Articles Teacher Language

What’s in a Name?

How do you refer to the students in your class when addressing them? At first glance, this may seem like a trivial issue; but consider how many times throughout the day we…
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JUL

18

A Guide on the Side

It's still summer, but I'm thinking ahead to winter. I'm picturing writing workshop time mid-way through the year: Students are busy at the computers, working with an intensity that's balanced by smiles…
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MAR

11

Waiting to Speak

Recently, more than a handful of my first graders were struggling with waiting to ask questions or make comments during direct instruction. I responded by using tried and true teacher practices: giving…
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JAN

07

Magnetic Friendships

As a kid, I was fascinated by magnets: the force they exert, the way they could push and pull through tables, windows, and papers . . . sometimes without even touching! Now…
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JAN

03

Reinforcing, Reminding, and Redirecting

Adapted from the new 2nd edition of The Power of Our Words
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DEC

04

Sometimes Less Is More

The other day Ben returned to our classroom after a session with the occupational therapist, yelling "I'm here, guys!," which interrupted the lesson and caused a few students to giggle. I looked…
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NOV

26

Noticing Positives

What’s going well in your classroom these days? At this time of year, especially, it’s common for teachers to focus more energy on challenges such as reteaching procedures that aren’t going smoothly,…
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16

Naming What Children Can Do

Mr. Park's fourth grade class was the most impulsive and squirmy group of children he'd ever taught. Children speaking out of turn, talking to neighbors, playing with small objects, or making odd…
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16

When Children Are Defiant

I once taught a second grader who sometimes subtly refused to go along with what we were doing. For instance, if we had to leave the classroom and John didn't want to…
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12

A Lesson Learned About Prizes

During my years of teaching, I have used individual written agreements coupled with a simple token system to give children with particularly challenging behavior the extra support they need to improve. Recently,…
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MAR

27

How Reading About Sammy Healed Me

A few years ago, I had a student who broke me. During our very first Morning Meeting, as my brand new class met each other, he slapped another first grader. Hard. As…
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NOV

19

The Value of Struggle

"When did your courage surprise you?" I was profoundly moved by this question when it was posed at a conference I attended years ago, and it came back to me recently when…
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AUG

01

Close the Gateway to Bullying

An adapted excerpt from Chapter One of the award-winning book, How to Bullyproof Your Classroom
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JUN

20

Read This Book! Opening Minds

How do you create classrooms in which children come to see themselves and their classmates as vital and powerful contributors to their own learning? In his new book, Opening Minds: Using Language…
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10

Want Positive Behavior? Use Positive Language

"Hello, Tasha! How's your new baby brother?" the principal says as she greets a student in the hallway during morning arrival. Just then a teacher comments to a student at his classroom…
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DEC

27

Questioning Your Assumptions

Winter break can provide teachers a bit of time and space to reflect on how the school year has gone so far, and to decide what adjustments to make in January. This…
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DEC

15

Encouraging Words

As a marathoner, I often think about the connections between my challenges as a runner and those of elementary school students. In both arenas, when the going gets tough—whether it's at that…
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SEP

29

Invisible Children

Are there invisible children at your school? A recent series of comments on the Responsive Classroom Facebook page got me thinking again about how many children go through their school days feeling…
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JUN

21

What Could Be

As teachers of young children, we do not always get to see our hopes for our students fulfilled. We have to trust that we and their future teachers will make a difference,…
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MAY

12

Positive Reinforcement

Last week I took part in a panel discussion about the pros and cons of positive reinforcement on Rae Pica’s online radio show. Her producers asked me to join because they read…
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MAY

10

Class Clown

Question: I am a parent of a very bright second grader. He reads at roughly a fourth-fifth grade level and has very strong math skills. The problem is he seems to have…
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01

What to Do About Tattling

"Jaime isn’t lining up in the right place." "Grayson said a bad word." "Olivia hit me!"I know from teaching young children myself how challenging it can be to face a seemingly endless…
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MAR

31

Fruitful Mistakes

Recently I left my coat in a classroom in northern California, lost the cover for my Blackberry somewhere between California and Greenfield, Massachusetts, and made a pot of soup for dinner that…
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FEB

23