and PowerPoints. Fall comes and classes begin.

By the time she is five weeks into the course and mid-term tests scores are coming in, it is clear that the majority of students aren't achieving the rigorous goals that Dr. Xavier had so painstakingly prepared.

DECISIONPOINT: At this point, we often come to the conclusion that the students enrolled in the class are not "strong enough" students to handle molecular biology to the degree Dr. Xavier has intended. This view presents Dr. Xavier with limited options. For example, she can (1) go on with the course anyway, implicitly or explicitly sending the message that students who cannot keep up don't really belong in this class/field, and/or (2) reduce the expectations placed on students (either by reducing the volume or difficulty of content or by loosening passing criteria).

Dr. Xavier's approach and the situation that she faces are common in higher education. The decision she must make as to how to respond (or not respond) is a frequent frustration.

For many, if we may speak frankly, this is simply the "natural selection" of higher education. Learning microbiology is tough. There may be a perception that some "have what it takes" and some, unfortunately, do not. That's life.

But wait! While it is surely accurate that not every student taking Dr. Xavier's course is destined for a job in microbiology, I suggest that we often come to the conclusion of who is "in" and who is "out" too quickly. In this scenario, we are not looking at "who can learn microbiology," but "who can learn microbiology the way Dr. Xavier happens to be teaching?" We are not examining "who can practice microbiology," but "who can demonstrate knowledge of microbiology in the form of a scantron multiple choice exam that Dr. Xavier happens to prefer?"

Recognizing that form and content are inseparable is really important for our discussion. When we talk about "rigor," what exactly do we mean here? The form or the content or both?

I suggest that there are different views under the surface of conversations surrounding rigor in higher education, and these implicitly different views may interfere with clear communication. Let's juxtapose rigor of form (methods and materials) and rigor as content (outcomes), for a moment.

Rigor as Methods & Materials. Some people may - consciously or unconsciously - associate rigor with methods and materials. In this view, maintaining rigor may translate into keeping a challenging textbook as a primary vehicle of content exposition. It may mean insisting that students write essays to demonstrate content mastery. It may mean a desire to maintain the oral-only lecture as the driver of instruction. In this setting, there is an implicit or explicit sense that students who cannot learn via lecture and textbook reading, who cannot write strong essays or perform on multiple choice tests are frankly not college material. While I often hear rigor expressed in these terms, I suggest that this has little to do with rigor and much more to do with inertia.

Rigor as Outcome. There is another way to think about rigor in higher education courses: rigor of outcome. In this view, creating or maintaining rigor may translate to setting lofty and professionally relevant student outcomes (what they will know/retain in future employment, be able to do/transfer to real world applications). Note that this understanding rigor has not yet made statement about how students learn or how they express their knowledge and skill. It is simply a view of outcome. In this setting, there is an implicit or explicit sense that how we teach and assess should support students in achieving the desired outcomes. There is no need to stick with certain methods or materials if options are available that would enhance students' ability to reach the goal.

Defining what we mean by rigor is an important check. Often, someone will say that they want rigorous outcomes, but in further conversation it becomes clear that this belies a desire to maintain materials and methods, as with Dr. Xavier. UDL is not compatible with the view that one must maintain traditional methods and materials; it is, however, instrumental for enhancing rigor of outcome.

In the case of Dr. Xavier, the confounding of the two types of rigor becomes clear. Explicitly, Dr. Xavier has set high outcome objectives for her students. That's wonderful. Implicitly, and perhaps unconsciously, Dr. Xavier has assumed that college-level courses should be delivered with "rigorous" methods of learning and assessment (i.e., traditional forms). Because of this, she may be prematurely concluding that her students are unable to achieve her rigorous outcomes when they struggled to reach and/or demonstrate those outcomes via traditional channels. The result is that Dr. Xavier is faced with a difficult lose-lose choice. Ironically, in her desire to preserve rigor (of methods), Dr. Xavier must reactively reduce rigor (of outcome) either by excluding who achieves the outcomes or by scaling back the outcomes themselves.

In addition to losses to course rigor, there are also personal and communal loses here. What a tragedy, for example, that there may have been some students in the class that would have made wonderful molecular biologists, but left the program after eeking by with a "D" in the class for reasons that - in fact - had nothing to do with their capacity to be microbiologists.
Re-envisioning with UDL
The same story would play out very differently should Dr. Xavier plan with and implement UDL.

Rather than reducing the rigor (outcome) of the course, many UDL experts believe that rigorous outcomes are requisite to applying UDL. If UDL doesn't reduce the rigor of the outcome, it increases the ways in which students may achieve the outcome.

The UDL framework involves thoughtful, intentional backwards planning (from objectives to assessments to methods and materials), with a conscious reflection on anticipated variability among learners. The implementation of UDL draws from a collection of well-established best practices, intentionally choosing ways to design flexible methods and materials to address learner variability en route to the stated objective.

When students can spend less time navigating rigid and inhospitable learning environments and assessments, more time and energy remains to focus on meaningful content and skill building.
Rigorous vs Difficult: A Source of Confusion?
So, why is UDL sometimes thought to reduce rigor? One answer may be in what I've already suggested, that there are difficult-to-see presuppositions about what a college student ought to be able to do / ways they ought to be able to learn. These presuppositions may be outdated and irrelevant for most professions. But it may also be that when UDL is implemented well, learning is in fact much . And I wonder if has become confused with difficulty . Can curriculum be rigorous, but still relatively easily achieved? I would say yes. But this is so unusual in higher education, that we have come to difficulty with rigor to a strong degree.

In a recent publication documenting the process of designing and implementing UDL in a nursing course, Kumar and Wideman ( ) found that students overwhelmingly benefited from the flexibility afforded to them in a UDL classroom. There are many gems in their manuscript, so I strongly recommend reading it in entirety, but one quote from a student really stood out to me. The student said, "It's my first time I'm doing this in university and French is my first language. And when I'm doing it in a different language, I was like panicking every time. And to pass this class-honestly, it's the way [the instructor] gives the material that makes it so easy" (p. 136). From my perspective, taking a science course in one's second language as a full-time student in a 4-year degree setting does not sound like something that would ordinarily be described as "easy." I can see how a knee-jerk reaction upon reading this would be to wonder how such a class could be so basic. But what becomes clear from the manuscript is that the class had high expectations for the students that never waned. Rather, the flexible options afforded to the students enabled them to feel more in control of their own learning, equipped to make good decisions, and supported in their acquisition of knowledge and skill. In other words, while the course was objectively rigorous, the student experience was subjectively easy.

That's what excellence in teaching and learning looks like.
Take Action!
So what can you do to get going with these concepts? I suggest taking the time to start with learning objectives for one unit of instruction. Make sure you have built strong, measurable objectives with verbs that match what the students actually ought to be doing. ( Here is an article that can help with that !). Develop/re-develop assessment(s) that enable students to demonstrate mastery of the objective. Where possible and reasonable, make these assessments as proximal to real-world application as you can. Also be on the lookout for ways that the task can be made flexible while holding to the same standard.

Next, think about the kinds of variability you can expect in your learners. To get started, you may want to think about variance in interest, background knowledge, preferences for expression, and common disabilities (e.g., sensory disabilities, learning disabilities; my disability profiles handout can be an aid for this step).

Then, consider how the learning experience can be made more flexible to enable students to find the learning easy (i.e., efficient and effective) despite a rigorous outcome.

Remember that implementing UDL is an iterative process. And you don't have to do it alone. Asking for support from a UDL specialist is an excellent way to walk through the design and implementation process and/or gather feedback before moving forward. Starting small (with one lesson or one unit) and expanding over time is a best practice for UDL integration.

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When speaking to faculty about implementing UDL, one concern often presented is that faculty do not wish to reduce the rigor of their course and content and are afraid that implementing UDL may do so. This is such an important concern.

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Postsecondary Education and UDL | National Center On Universal Design for Learning

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udlguidelines.cast.org! The current UDL Center site will be taken down onAugust 31, 2018. Please update your links accordingly. A brand new UDL Center will launch after August 31. Follow us on social media to find out more.

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The Mindset Kit is a free set of online lessons and practices designed to help you teach and foster adaptive beliefs about learning.

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Mindset Kit - Resources for growth and learning mindsets

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A free resource for educators and parents who want to foster learning mindsets such as growth mindset. Follow lessons and practices from experts and members of our community.

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Picture a high school ELA honors class full of amazing kids who came up through the grades without any struggling, kids who thrive in schools that believe these students would do just fine. It was a class of mine, students who felt initially uncomfortable but were ultimately able to come together and study Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five, a novel that presented content and literacy challenges the students weren't used to.

How about my son, who entered first grade last year as five-year-old, not because I'm a crazy, achievement-driven parent, but because we had just moved from New York to Massachusetts, which define cutoff ages differently? We thought to put him in with his age group, but the district saw that he'd do better in first grade (he actually tested past second), and his new teacher ran her literacy program using flexible grouping so that all the kids could continually excel as was appropriate.

There are also the children about whom we research and debate by statistically measuring their challenges and opportunities. These are the rural, inner city, low SES, ELL, and ethnic minority students who, for a wide variety of reasons, continue to show up toward the bottom of the achievement scales used by schools and American society.

Or the incredibly successful, well-intentioned and high-performing faculty department that is faced with changing student needs, mandated curriculum adjustments from the Common Core, and a societal call to leverage technology for a variety of reasons. Should they maintain the program they've always used since it's been so successful for so many?

These are just examples, but what do they have in common? The need to grow. Please note that I didn't say the need to meet some predefined goal or the need to adopt any particular program. I simply believe that all people, especially within the context of education, are learners with room for improvement.

Paradigm vs. Pedagogy

In the early 1800s, Henry Longfellow prompted readers "to act that each tomorrow finds us farther than today," defining a theme that runs parallel with Carol Dweck's 2007 milestone publication, . Both of these works push their readers, not to achieve any specific goals, perform at any specific level, or behave in any specific way -- they simply, brilliantly, and empathetically direct each person to believe in their own ability -- and the ability of others -- to become better at being themselves. In a very "Zen" or holistic manner, Longfellow and Dweck are prompting us to love who we currently are and to keep growing beyond whatever it is we've accomplished today. More so than any other field, the world of education must embrace this directive.

I am a die-hard fan of the work being done by Angela Duckworth, Carol Dweck, and the many others who are considering and building on it. Clearly, if we don't believe that not only is it within our nature to improve, but also within our control, we will become paralyzed. We have to realize as well that growth, change, and progress all take patience and hard work. We can add the idea of resiliency into this mix, because struggle and outright failure are integral parts of these processes.

The issue that I'm finding -- and I'm not by any means alone -- is that growth mindsets, grit, and resilience are being championed not as paradigms that will take all people to whatever's next on their journey, but as pedagogical methods for classes, schools, and districts populated with students who don't achieve at the metrics we're using. This belief is problematic in two ways.

First, those who use growth mindset as pedagogy fail to dignify the lives and experiences of the students, who often show plenty of grit and perseverance in their home lives, much less their managing to make it through time in school where they're considered unsuccessful. If anything, it's actually the students coasting through our classes, schools, and assessments who don't understand what it is to work through adversity and need to be coached in resilience.

The second issue is that, although there are examples of growth as a valued indicator of success, too often we still use a limited view of achievement as our measure of success. I support the Common Core and newly adopted educator evaluation systems. I believe in the value of strong outcomes that represent high expectations, but I know that if we aren't applauding the processes along the way, we're setting ourselves up to fail -- some people's efforts will be devalued because they aren't achieving the defined goals in the given time. It also means that others will be allowed to coast, merely because they've already reached "grade level" standards, however those are defined, and regardless of whether those actually represent anything accomplished because of school.

5 Growth Mindset Practices

In their groundbreaking book, Professional Learning Communities at Work, Richard DuFour and Robert Eaker say it clearly when pointing out the issue that comes about when change initiatives are considered "a task to complete rather than an ongoing process." If we really want to improve our schools, our work, and the education of our students, we can do so by adopting a new mindset -- for everyone -- that would include:

1. Being humble enough to accept that there are things about ourselves and our practices that can improve

2. Becoming part of professional teams that value constructive critique instead of criticism

3. Treating setbacks as formative struggles within the learning process instead of summative failures

4. Realizing the restrictive role that timelines can play in reaching high standards, and using foundational philosophies such as Universal Design for Learning (UDL) to map systems so that everyone's growth is supported

5. Create flexible grouping at all times so that nobody's trapped in any one course level or particular type of work.

How do you encourage a growth mindset in your school or classroom?

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Growth Mindset: A Driving Philosophy, Not Just a Tool | Edutopia

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Picture a high school ELA honors class full of amazing kids who came up through the grades without any struggling, kids who thrive in schools that believe these students would do just fine.

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How to Personalize Education with the iPad

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How to Personalize Education with the iPad

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Luis F. Pérez, PhD, shares his personal experience and expertise in the field of inclusive design as a consultant, speaker, and author. Dr. Pérez is a Technical Assistance Specialist at the National Center on Accessible Educational Materials (AEM Center) at CAST. He earned his doctorate in special education from the University of South Florida, and in 2009, he was named an Apple Distinguished Educator. Dr. Pérez is President-Elect of ISTE's Inclusive Learning Network, which previously selected him as its Outstanding Inclusive Educator in 2016.

To stay up to date with his resources for educators, including eBooks and video tutorials, visit his website or follow him on Twitter at @eyeonaxs.

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Luis F. Pérez, PhD, shares his personal experience and expertise in the field of inclusive design as a consultant, speaker, and author. Dr. Pérez is a Technical Assistance Specialist at the National Center on Accessible Educational Materials (AEM Center) at CAST.

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In The syllabus can be used to encourage growth mindset by including messages or policies that focus on incremental development and improvement, put value on hard work and effort as a way to achieve mastery, and provide opportunity for formative feedback. Santa Monica College partners with PERTS Lab at Stanford University and UCLA in a student success initiative called "Boosting Achievement with Messages that Motivate," Carol Dweck describes how classroom messages can help in developing growth mindset, thus enhancing student's motivation and ultimately resulting in greater achievement. The next three posts will discuss practical strategies for encouraging growth mindset in the classroom: how you can use the course structure, syllabus, assessment, feedback, and communication to foster growth mindset.
GRIT. Their website offers a rubric intended to assess how your current syllabus encourages growth mindset, several examples of growth mindset and fixed mindset language, and a handout on fostering deep learning by incorporating the principles of growth mindset and grit.

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In The syllabus can be used to encourage growth mindset by including messages or policies that focus on incremental development and improvement, put value on hard work and effort as a way to achieve mastery, and provide opportunity for formative feedback.

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Using Word Clouds in the Online Classroom

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Using Word Clouds in the Online Classroom

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In the online classroom, word clouds can be a fun, simple, low-stakes way to collect and convey information among learners . Of course, there are those who push back on the use of word clouds, like word clouds support only the crudest sorts of textual analysis, much like figuring out a protein by getting a count only of its amino acids software architect Jacob Harris who says, " ." But, some of us also counter that and say things like if appropriately designed, framed for the right audience, and the purpose is clear and meaningful, word clouds can be effective, engaging activities for adult learners.

According to Knowles' principles of andragogy, the art and science of helping adults learn , adult learners draw on their accumulated personal and professional experiences and are motivated by internal factors that influence how they want to learn. Adult learners like to learn cooperatively and collaboratively in a way that piques their interests and pays attention to their needs. Word clouds allow learners to share their experiences, recognize patterns among their peers, project their own personalities in the online classroom, and start to see each other as co-creators in the learning process .

Below are a few activity examples and descriptions designed to validate adult learners' prior knowledge and life experiences, promote peer-to-peer interaction, and provide learners with alternate ways to engage with content.

Ice Breaker Introductions

Ice Breaker activities give the instructor an opportunity to identify overlap in interests or gaps in understanding that can help drive the course direction, as well as helping instructors better monitor and facilitate learner progress. Learners can share:

What they expect to learn from the course.

Their course goals or personal learning goals.

Their current level experience with the course content or online learning.

Interesting information about their personal lives.

Prior Knowledge Poll/Survey

Based on the subject matter, learning outcomes, and content of the course, you can design an activity like this one:

The instructor poses a question to learners using a word cloud generator, such as "What do you fear the most?", to which a possible common answer could be "Failure."

Instructors then create a discussion prompt based on what learners fear and why failure seems to be the most common fear.

What does failure look like?

Why do you fear failure most?

How do you recognize fear?

This kind of activity can be be used to get learners thinking about what they already know about fear and failure and how that aligns or misaligns with what they should or want to learn about fear and failure.

Before and After Reflection

Assign students a pre- and post-course word cloud that demonstrates changes in understanding of a certain topic, like leadership:

This is another example of an activity that would benefit from a discussion prompt asking students to reflect or comment how and why their understanding changed over time.

Keep in mind, that the activity should drive the tool choice and usage. Word clouds are not a quick fix for courses that lack active learning. Although giving students different modes to engage with content is one reason to use a word cloud, when designing for adult learners, connecting the activity or assessment to the learner's real-life experiences and providing clear, directions, guidelines, and purpose are essential to facilitate active, learner-centered learning.

Word Cloud Generators

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Word Cloud Activities: Engaging Learners in the Online Classroom - SPS | Distance Learning

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In the online classroom, word clouds can be a fun, simple, low-stakes way to collect and convey information among learners. Of course, there are those who push back on the use of word clouds, like software architect Jacob Harris who says, "word clouds support only the crudest sorts of textual analysis, much like figuring out a protein by getting a count only of its amino acids."

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Concept Mapping in the Higher Education Classroom

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Concept Mapping in the Higher Education Classroom

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Concept Mapping in the Higher Education Classroom

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Cool Tools presentation for WMU Office of Faculty Development AY 2012-2013/2013-2014   Teaching Concept Mapping

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Center for Professional Personnel Development (Penn State University)

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Using Plickers for Immediate Feedback in the Classroom (Center for Professional Personnel Development)

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Using Plickers for Immediate Feedback in the Classroom

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Kahoot! | Learning games | Make learning awesome!

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Kahoot! is a game-based learning platform that brings engagement and fun to 1+ billion players every year at school, at work, and at home.

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Login or sign up for free on Socrative - your assessment partner for real-time assessments and instant insights.

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Pear Deck is on a mission to help teachers create powerful learning moments for every student, every day - using the tools you already know and love.

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There is no shortage of formative assessment strategies, techniques, and tools available to teachers who use formative instructional practice in their classrooms. Here is an extensive list of 75 digital tools, apps, and platforms that can help you and your students use formative assessment to elicit evidence of learning. We didn't just add any old tool to this list. Here are the criteria we used for those that made the cut:

Supports formative instructional strategies and ways to activate learners to be resources for themselves and peers

Is free or awful close to it (under $10 per year, where possible)

Allows both students and teachers to take the activator role when possible (sometimes teachers need to get things started)

Before you dig into the tools, I encourage you to spend some time thinking about exactly what you want to accomplish with your students. "How to pick the right digital tool: Start with your learning goal" by Erin Beard can help you wrap your head around goals and guide you in choosing the best tool for the task. "27 easy formative assessment strategies for gathering evidence of student learning" can help you decide what strategies work best for you and your students.

Record audio and video

Create quizzes, polls, and surveys

1. Crowdsignal Lets you create online polls, quizzes, and questions. Students can use smartphones, tablets, and computers to provide their answers, and information can be culled for reports.

2. Edulastic Allows you to make standards-aligned assessments and get instant feedback.

3. FreeOnlineSurveys Helps you create surveys, quizzes, forms, and polls.

4. Gimkit Lets you write real-time quizzes. And it was designed by a high school student!

5. Kahoot! A game-based classroom response system that lets you create quizzes using internet content.

6. MicroPoll Helps you create polls, embed them into websites, and analyze responses.

7. Naiku Lets you write quizzes students can answer using their mobile devices.

8. Obsurvey Designed to make surveys, polls, and questionnaires.

9. Poll Everywhere Lets you create a feedback poll or ask questions and see results in real time. Allows students to respond in various ways. With open-ended questions, you can capture data and spin up tag clouds to aggregate responses.

10. Poll Maker Offers unique features, like allowing multiple answers to one question.

11. ProProfs Helps you make quizzes, polls, and surveys.

12. Quia Lets you create games, quizzes, surveys, and more. Access a database of existing quizzes from other educators.

13. Quizalize Helps you create quizzes and homework.

14. Quizizz Guides you through designing quizzes and lets you include students in the quiz-writing process.

15. Quizlet Lets you make flashcards, tests, quizzes, and study games that are mobile friendly.

16. Survey Hero Designed to build questionnaires and surveys.

17. SurveyMonkey Helpful for online polls and surveys.

18. SurveyPlanet Also helpful for online polls and surveys.

19. Triventy Lets you create quizzes students take in real time using individual devices.

20. Yacapaca Helps you write and assign quizzes.

21. Zoho Survey Allows you to make mobile-friendly surveys and see results in real time.

Brainstorm, mind map, and collaborate

Present, engage, and inspire

Generate word or tag clouds

1. EdWordle Generates word clouds from any entered text to help aggregate responses and facilitate discussion. Word clouds are pictures composed of a cloud of smaller words that form a clue to the topic.

2. Tagxedo Allows you to examine student consensus and facilitate dialogues.

3. Wordables Helps you elicit evidence of learning or determine background knowledge about a topic.

4. WordArt Includes a feature that allows the user to make each word an active link to connect to websites, including YouTube.

Get real-time feedback

Foster family communication

1. Remind Lets you text students and stay in touch with families.

2. Seesaw Helps you improve family communication and makes formative assessment easy, while students can use the platform to document their learning.

3. Voxer Lets you send recordings so families can hear how their students are doing, students can chat about their work, and you can provide feedback.

Strengthen teacher-to-student or student-to-student communication

Keep the conversation going with live chats

1. Yo Teach A backchannel site great for keeping the conversation going with students.

2. Chatzy Supports live, online chats in a private setting.

Create and store documents or assignments

1. Google Forms A Google Drive app that allows you to create documents students can collaborate on in real time using smartphones, tablets, and laptops.

2. Piazza Lets you upload lectures, assignments, and homework; pose and respond to student questions; and poll students about class content. This tool is better suited for older students as it mimics post-secondary class instructional formats.

Learn more

There are several resources for learning more about formative assessment and responsive instruction strategies. Consider our formative practices workshops, where school and district teams can gain a better understanding of the role formative practice plays in instruction and the four foundational practices to use in the classroom. Or for a quick start, download our eBook "Making it work: How formative assessment can supercharge your practice."

Jump in, try new tools and methods, and have fun!

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75 digital tools and apps teachers can use to support formative assessment in the classroom

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We've compiled an extensive list of 75 digital tools that can help teachers use formative assessment to elicit evidence of student learning.

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Office is committed to inclusive design and accessible products and content. We are constantly working to offer more to boost every user's productivity. On this page, find resources for people with disabilities and find out how to make your content accessible for all.

For general Office help, see the Office help home page.

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Office Accessibility Center - Resources for people with disabilities

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Office is committed to inclusive design and accessible products and content. We are constantly working to offer more to boost every user's productivity. On this page, find resources for people with disabilities and find out how to make your content accessible for all. For general Office help, see the Office help home page.

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Canva is a free-to-use online graphic design tool. Use it to create social media posts, presentations, posters, videos, logos and more.

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David Rose - Universal to Personal: Teaching with Universal Design for Learning in Heart & Mind

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David Rose - Universal to Personal: Teaching with Universal Design for Learning in Heart & Mind

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Universal to Personal: Teaching with universal design for learning in heart & mind - Dr. David Rose

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5 Minute Film Festival: Culturally Responsive Teaching

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5 Minute Film Festival: Culturally Responsive Teaching

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The changing racial and cultural landscape of America is certainly a much-discussed topic -- some researchers studying U.S. Census data and demographics even say that America could be a "minority majority" country as early as 2050. While the barriers between countries continue to come down, and globalization continues, how can teachers address the needs of students from a variety of cultural backgrounds and upbringings? This collection of videos introduces culturally responsive teaching (CRT), and includes some techniques that you can use to help students from diverse backgrounds succeed together.

Video Playlist: Culturally Responsive Teaching

Watch the first video below, or watch the whole playlist on YouTube.

1. Valerie Purdie-Vaughns on Unintentional Bias (3:04)
In this short video from Big Think, researcher Valerie Purdie-Vaughns explains how bias and assumptions can unconsciously affect the way you act. Although it's geared toward diversity awareness in the workplace, this is a good primer on cultural discrimination.

2. Expanding Teacher Self-Knowledge (1:27)
Since bias is often unconscious, one of the first things a culturally responsive teacher can do is be aware of assumptions about themselves and their students. This quick tip from the Southern Poverty Law Center's Teaching Tolerance initiative explains the value of self-reflection.

3. Office Chat: Culturally Responsive Teaching (9:24)
In this interview, Dr. Kavatas Newell, a faculty member at the University of Mary Washington, introduces some initial ways that teachers can incorporate culturally responsive teaching methods into their classrooms. The audio quality here is a bit low, but the tips are worth it.

4. The Danger of a Single Story (19:16)
Author Chimamanda Adichie's amazing TED talk introduces "The Danger of a Single Story." Teaching students of other cultures may require that you look past familiar stories and narratives to find school materials that resonate with your students' experiences and lives.

5. Building Trust With Families (14:12)
Many students from other cultures are English-language Learners (ELL). Although this video is long at 14 minutes, the panel of teachers and principals organized by Colorin Colorado offers great tips for connecting with the families of ELLs.

6. Recognizing Individual Characteristics (1:10)
This quick video, also from the Teaching Tolerance initiative, reminds viewers to respect students' individuality, even as you learn more about cultural differences and introduce more responsive practices into the classroom.

7. Education: Culture Matters (14:25)
This video from the Kamehameha Schools showcases the importance of culturally responsive educational programs. Students from the native Hawaiian population thrive when they learn in programs that incorporate their cultural heritage and traditions.

More Resources on Culturally Responsive Teaching

Whether you've been teaching diverse learners for years, or you're just starting to think about how to incorporate CRT into your classroom, these organizations and articles can help.

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5-Minute Film Festival: Culturally Responsive Teaching | Edutopia

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The changing racial and cultural landscape of America is certainly a much-discussed topic -- some researchers studying U.S. Census data and demographics even say that America could be a "minority majority" country as early as 2050. While the barriers between countries continue to come down, and globalization continues, how can teachers address the needs of students from a variety of cultural backgrounds and upbringings?

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Many teacher resources explore the fundamentals of Universal Design for Learning (UDL). This one takes UDL to the next level for educators who understand the basics-and can't wait to start using UDL in their lesson plans and classrooms.

In this practical, accessible guidebook, UDL expert Patti Kelly Ralabate walks teachers through the entire UDL lesson planning process, from developing learning goals to monitoring student progress. Through vignettes, exercises, video demonstrations, and other immediately useful resources, K-12 educators will discover how to translate UDL from theory to practice and plan lessons that meet every learner's needs. An essential guide for teachers, college instructors, specialized instructional support personnel, IEP team facilitators, curriculum planners, and inclusion facilitators, this book will help educators supercharge their lesson plans with one of today's best teaching approaches-and improve outcomes for students with and without special needs.

THIS BOOK HELPS TEACHERS

Review and understand the big ideas of UDL-what it is, what it's not

Create effective learning goals based on content and performance standards

Make sure learning goals are S.M.A.R.T.: Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Results-oriented, and Time-bound

Design lesson plans that address learner variability-even when teachers don't yet know the specific needs of every student

Measure what matters by applying UDL principles to assessment of student progress

Infuse UDL features into traditional instructional methods (with examples of how 10 other educators did it!)

Enhance UDL lessons with materials, tools, and media that add real value

Use self-reflection strategies and professional learning communities to continuously strengthen everyday practice

PRACTICAL MATERIALS: To guide teachers through each phase of the lesson planning process, the book includes scenarios, models, charts, application exercises, reflection questions, check-ins, and 7 classroom videos (available online) that bring key UDL concepts to life. Educators will also follow the lesson planning process of three teachers as they apply UDL for the first time.
Watch a webinar to get an inside look?

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instructional design; inclusion; variability; modifying schoolwork; adaptations; universal design for learning; teaching methods

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Many teacher resources explore the fundamentals of Universal Design for Learning (UDL). This one takes UDL to the next level for educators who understand the basics-and can't wait to start using UDL in their lesson plans and classrooms. In this practical, accessible guidebook, UDL expert Patti Kelly Ralabate walks teachers through the entire UDL lesson planning process, from developing learning goals to monitoring student progress.

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Teachers can improve outcomes and build equity in the classroom by listening closely to their students. Here are six ways to do that.

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Explore Strategies - Eberly Center - Carnegie Mellon University

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Center for Teaching Innovation and Excellence: Oberlin College

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Center for Teaching Innovation and Excellence: Oberlin College

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Center for Teaching Innovation and Excellence

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By Steve Volk (September 7, 2014)

My mother (who taught Spanish and French), my sister (quite competent in French), and I (Spanish) used to tease my father mercilessly about his inability to speak a language other than English. We drove around Mexico when I was young and laughed with great zest when, after each meal, he would try to ask, in Spanish, for the check ("La cuenta, por favor"). What emerged from his mouth were strange sounds that had quite literally become lost in the translation. The server would look at him in puzzlement until one of us stepped in to the rescue.

For my own part, I still remember the "D" I got on my drawing of an American eagle in the 4 th grade from Mrs. Simmons, who (I thought) was a lovely teacher and was just pointing out a reality: I couldn't draw, never could, still can't. My father's problem was that he just couldn't learn another language. (He often told the story of how, when he was a student at the University of Wisconsin - he became a lawyer; no slouch, he - his Latin teacher gave him a "C" instead of failing him if he promised never to take a foreign language again.)

So, where are these familial stories going? To the mindset research of Carol Dweck, a psychology professor at Stanford, which is the subject of today's "Article of the Week." Those in psychology or neuroscience will surely know her work. To boil it down drastically: through decades of research, Dweck (and her co-investigators) came to the conclusion that most people have two very different understandings about intellectual abilities and where they come from. Some think that people are just naturally talented in certain areas (foreign languages, art, math, music, etc.), and if you weren't born with those abilities, there's not much you can do to change that. Others think that intellectual abilities can be cultivated and developed if you apply yourself to the challenges at hand. It's not that people don't differ in their current skill levels, nor that with hard work everyone can be a Serena Williams, a Yo Yo Ma, or an Albert Einstein, but this second group believes that they can improve their underlying abilities if they work at it. (Interestingly, Einstein once wrote, "It's not that I'm so smart, it's that I stay with problems longer.") Dweck called these approaches "mindsets," and labeled the former a "Fixed Mindset," and the latter a "Growth Mindset."
Fixed vs. Growth Mindsets
Now, for those who are about to tune away thinking, "why is he peddling this pop motivational claptrap?", don't leave just yet. The research is solid (Dweck is a renowned scholar), but more importantly, her research contains implications for how we teach and interact with our students. Consider this. According to "mindset" research, those with a fixed mindset see evaluations (grades, comments written on papers or spoken in class, etc.) as appraisals of their intelligence, how "smart" they are, not as an indication of how much work they put into the paper, or how much reading informed their question in class, or what they learned. To get a "B" on an exam essentially means that they not smart enough to be "A" students. (Or that we, the teachers, got it wrong!)

The repercussions of this kind of thinking are serious. Most critical, in my mind, is that students who show the characteristics of the "fixed" mindset will try to avoid challenges. Think of it this way - and this is particularly true for our students who have done well throughout their pre-college careers. Receiving a "B" in a course proves that the student is not as intelligent as the "A" student. Now that's the last thing students want to disclose, so they will avoid challenges and stick to areas where they are (more) convinced of their abilities. Those with a growth mindset, on the other hand, have a greater tendency to take on challenges, persist in the face of adversity, and learn from criticism, largely because (at some level), they have accepted that their brains are just another muscle that needs to be exercised in order to develop.

Dweck summarizes this in the following way. If you have a fixed mindset:

Your goal in the classroom is to not look dumb.

Having to exert effort makes you feel dumb.

If you have a setback, you really feel dumb.

But if you have a growth mindset, then:

Your goal in the classroom is to learn.

Having to exert effort makes you feel like you're learning.

If you have a setback, you see it as a learning opportunity.

Some years ago, Dweck brought some students into the brain-wave lab at Columbia University to study how their brains behaved as they answered difficult questions and received feedback. She found that those she tagged as having a fixed mindset actually were tuning out information that could help them learn and improve. They were only interested in hearing feedback that reflected directly on their present ability, and didn't even show an interest in hearing the right answer when they had gotten a question wrong, because they had already failed and it just proved they weren't able to answer those questions. Those with a growth mindset, on the other hand, were quite attentive to information that could help them expand their existing knowledge and skills, regardless of whether they'd gotten the question right or wrong - in other words, their priority was learning, not the binary of success and failure.

This should raise the question of whether anything can be done to address mindsets that are already "set in place." I will never be a Picasso, but will I be able to think of myself as someone who can, with practice, draw? I'm reminded of the famous Stanford marshmallow experiment that showed that young children who could delay gratification (by not eating the marshmallow when the tester left the room) would do markedly better in myriad ways later in life than those with low self-control who gobbled it down after a few seconds. (A new study has suggested other variables are equally critical.) Anyway, I was always left thinking that the poor 4-year old who wolfed down the marshmallow was doomed for life and nothing could be done about it.
What We Can Do
Actually, that's not the case with self-control ("Once you realize that will power is just a matter of learning how to control your attention and thoughts, you can really begin to increase it," says Walter Mischel, who devised the experiment), and it's not the case with mindsets. And that's where we come in.

1. With advisees: Mindset research suggests that we need to encourage students to think of learning as a challenge they can take on in areas they are convinced they are "not really good at." How do we respond when an advisee says that she's really bad at math so will try to satisfy her QFR requirement some other way? Or when a student says that he's just not a good writer and so will try to avoid classes that have a lot of writing? We could say that these courses are "good for you," or that you should go beyond your comfort zone, but that doesn't give the student any sense of why it's "good" to go beyond one's comfort zone since they haven't succeeded in math or English in the past and, not succeeding again will only confirm that they're dumb, which is the last thing they want to be revealed about them. What if we talk about Dweck's research when these moments come up, which can give them a better idea of why challenges aren't just "good" for you, but are at the basis of learning?

2. With students in our classes: We need to give students a sense that doing well is not a question of having an innate ability in the subject, but of hard work. When we talk about feedback and grades, we should insist on high standards and at the same time give assurances that our students can do it if they apply themselves, although there's a caveat here. We can help students with advice on effective study and test-taking strategies, but, as Dweck pointed out, "Study skills and learning skills are inert until they're powered by an active ingredient." Students may know how to study, but won't want to if they believe their efforts will be futile, that they are not good at biology and the class they are in will just prove how dumb they are. You need, as well, to "target that belief," as Dweck puts it, and then you will "see more benefit than you have any reason to hope for."

Think about adopting some of the following strategies in your classes:

Talk about how learning occurs (a little bit of brain science never hurt), and what the research has shown about different mindsets. You can tell stories about former students who thought they would never learn the subject but who, with persistence and effort, ended up being successful in the course or in their later careers.

Talk about what it will take to learn the course material effectively -make explicit your expectations for the amount of time they should be putting in and the types of activities they should be engaging in outside of class.

Emphasize that "fast" learning, getting assignments or exams done quickly, is not the same as "deep" learning. Often students who take longer to "get it" learn the material more deeply. Faster can at times produce the right answer, but often at the expense of learning.

Break difficult or complex tasks down into their component parts so that students will see for themselves their own skills building up over time.

Think of how you respond to students in class. For students who answer correctly (or with good insight), just delivering praise ("Great answer, Alexa!") doesn't give them or those who didn't have the right answer any sense of where that great answer came from or where to go from there. Perhaps this might help more: "Good answer from Alexa...she was able to look at the evidence from the last experiment [filling in what that was] and apply it to the new circumstance. Where else can we go with this? What's still missing?"

3. In terms of our curriculum: Think, for a moment, of the structure of our curriculum. Its premise is the same as that of all liberal arts curricula: depth (major) plus breadth ("general education" requirements). But why the breadth? We have a new "Curriculum Exploration Requirement" that requires students to "complete a number of courses distributed across the curriculum," and "engage the curriculum broadly from the time they arrive at Oberlin." We do this "to encourage students to become familiar with a range of scholarly approaches in different subject areas by exploring the curricula in each of the three broad divisions of the College (arts and humanities, social and behavior sciences, and natural sciences and mathematics)." This is not a bad goal, but what if we were to think about it in terms of what mindset research tells us. The point is not just or only exposure to different scholarly, disciplinary or epistemological approaches for the sake of exposure, but an insistence that students challenge themselves in order to build the growth mindset that will serve them well later on. If we require students to take courses in areas they feel "dumb" in, they will often try to satisfy the requirements by essentially avoiding them ("what can I do to satisfy QFR without taking math?"), or, if they do enroll, will not really engage in them (pass/fail?) since to do so and do poorly will only prove how stupid they are. (And, perhaps we enable that: take that philosophy class pass/fail if you're worried about the grade!) Instead, how do we build challenges into the curriculum? How do we provide a curriculum that encourages students to realize that they can learn in areas that previously they had closed off? How, to return to Einstein's quote, can we construct a curriculum that helps all our students stay with problems longer? If we think about our curriculum through Dweck's research, it suggests that the basis of curricular decisions should not be on breadth for the sake of breadth, but challenge for the sake of challenge. We can do that by engaging the various divisions of the College and Conservatory, but why we do that now becomes clearer.

It should also be clear that everything about mindset research that applies to students in the classroom, applies equally to what they do outside of the classroom: in athletics, leadership, artistic endeavors, etc.

A final point on teaching via mindset research. We set high standards, expect our students to meet them, and will provide them guidance for doing just that. But are we inadvertently introducing cues into the classroom that needlessly (and quite likely unintentionally) tell some students that they don't belong? We need to think of the examples we use, the posters on our walls, the pronouns we employ. Will they tell some students that math, or computer science, or creative writing is just not for them? I think of a quote from Justice Sonya Sotomayor, in her recent biography. She said that when she reached college she "felt like a visitor landing in an alien land." "I have spent my years since [college]," she continued, "while at law school, and in my various professional jobs, not feeling completely a part of the worlds I inhabit." What can we do to insure that all our students not only feel that they belong, but understand that, if they work hard, they can grow.

OK, then. Back to my drawing of the American eagle!

Some additional resources:

Carol Dweck's homepage at Stanford links to more than 40 pdf's of her articles.

Mindset: The New Psychology of Success (Ballantine Books, 2007).

Self-theories: Their Role in Motivation, Personality, and Development (Essays in Social Psychology) (Psychology Press, 2000).

Marina Krakovsky, "The Effort Effect," Stanford Alumni Magazine (March/April 2007).

Maria Popova, "Fixed vs. Growth: The Two Basic Mindsets that Shape Our Lives," Brain Pickings (Jan. 29, 2014).

"Mindset and Math/Science Achievement (2008)," National Numeracy (Nov. 21, 2013). The article links to Carol S. Dweck, "Mindsets and Math/Science Achievement."

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Mindsets: "I'm not really good at that..."

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By Steve Volk (September 7, 2014) My mother (who taught Spanish and French), my sister (quite competent in French), and I (Spanish) used to tease my father mercilessly about his inability to speak a language other than English.

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Learn how to promote mistakes from Carol Dweck and Jo Boaler; watch teachers use this practice in action; and download activity ideas to try in your classroom.

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Malcolm Ocean is the founder of a company called "Complice," advertised as a "startup changing how people relate to their ambition." He offers an interesting essay on "applied growth mindset", in which he recognizes the difference between knowing what growth mindset means and using it consistently in your learning. He suggests that applying growth mindset consistently requires practice, which can be done in part by shifting the language you use from fixed to growth mindset.

There are several on-line resources useful to reinforce growth mindset language:
Finally, I encourage you to read an essay by the Lenox Academy Assistant Principal, commenting on the value of building growth mindset culture in schools, and watch the short video below of teachers describing their experiences teaching with a growth mindset program called Brainology.

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Malcolm Ocean is the founder of a company called "Complice," advertised as a "startup changing how people relate to their ambition." He offers an interesting essay on "applied growth mindset", in which he recognizes the difference between knowing what growth mindset means and using it consistently in your learning.

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The power of believing that you can improve

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Carol Dweck researches “growth mindset” — the idea that we can grow our brain’s capacity to learn and to solve problems. In this talk, she describes two ways to think about a problem that’s slightly too hard for you to solve. Are you not smart enough to solve it … or have you just not solved it yet? A great introduction to this influential field.

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Analyzing a college course that adheres to the Universal Design for Learning framework

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Analyzing a college course that adheres to the Universal Design for Learning framework

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The 5W Cube is a portable strategy to target open-ended questions (beginning with who, what, when, where, why, and how) as a means of exploring content and conversational speech. The 5W Cube helps students formulate questions and foster meaningful connections with content. The 5W Cube is a general strategy...

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Podcast: Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain

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Podcast: Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain

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This school year, I have the privilege of working shoulder to shoulder with teachers who are rolling up their sleeves and asking hard questions about how they can better serve their under-performing students who are disproportionately English learners, poor students, and students of color. They are working to incorporate culturally responsive practices into their classrooms.

I believe culturally responsive teaching (CRT) is a powerful method for accelerating student learning. But truth be told, most educators are not really sure what it is or what it looks like. For some, it seems mysterious. A number of leaders discount it because it seems too "touchy feely" or only focused on raising students' self-esteem, when they need to raise achievement levels. But CRT is so much more than that. It's the reason why I wroteCulturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain. ( Brief podcast on CRT)

Two of the biggest challenges I see teachers struggle with when first embracing CRT, is understanding the role culture actually plays in instruction and how to operationalize culturally responsive practices. They worry that they have to learn 19 different cultures -- everyone's individual customs, holidays, foods, and language. This simply isn't true. Here are four other big ideas about culturally responsive teaching to keep in mind:

1. Culturally responsive teaching isn't the same as multicultural education or social justice education. Too often we use the terms culturally responsive teaching and multicultural education interchangeably, when they're different things. They are related, but only culturally responsive teaching focuses on building students' learning power. It's important to remember that CRT isn't about diversity training, but about helping students reach deeper levels of understanding.

2. Culturally responsive teaching builds students' brain power by Improving information processing skills using cultural learning tools.This isn't an aspect of CRT we talk about a lot. Instead, educators like to focus on the affective elements. Keep in mind one way that the achievement gap manifests itself is by creating dependent learners who find it hard to do critical thinking or independent learning. When we focus on using culture as a cognitive scaffold, then we're able to leverage students' neural pathways that make learning easier.

3. Culturally responsive teaching is grounded in social and cognitive neuroscience. Neuroscience is giving us new findings every day that support why culturally responsive practices work. For example, social neuroscience reminds us that relationships are the on-ramp to learning, meaning if a student doesn't feel heard or seen, then it leads to increased stress. Stress hormones like cortisol impair the brain's executive function. So in order to create a learning environment conducive to all students learning, we need to lower stress hormones by building those relationships.

4. Culturally responsive teaching requires teachers to recognize the cultural orientation we call "collectivism."Teachers are often confused about how culture plays a role in culturally responsive teaching. They think they have to mention race, ethnicity, or cultural artifacts like ethnic food, music, or literature all the time for every different group. Instead, a key starting point to making cultural responsiveness manageable is to organize instructional activities around collectivist cultural principles -- group harmony and interdependence. Vygotsky talks about this as "socio-cultural learning" and highlights that it is necessary to move students into their zone of proximal development.

Here's another important point to make: Culturally responsive teaching isn't a program or set of strategies. First and foremost, it is a mindset. That means that it's equally important to do the ongoing "inside-out" work to build your social-emotional capacity to work across social, linguistic, racial, and/or economic difference with students and their families. Too often I hear educators say that they are "color-blind" or don't understand the socio-political issues that lead to inequities in education -- like disproportionate discipline outcomes for boys of color or low achievement data for English learners, poor students, and students of color in general.

We have to make it our personal business to build our emotional stamina to address our own blind spots and biases. One of the nation's leading implicit bias scholars, Patricia Devine of the University of Wisconsin, compares implicit bias to habits that, with intention and practice, can be broken. Her research has found that three conditions need to be in place for individuals to successfully "de-bias":

1. Intention: You have to acknowledge that you harbor unconscious biases and are motivated to change.

2. Attention: You have to pay attention to your triggers and know when stereotypical responses or assumptions are activated.

3. Time: You have to make time to practice new strategies designed to "break" your automatic associations that link a negative judgment to behavior that is culturally different from yours.

"De-biasing" requires a level of metacognition. In this case, you're not thinking about your thinking, but thinking about your unconscious reacting. Remember, it isn't about getting rid of our biases, it's about rewiring our brains to not respond unconsciously to the negative dominant narratives about the learning capacity of poor students, students of color, and English learners. We have to tame our amygdala, our brain's fight or flight defense mechanism, and take advantage of neuroplasticity - our brain's ability to change itself and respond differently to emotionally charged situations, like talking about race, culture, and inequity.

At the end of professional development sessions with teachers, I usually share this quote from Atul Gawande, author of the Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right: "Better is possible. It does not take genius. It takes diligence. It takes moral clarity. It takes ingenuity. And above all, it takes a willingness to try." Operationalizing CRT may seem overwhelming, but start with something small but high leverage, and grow your comfort and skill level. We can do this!

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Culturally Responsive Teaching & The Brain

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This school year, I have the privilege of working shoulder to shoulder with teachers who are rolling up their sleeves and asking hard questions about how they can better serve their under-performing students who are disproportionately English learners, poor students, and students of color.

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DO-IT The Center for Universal Design in Education

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DO-IT The Center for Universal Design in Education

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scald=4956:sdl_editor_representation {"link":"http://www.washington.edu/doit/videos/index.php?vid=69"}] Watch Quality Education is Accessible, a video on universal design for student instruction. The Center for Universal Design in Education (CUDE) develops and collects resources to help educators apply universal design (UD) in order to make all aspects of the educational

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CAST would like to thank TextHelp Systems Ltd. for use of the SpeechStream toolbar in the UDL On Campus web site.

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The Center for Culturally Responsive Teaching and Learning.

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The Center for Culturally Responsive Teaching and Learning.

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Culturally Responsive Design for English Learners

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Culturally Responsive Design for English Learners

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Culturally Responsive Design for English Learners: The UDL Approach

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The UDL Guidelines are a tool used in the implementation of Universal Design for Learning, a framework to improve and optimize teaching and learning for all people based on scientific insights into how humans learn. Learn more about the Universal Design for Learning framework from CAST. The UDL Guidelines can be used by educators, curriculum developers, researchers, parents, and anyone else who wants to implement the UDL framework in a learning environment. These guidelines offer a set of concrete suggestions that can be applied to any discipline or domain to ensure that all learners can access and participate in meaningful, challenging learning opportunities.

Coming soon! UDL Guidelines 3.0

The UDL Guidelines are a living, dynamic tool that is continuously developed based on new research and feedback from practitioners. In 2020, CAST launched our most recent effort to update the UDL Guidelines, with a specific focus on equity. There has been a strong call from the field-both practitioners and researchers alike-to more fully develop the Guidelines to address critical barriers rooted in biases and systems of oppression. The current update aims to respond to this call and to work toward fulfilling the promise of the Guidelines as a tool to guide the design of learning environments that more fully honor and value every learner.

Since our launch in 2020, we have been committed to a community-driven, inclusive, and transparent updating process. As part of this effort, we are:

Collaborating with an Advisory Board, a UDL Guidelines Collaborative, and a Young Adult Advisory Board to guide our work

Conducting focus groups with a diversity of participants to learn from their perspectives, lived experiences, and feedback

Reviewing the research on the UDL Guidelines research pages to understand the balance of different research fields, methodological approaches, epistemological approaches, and author positionalities

Conducting literature reviews of equity-oriented research that connect to and extend the Guidelines, such as disability studies and critical pedagogy studies

We are excited to share this next iteration of the UDL Guidelines in 2024. If you are interested in receiving our UDL Guidelines 3.0 newsletter to stay updated on our progress and to share your ideas and perspectives, please complete this brief form.

Review the Summary

Explore the Full Draft

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The UDL Guidelines are a tool used in the implementation of Universal Design for Learning, a framework to improve and optimize teaching and learning for all people based on scientific insights into how humans learn. Learn more about the Universal Design for Learning framework from CAST.