Blog
Working Through Behaviors
I got on Facebook this morning just like any other morning. I scrolled through the educational posts on my feed, and they are all talking about the same thing: behavior. Behavior is an issue . . . Read more
You Are Loved, and We Are So Happy You Are Here!
We know COVID-19 and the global pandemic changed things for everyone in education. But for our youngest learners, who often come to preK with deficits in language and socialization, the pandemic . . . Read more
Does 'All' Mean 'All?' Labels, Be Gone!
[Photo courtesy of Kenneth Williams’ Defenders and Disruptors of the Status Quo: Who Will Educators Choose To Be? (2017)] Great teachers who truly want what is best for their students . . . Read more
Coordinate, Manage, Lead
These three words all have something to do with making something happen. Yet in the PLC at Work® culture, there are very important distinctions among those words that can have a profound impact on the way your building operates to ensure high levels of learning for all students. Read more
The Beauty of the PLC Process
The beauty of the PLC process is that the more our educators learn about best practices and implement those practices, the more our students will learn and grow. Over the past couple of years, we started to see an uptick in unwanted behaviors in our school. The great thing about reaching out to my entire staff was that I had several people who had previous experience implementing the PBIS (Positive Behavior Intervention and Support) process. Read more
School Is a Home for the Mind
Ask most teachers and they will tell you they wish they had more strategies/training/resources to challenge their students to think for themselves; to acquire and use a repertoire of strategies that will help them attack a problem or situation for which there is no immediate or obvious answer. The importance of this aspect of student learning has become glaringly obvious with the increased rigor of Common Core standards and the assessments used to measure proficiency in those standards. Read more
Legendary Lessons I Wish I’d Known My First Year of Teaching
I recently spent time with my parents for our weekly lunch date. Amid our customary conversations about the state of our nation’s political system and where the best senior citizen lunch discounts can be found, we began to muse about life lessons that I had learned during my formative years. After much time had passed, these lessons (and the resulting consequences) are now looked back upon with some measure of fondness. But during the time they occurred, these lessons and consequences evoked the same emotional reaction as losing my favorite George Brett baseball card. Read more
Both Sides of the Pyramid: Behavior and Academics
“It’s hard to do the collaborative work of a professional learning community if your school is struggling with student behavior and school climate issues,” commented a teacher at . . . Read more
PBIS: The Perfect Fit for Behavior Intervention in a PLC
Two years ago, our school decided to implement PBIS (Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports). We felt that we had a good handle on the academic side of the PLC, but something was missing. . . . Read more
Empowering the Silent Stakeholders—Students
“To be a teacher is to be a prophet. We are not preparing children for the world we live in but for a future we can barely imagine.”—Gordon Brown, Former Dean of MIT Engineering School. Read more
When Homework Is Not Being Done at Home
Whenever I present on effective interventions, one of the most common questions I receive is: “Too many of our students just won’t try . . . how do we motivate them to do their . . . Read more
Using Your Best to Help the Rest: Another Thought on Intervention
It has been exciting over the years to see the growth of our students at Lakeridge Junior High as we have committed to increasing the capacity of adults through the processes associated with being a Professional Learning Community... Read more
Excerpt: Pyramid of Behavior Interventions, Chapter One
We believe that academic and behavioral performance go hand in hand. One study (Hawkins, Catalano, Kosterman, Abbott, & Hill,1999) found that when schools raised their level of academic achievement, behavior problems decreased... Read more
Teaching Students to Be Responsible With PLCs
In a blog post last year called Do PLCs Enable Students to Act Irresponsibly? (February 16, 2010), I presented the premise that schools should do more than hope students act responsibly but rather should put procedures in place to require students to do so. I acknowledged that almost all educators would prefer that students act responsibly because responsible behavior is important to their success in school and in life. I also suggested that regrettably, some of the students who enter our schools do not act responsibly. Read more
Do PLCs Enable Students to Act Irresponsibly by Asking Educators to Assume Greater Responsibility for Learning?
Those familiar with our work know that we contend schools committed to helping all students learn provide students who are not being successful with additional time and support for learning in a way that is timely, directive, and systematic. This proposal is sometimes met with skepticism by… Read more