We have all taken those surveys after a professional development workshop asking us to provide feedback. Most likely, you completed that survey in Google Forms™. Google Forms™ does not just have to be surveys. Google Forms™ exists for any form of data collection, which makes it a perfect tool for teachers! Many features allow you to use it for your math classroom. Maneuvering the ...
5 Habits of Highly Effective Teachers
We all remember our most effective teachers. Personally, I remember Ms. Eckles; she was the first math teacher that made all my years of math all come together and CLICK. As an 8th grader at the time, I was oblivious to her skill, but now that I have been a teacher, I know that SHE WAS DOING SO MANY THINGS REALLY WELL! Today, I am sharing five things that every effective teacher does or ...
4 Ways to Use Nearpod in the Classroom
As teachers, we want to meet all of our students’ needs. But in a classroom of 30 or more students, it can feel overwhelming. EdTech tools like Nearpod make meeting your students’ needs a little bit easier. Not only is the website easy to use, but creating lessons is simple, and there are many built-in tools available within Nearpod to use to differentiate instruction in your classroom. ...
Health Insurance Alternatives for Teachers
One of the most highly discussed items that is currently impacting educators across the country is the rising cost of health care. Insurance plans that school districts are able to provide include extremely high deductibles and very high premiums (especially if you are carrying your children or entire family). Today, I want to share my personal experience with health insurance ...
GimKit: Up Your Student Engagement
Kahoot, Quizizz, Quizlet... Have you tried them all? When the weather turns nicer and your students are dreaming of summertime, their attention starts to wane. Whew, it is hard to keep students engaged! It is the perfect time to introduce something new into your classroom. One of my favorite new games to play in class is Gimkit! Gimkit was created by a high school student for ...
5 Ways to Use Pear Deck
One of my favorite ways to introduce new content to my students is to use the website Pear Deck. If you are using Google Slides or PowerPoints to share new content with your students, Pear Deck is a tool that needs to be in your digital toolbox. Today, I wanted to share 5 ways to use Pear Deck in your classroom: Pear Deck has generously offered readers an extended trial on the ...
Developing a Number Sense Routine
When we surveyed math intervention teachers about the struggles that students have, there were several themes that we heard, and “a lack of number sense” sums up the most prominent one. From my personal experience, I can attest that number sense does come easier for some students than others. It might be why adults say things like, “I am not a math person.” Is it possible that we are ...
Tips for Managing Small Group Instruction
One of the biggest hindrances to pulling students into small groups is the big question of, “What are the other kids doing while I am working with my small group?” About half of the questions I get about small group instruction revolve around the idea of how to keep students who are not at the small group table engaged and working. Here are a few tips on managing small group ...
Why Intervention Should be Skill Based
Over the past several months, I have been sharing quite a bit about best practices that surround the concept of math intervention. We have discussed strategies for improving number sense, getting started, and what to do when your students are all on different pages. Today, I want to discuss why I believe that a skill-based math intervention approach is the best one to ...
Building Staff Culture
If you are interested in implementing some small things that go along way to increase positive staff culture, then this post is for you! Personally, I believe administrators should take charge of implementing (though I’m not sure if many administrators read this blog) these school-wide activities because I think it has a greater impact on the entire staff culture. However, I do think ...