Links I Enjoyed Recently
Confession: One of my favorite series on almost every blog I read is the weekly links post. I love checking out what other people are reading, and I find the posts often stretch my thinking and help me discover sites I would never have found on my own.
So it should come as no surprise that we’ll be doing some links here. They probably won’t be every week (at least not at first!), because I just feel like that would be a bit much. After all, we’re just getting to know each other!
My links will be a mix of everything – some education focused, some things I’ve just found interesting, and some I just liked. I hope you’ll share what you love too!
Incorporating Play-Based Learning in the Elementary Grades
If you’re passionate about play-based learning but not sure how to effectively integrate it while still effectively teaching the standards, this is a great place to start.
Why Self-Care Isn’t All About Bubble Baths And Champagne
A great reminder of what self-care is (and is not). Always good to remember that we must be good to ourselves in order to be good to others.
It’s Playtime
This article from the National Association of Elementary School Principals inspires me to continue searching for the balance and finding ways to bring meaningful play into my classroom, because research tells us we should! My favorite quote from the article: “The Common Core State Standards do not preclude play for kindergarten students. And they should not serve as an excuse for removing it from preschool classrooms even though anecdotal reports indicate that that is happening.”
What It Really Means When We Say A Neighborhood Has “Great Schools”
I don’t have the answers to this, but it’s something I’ve thought about since I unearthed the truth about school funding in college. It was a mental question when I was in my first years teaching in one of the wealthiest school districts in America, and it troubled me when I intentionally moved into a Title 1 school a few years later.
As a parent, I think about these issues often, especially since we’re in the middle of a move and have become quite familiar with the resources mentioned in the article. I have found it frustrating (but sadly not surprising) to see how heavily test scores are weighed on some of these sites. There is so much more to consider than the scores students get on their tests! Are they playing? What are the class sizes? How much time is given to recess? The arts? How is the social-emotional curriculum? How are students being taught to think? Which is given a greater priority in the school district – thinking or correctly answering a test question?
One Of My Favorite Blogs Recently Turned 20!
I have read this blog for as long as I’ve known there were blogs, and I loved his book The Sweet Life in Paris.
