TEACHERS
How might we rethink the profession and ensure teachers are poised to learn and thrive?
Field Trip: February 4th, 2021 10-11:30 PT
Workshop: February 17th, 2021 12-1:30 PT
Students thrive when educators thrive. They learn best when teachers are supported learners. But the demands and conditions for many educators makes this a tall order. How do we question the assumptions behind what it looks like to be a teacher today? How do we shake up the systems to ensure the profession can live up to its highest potential — empowering, sustainable, flexible, supported, and fulfilling?
Access to this month’s experiences start at $25.
Field trip guests
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Avalon School
Avalon is a small, tuition-free public charter school for students in grades 6-12 located in Saint Paul, Minnesota.
It has pioneered two separate, powerful models of education: a Project Based Learning curriculum and a Teacher-Powered governance model. Teachers collectively make all decisions regarding curriculum, budget, professional development, and personnel.
An interview about Avalon with Carrie Bakken (who will be joining us), from Education Reimagined.
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The Academy for Teachers
A NYC-based nonprofit that raises respect for a noble profession by honoring and supporting exceptional teachers. The Academy offers master classes for teachers featuring extraordinary people in diverse fields, like Henry Louis Gates Jr., Gloria Steinem and Ta-Nehisi Coates.
A story about The Academy for Teachers from the Wall Street Journal: Nonprofit Aims to Inspire Teachers and Honor Their Vocation
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The Teaching Well
An Oakland-based nonprofit consulting group taking an organizational wellness approach to interrupt chronic teacher turnover in districts and charters across the nation. In partnership, The Teaching Well works to “heal adult culture by providing tools for healthy dialogue, emotional regulation and mindful stress resilience.”
An essay in EdSurge by The Teaching Well’s Director of Instruction, Jill E. Thomas: Pandemic Underscores ‘Wellbeing Gap’ in the Teaching Profession
WORKSHOP (2.17.22)
For our workshop this month, we’re hosting a “book club:” We’ll collectively explore three books that offer different perspectives on the reality and promise of the teaching profession.
The purpose of this workshop is to 1) Get acquainted with perspectives on teaching that are new to us (or deepen our thinking about perspectives we already have), and 2) Join other folks in conversation about these ideas in order to build connections with each other across diverse contexts, geographies and roles.
When you register, you’ll have the option of choosing one of these three books to be sent to you. Each book will come with an invitation to dig into a few passages prior to the workshop. (Don’t worry: You can join us without reading the whole thing.)
THE TEACHING BRAIN | Vanessa Rodriguez
“Countering the dated yet widely held presumption that teaching is simply the transfer of knowledge from one person to another, The Teaching Brain weaves together scientific research and real-life examples to show that teaching is a dynamic interaction and an evolutionary cognitive skill that develops from birth to adulthood.
With engaging, accessible prose, Harvard researcher Vanessa Rodriguez reveals what it actually takes to become an expert teacher.”
TEACHING WHEN THE WORLD IS ON FIRE: AUTHENTIC CLASSROOM ADVICE, FROM CLIMATE JUSTICE TO BLACK LIVES MATTER | Edited by Lisa Delpit
Is it okay to discuss politics in class? What are constructive ways to help young people process the daily news coverage of sexual assault? How can educators engage students around Black Lives Matter? Climate change? Confederate statue controversies? Immigration? Hate speech?
In Teaching When the World Is on Fire, Delpit turns to a host of crucial issues facing teachers in these tumultuous times. Delpit's master-teacher wisdom tees up guidance from beloved, well-known educators along with insight from dynamic principals and classroom teachers tackling difficult topics in K–12 schools every day. This cutting-edge collection includes essays by Pedro Noguera, William Ayers, Hazel Edwards, Christopher Emdin and more.
Learn more: https://thenewpress.com/books/teaching-when-world-on-fire
WE GOT THIS. | Cornelius Minor
While challenging the teacher as hero trope, We Got This shows how authentically listening to kids is the closest thing to a superpower that we have. What we hear can spark action that allows us to make powerful moves toward equity by broadening access to learning for all children.
A lone teacher can’t eliminate inequity, but Cornelius demonstrates that a lone teacher can confront the scholastic manifestations of racism, sexism, ableism and classism by showing:
exactly how he plans and revises lessons to ensure access and equity
ways to look anew at explicit and tacit rules that consistently affect groups of students unequally
suggestions for leaning into classroom community when it feels like the kids are against you
ideas for using universal design that make curriculum relevant and accessible
advocacy strategies for making classroom and schoolwide changes that expand access to opportunity to your students