Tag: #education

Classroom Community Building

by Laura Steinbrink, posted in Education

Relationships between students and their teachers are important, but so are the relationships built in class between classmates. While pacing guides and other curriculum demands can become overwhelming fast, there are some easy ways to work in relationship building too. New students popping in throughout the school should definitely be a reminder to add team building or relationship building into your plans, but the truth is that all students benefit with regular or periodic activities that help them get to know their classmates.

Google Forms + Previously Created Graphics=Magic

by Laura Steinbrink, posted in Education

If you aren't using Google Forms, it's time to up your game and this post may help get inspired to give it a try. If you are using Forms regularly or at least frequently, this post is for you too. Although Forms can help you quickly and easily gather data and artifacts for assessing student learning, this post isn't really about that. My focus here is more on the aesthetics of those Forms.

5 TECH Inclusive Platforms

by Laura Steinbrink, posted in Education

If you have never considered how tech can make your class more inclusive, I encourage you to do so. If you have considered ways to meet the needs of your students in more diverse ways while helping to build a positive culture in your class, then this post may be just a refresher for you. I will briefly feature Pear Deck, Buncee, Microsoft tools, Wakelet, and Flipgrid to show how these tech tools can help you create that inclusive classroom we all need.

I Call Cap On That

by Laura Steinbrink, posted in Education

I am a big proponent of turning over areas of lesson designing to students. While I head into class with a clear outline of what I want students to accomplish, I am more than willing to give them the opportunity to refine the details of my plan's execution. When it comes to building game elements into a lesson, my students are the pros at making it more fun for them while at the same time, retaining or enhancing the impact on their learning. So take the following learning activity, try it in your classroom, then encourage your students to find ways to improve it.

Microsoft Literacy Tools and More

by Laura Steinbrink, posted in Education

As an English teacher, reading as always been a love of mine personally, as well as a focus of mine professionally. As a high school teacher, though, I have not been taught HOW to teach the reading skills. My expertise is in the analysis and comprehension of texts, so when the district begins to talk about having the English teachers facilitate reading intervention, I throw up my hand to point out that I have no literacy training. I'm probably not the only teacher this has happened to, and if we're being honest, it is up to everyone in a district to ensure all students can read and have the tools necessary to help them be successful readers.

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5 Things Administrators Can Do to Build Trust and Community in Their Buildings

by Laura Steinbrink, posted in Education

My hat is off to all educators out there who just survived one of the hardest years, if not THE hardest, in education to date. If we never hear the words “flexibility” and “pivot” again, life would be grand. However, as we look ahead to the 2021-22 school year, there is still a cloud of uncertainty hanging over it.

Highkey Relationship Building

by Laura Steinbrink, posted in Education

Teaching during a pandemic presents a lot of problems for educators to face and solve daily, and clearly I haven't solved the problem of posting regularly since the 2020-21 school year began. However, as we ended the week before the holiday break, I realized that there was something I could share that would benefit teachers both online and those teaching face to face. Something that wouldn't be overwhelming because we already have it in our toolboxes, although it occasionally falls behind other tools and is temporarily forgotten.

How to Add Game Elements to Your Lesson: Among Us-Google Style!

by Laura Steinbrink, posted in Education

I am always watching to see how I can incorporate them, and this past week, with the help of other educators and my students, I figured out how incorporate Among Us-Google style! Please note right now that I have never actually played this game. I have observed students become obsessed with it, and from there I just asked a lot of questions, which my 14 year-old son can verify. If you are not a Google school, then using the collaborative features of other programs, like Wakelet and Powerpoint, will function similarly for you. As we rolled it out this week, I took notes, and the students helped me revise the game elements as needed, so the following is what we came up with, and it includes how to do this if you are teaching virtually or face to face. Get ready for some fun with a collaborative or gallery-style lesson.

Your Story Matters. Here’s Mine.

by Laura Steinbrink, posted in Education

From the time I became very aware of what my parents did for a living, I firmly decided that I did not want to follow in their educational footsteps. They worked too hard for too little compensation for all the time and effort they spent on their work, students, and school. They were outstanding educators (my dad retired as an elementary principal, and my mom retired as a psychological examiner for an educational cooperative). In college, as I considered my major area of study and degree options, Dad pointed out that careers define where we live.

Reflective Review: Think it Through Then Do

by Laura Steinbrink, posted in Education

Your lesson has gone really well, but you want to make that new learning sticky before students leave for the day or head to their next class, or before you move on to the next subject if you are teaching elementary. There are a lot of strategies that you can go to here, but which one? That, friends, is at the sole discretion of the teacher, and there is no one right answer. While exit tickets, after action reports, think-pair-share, brain dumps, and sketchnotes are just some of the many options to choose from for ending a lesson, I may have one more cognitive tool you can add to your educational tool chest.