I use to say April belongs to testing as this was the month my district began high-stakes state testing. Now, they start in March and end in May. That means high-stakes testing consistently touches the climate in my class for
Read More
Social Development is More Important Than Ever (Part 2)
In Part 1 of this article, we discussed Dr. Montessori’s theory on the First Plane of Development. In that, we explored the social development of the child between the ages of 0-6 and introduced you to The Casa. The Montessori
Read More
Unintended Positive Consequences of Being an ASU ASAP Fellow
I was so excited to learn that I was accepted into ASU’s ASAP Fellowship. I would finally receive the support and resources I needed to help deliver more meaningful STEM opportunities in my class. I was expecting for this to
Read More
Free School Breakfast? Thank a Panther!
The Black Panthers, in my opinion, represent Black independence and autonomy. They impacted my life growing up through education and real-life examples of African Americans who positively impact their communities. In fact, their contributions have positively impacted millions of Americans,
Read More
You Want It, You Make It
One thing that I intentionally make a part of our class culture is student ownership of our environment. In a time when children’s contributions are minimized, the classroom is one place where they can expect to have something to offer.
Read More
STEM Funding and Support Opportunities
We are all aware that we are in the technology era. As a teacher of this era, I recognize that STEM learning opportunities are necessary. It is as important as teaching standard math and language arts, yet many teachers are
Read More
We Started at the End…Now We’re Here (Pt. 2)
August 3rd was here! Our first day back and I already had two Montessori Student Teachers observing our class. They had a specific request to see how to start the first day of school. I gave them some history of
Read More
We Started at the End…Now We’re Here ( Part 1)
Our Last Day = Our First Day (the big setup) It was going to be a short week and we were all grateful! After returning to school full time with COVID restrictions and limitations, we were all ready for summer
Read More
Preparing the Gifted Environment
This COVID year has highlighted some uniques needs in my classroom. As we are naturally concerned about supporting the academic and social needs of our most at-risk students, I noticed little to no attention was given to supporting these same
Read More
Unexpected Student Interests
We have completed our first full week of in-class instruction. It has been calm and a rather easy transition since we kept the same structure as our online setup. This has been especially necessary due to half of the class
Read More