Writing is power for me.  It is literally the pathway to my best thoughts. I’ve been recently recording some videos for a mini-training we are launching on state assessments (coming in March!- shameless plug). I typically write out a script to the trainings, and then chunk it down and record it bits at a time,…

I had a realization while working in some middle schools in South Texas recently. I was working with several writing teachers, and I kept hearing the same things: “The kids are not developing their ideas”, “The kids are not able to state a claim and back it up with reasons,” “The students aren’t able to…

I would venture to say that one of the biggest “misnomers”’ of culturally responsive teaching is that it is solely, or even mostly, built on understanding different cultures and building relationships, and that it has little to do with instruction. This couldn’t be further from the truth, which is one of the reasons why I…

When I met Jacob Chastain, he was a middle school ELA teacher at a Title 1 school. He was eccentric, and clearly brilliant, and he loved his job. He was a high level thinker all the time. He asked great questions of his students, and expected great things from them.  The problem was not all…

As we continue to look at our targeted students in culturally responsive teaching, we have to look at a population where the gap is growing significantly – our Long Term English Learners. These are the students who have been in the US longer than 6 years, but haven’t exited the EL program, and there are…