“The books are here!” English teacher Christina Lopez shouted excitedly as she pushed through the faculty lounge door. She held a brown cardboard box in her left hand and a box cutter in her right. She crossed to the table and dropped the box. Its thud splashed coffee over the rim of P.E. teacher Rex […]
Al Boerema began the conversation by asking the panel members to reflect on the tension between the standards/accountability movement that has taken center stage in public policy on education and the equity perspective that emphasizes cultural diversity, positive relationships, and equipping students to confront social inequities through culturally appropriate pedagogy and student-centered learning and teaching. […]
To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven . . . —Ecclesiastes 3:1 Welcome back! Now that the tree has been chipped and you’ve plowed through what you know of “Auld Lang Syne,” it’s time to get back to work, lest “old acquaintance be forgotten.” The Christmas season and […]
Spaces where learners flourish are spaces of discovery and possibility, where imagination and creativity are nurtured, where learners engage deeply and meaningfully with each other and the world, where learners have room to discover and pursue their passions under the loving guidance of adults who share the learning space. I believe most good teachers want […]
Three Days into My Teaching Career, 1994 Twenty-nine students dutifully pulled out a worksheet. Words like erosion, deposition, and alluvial spilled into every blank. The power of assigning humbled and scared me. If my command generated this much work, I wondered, how much would students do if they really wanted to learn something? I have […]
Like most teachers, I have asked students to work on projects in my classes. The idea of having students make and create projects is not new. Project-based learning (PBL), however, shifts student learning to be through the project rather than using the project as a reflection of learning at the end of a unit or […]
I figured it would be a pretty easy thing to do. About eight years ago, I began teaching a college course called “Fine Arts in the Classroom.” Since this is an elective course that education students take toward the beginning of their course of study, I thought it would be easy enough to incorporate project-based […]
A Vision for Education Education reform has been a hot topic in North America for many years. In 2011, Barack Obama focused his State of the Union address on America’s need to “Win the Future.” The speech highlights education as a primary pillar in a global competition for dominance: “If we want to win […]
Four things have become clearer to me in recent years. First, Christian schools must be distinctively different. Second, the engagement of the student in today’s era is paramount for meaningful learning to take place. Third, our goal is the flourishing of each student. Fourth, what we really are about in Christian education is […]
Thoughtful Christian educators, realizing that they live and work in a rapidly changing world, are constantly looking for ways to improve the way they do their work. They ask themselves questions like these: How can we reconcile the constant emphasis on the need to encourage our students to develop twenty-first-century learning skills with our mission […]