As current school leaders, we have to be mindful of how we will create school cultures that will support the social emotional needs of our teachers and students and their families. Now more than ever, there is a need for people to share and understand as we seek to make sense of our world today. There is a need to begin emotional and psychological healing but that can only happen when we create safe spaces to share our anxieties and fears.

The varied ability across classrooms in the United States is, oftentimes, a daunting challenge for today’s teachers. Considering the limited time and resources available in which to meet all those needs, leaves the educator asking the question, how do I divide my time, resources and myself in order to effectively meet the needs of all my learners? This article will examine how teachers can leverage high impact, research based instructional literacy principles and strategies in order to achieve academic growth across all content areas.

In today’s reality of standards-based instruction, it has become increasingly challenging to ensure that all students receive high quality and equitable access to a culturally relevant education. For English language learners (ELLs), the challenge is even greater. ELLs are faced with the task of acquiring content knowledge while learning a second language. As the number of ELLs throughout the United States continues to increase, it is critical that teachers, both mainstream and ELL specific, consider how best to enhance ELLs language proficiency in order to increase understanding of academic content. This article seeks to equip teachers with different ways to support and engage English language learners in the mainstream classroom.

As school begin to address the challenge of reopening schools, a greater concern of how to address learning loss created during remote instruction has taken center stage. Now, more than ever, administrators, teachers and families continue to question how best to meet the learning needs of their students, especially after losing more than a quarter of the 2019-2020 academic year to the current pandemic. One recent study, conducted by NWEA, predicts that students will experience a learning loss of 30% in reading and as much as 50% in math as a result of the pandemic. Left untamed, these types of academic setbacks could have significant negative implications for students who were previously preforming on grade level and even more disastrous for students who were already behind. This article hopes to discuss the how differentiation practices can be leveraged to address lost learning during pandemic remote instruction, while also highlighting procedural steps to effectively accelerate learning.

Nineteenth century American social reformer Henry Beecher once said, “The head learns new things, but the heart forever practices old experiences.” For centuries, philosophers as well as scientists have strived to intellectually to explain how the brain processes as well as incorporates new information. Consequently, the how/what the brain learns has dramatic implications for how students perceive themselves. Although it has only been in the last few decades that strides in cognitive science have revealed new information about how non-cognitive factors influence student learning. This has provided tremendous insight and generated new implications for classroom instruction.

In this article entitled “Contested Knowledge: A Critical Review of the Concept of Differentiation in Teaching and Learning” written by Sasha Taylor, the paper outlines her case for how differentiation has led to increasing inequality in the classroom. It starts with an introduction to her definition of differentiation, theories and knowledge, implementation, benefits, and then outlines the factors she believes impacts differentiation – socio-economic background, gender, culture.

School leaders tasked with school improvement face a daunting challenge. As the bottom 5% of schools within the U.S are identified in need of school improvement based on, among other factors, proficiency on standardized tests, school leaders and their constituents face often unique and alarming sets of circumstances when confronting such problems. Oftentimes available improvement strategies can appear numerous, overwhelming, extravagant and time consuming. Time, in many cases, is not an unlimited resource gifted to school improvement leaders and personnel. The brilliance of quality action planning, when done strategically, offers school leaders a targeted cost-effective game plan to address the unique needs within a school building. This article will examine and discuss key factors leaders should consider in order to facilitate action planning that delivers authentic results.

In their article entitled, “Constructivism and Differentiation: Research and Practical Strategies for Assessment”, provided by the Lookstein Content Team, they detail a justification for the use of differentiated assessment in Jewish Day Schools. This perspective is continuously validated through the use of psychological and scholarly research, mainly a discussion of constructivism and instructional practices that, according to the author, best supports the acquisition of knowledge. Their premise revolves around the idea that the most effective form of instruction is one that is “hands on...that encourages students to be actively involved in learning.”

The comprehensive needs assessment, or program evaluation, of a school is actually a pretty difficult review to get right. Getting it wrong impacts your staff, your culture, and ultimately your students. So, in this guide we explore seven things that, in our experience, you need to do to ‘get it right’ and optimize the value (and meaning) your school derives from the process….

Implementing a Collaborative Quality School Review Process to enable continuous and sustainable school improvement

Generally speaking, school staff feel most comfortable to discuss and action necessary change when they are empowered to own the process. Of course, there is a need to heighten accountability, but most success will be seen through a process that involves staff members as the creators and implementers of the work. To increase staff involvement and action school leaders are turning to Collaborative Quality Review processes.

Here are five reasons why…..