In a successful middle school, school counselors support young adolescents' academic progress and personal wellbeing through a variety of methods. Classroom instruction, or classroom guidance, offers one method of providing such support and features the benefit of allowing middle grades school counselors to reach all students in their schools.…

Positive and constructive feedback is a form of positive reinforcement essential to effective instruction and classroom management. This article provides practitioners with a range of realistic positive and constructive feedback strategies and descriptions of how such feedback can be implemented in schools and classrooms, with a special focus on…

Early experiences with planning and guiding children's learning can be exciting for preservice teachers in undergraduate teacher training programs. In this article, observations of a preschool play session guide four preservice teachers to design a series of play-centered lessons addressing serious science concepts (Hall 2010). While the concepts…

Teacher residencies have been an ongoing discussion in the educator preparation world for nearly a decade. This paper describes a promising practice in program design at a university that offers alternative pathways to licensure to meet the demands of school districts, especially in economically disadvantaged communities in one region of the…

Classroom management is the key to learning. Routines are the foundation of classroom management. Students require structure in their lives. Routines provide that in all of their life from the time they awake until the time they go to bed. Routines in a school and in the classroom provide the environment for learning to take place. The paper is…

One of the most important roles of a teacher is to create a safe space for learners, consistent with the Center for Applied Special Technology (CAST) Universal Design for Learning guidelines (CAST 2011). Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is a framework for teaching and learning, based on neuroscience research, that guides teachers to eliminate…

To better serve students' evolving needs in music, music educators must connect classroom learning with how students use and interact with music in their daily lives. One way to accomplish this is by approaching classrooms with the music user in mind, which can open new possibilities for meaningful music making and remove students from the…

Reading is an "invisible" skill, making it challenging to address in a college classroom. Yet, it is fundamental to disciplinary thought. Inspired by the "signature pedagogies" conversation, I wanted to find ways to make more visible in my classroom what I do when I work with readings. This gave rise to several questions: How…

We describe a new approach to the use of video-based technology for conducting controlled experiments in classroom contexts. Specifically, we describe a process for editing video recordings of live classroom lessons to create multiple versions, such that only one aspect of the lesson is systematically varied. Other aspects of the instruction are…

In the recent past, during the 36 hours of required coursework necessary to become a certified teacher in the state of New York, not a single course deviated from the same model of teacher centered lectures and a long list of "to dos" that would presumably enable pre-service students to face 30 odd children in their own classrooms with…

Teaching soft skills (i.e., grit, empathy, collaboration, perseverance, communication, ethics, self-management) is a task that might seem overwhelming to new teachers, but this article offers practical advice from students about how to incorporate the lessons into the classroom.

If you are seeking greater student engagement and growth, you need to integrate high-impact formative assessment practices into daily instruction. Read the final article in our five-part series to find advice aimed at leaders determined to bring classroom formative assessment practices district wide. Learn: (1) what you MUST consider when…

In this article, veteran educator Otis Kriegel provides eight questions that teachers can ask themselves as they create or tweak lesson plans. With practical, straightforward advice, Kriegel suggests that teachers be mindful of who their audience is, how much students already know, and what materials they'll need. He also urges teachers to…

This article addresses the importance of teaching transformative usability and accessibility concepts through the lens of disability studies in general business and professional communication courses. It argues that when students learn to analyze audiences, include diverse users, and foresee accessibility "before" the final draft because…

The last two years disrupted public education systems, but they also highlighted opportunities. Schools and districts can apply the nimbleness they demonstrated during the pandemic to efforts to reconnect and reengage their students. In this moment, state boards of education are in the perfect position to guide schools and districts, not just to a…