When I first transitioned from using writing prompts to doing thematic blogs, I attempted a middle ground. I offered a list of three writing ideas and a fourth described as “free choice.” To my surprise, only a few students chose the free choice option. Students seemed…
Subscribe to YouTube Channel My kids participate in an amazing hands-on learning experience every summer. It’s called home. It’s where they write stories, paint pictures, go on expeditions, visit parks, read books, and build things with duct tape and cardboard. For the entire summer,…
My son is weird. Not bad weird. Not socially awkward weird. Just weird. He sees the world differently. This last January he asked me if I would make him a graphic novel about a mutant taco-turned-superhero. He loves to design his own Pokemon characters and…
I never learned how to write copy in school. In fact, even after taking a ton (yes, we weigh them in tonnage) of literature and humanities classes, I somehow graduated from college without knowing the term “copy writing.” To be fair, I went to Arizona…
For the last 12 years, I’ve used design thinking as a teacher, an author, an educational technology startup founder and an artist. I’ve used in in the non-profit world in program development and I’m currently using it right now as I lead a team of…
“We need kids to be creators, not consumers.” I’ve heard this statement so many times at conference and in Twitter chats and in blog posts. I get it. We want students to be creative. But is consumption actually a bad thing? See, every person I…
Portfolios are a powerful way to help students showcase their work, reflect on their learning, and set goals for the future. But as an educator (first as a middle school teacher and now as a college professor), I have always been looking for ways to…
When I was a kid, I hated research papers. I hated the paint-by-numbers rules we had to follow. I hated the fact that I couldn’t choose the topic or ask the questions or find the sources. I hated the notecards and the binders and everything…
When I first began teaching, I viewed research as something separate from the rest of learning. We did research projects or we kept the research as a phase within a project. Since then, I’ve had some shifts in how we do research: 1. Start with…
The picture above is an example of a game where students have to shoot a soccer ball past the goalie (moved by the opponent). The ball drops down and they get a shot again. It is visually-appealing and fun to play. This was part of…
