Let’s get at least two things right in our schools: dignity and respect

Our industry’s ongoing experimentation with personalized learning has seen some interesting (even troubling ) twists and turns as educators, industry leaders, and policy-makers try to sort out a common definition of what we mean by it and a set of best practices that captures what it looks like in action. As with many things in education, it is fair to say that we might be making this simple concept into something much more complicated (even controversial) than is necessary. In fact, maybe our parameters around personalized learning should remain fluid as long as our actions begin and end with valuing each child as a person, and providing each one a learning path that is unique unto themselves. In fact, with the lives of so many…

The reality that we all face as teachers and leaders, and that no one seems to be talking about, is how our schools and curriculum are being asked to do much, much more than inspire life-long skills in reading, writing, and arithmetic. My how times have changed. As schools are thrust into the intriguing demands of social-emotional learning (SEL), we have to wonder how we ever got here without it and what the end-game of schooling will be someday if we can figure out how to navigate the pressures of covering so many content standards in so little time with teaching our children how to manage their emotions, build strong relationships, improve their social skillsets, and gain life-long confidence. What we might find out is…