Resources

If you’re a preservice teacher, you’ve probably already pictured yourself in your future classroom. Maybe you’re working on an early childhood degree, because you want to help young children get their education off to a strong start. Or you have a passion for math, and want to immerse yourself all day in the wonders of geometry and calculus. There’s a wide range of subjects and age groups to choose.

But you may not have considered special education. Or maybe you did, and dismissed the idea because it seemed overwhelming, or you thought it wasn’t for you. Whatever the reason, you may want to reconsider.

Even if you’re already a working teacher, adding an additional credential or certification in special education might be worth the investment of time and money. Here are some factors to consider. 

Over the last decade, project-based learning (PBL) has transformed secondary education throughout the United States. In a PBL school, students are active learners, and take ownership of their education. The teacher is a facilitator to knowledge, and not the gatekeeper. 

If your school has yet to adopt PBL, knowing where to start is no small challenge. To get you and your students’ feet wet, you need to use an ‘entry-level’ PBL, one that is challenging but not overwhelming.

This article proposes a PBL that pairs an English III and U.S. history teacher (along with their students). It is adapted from a PBL that the author helped develop and implement in spring 2013. 

Andrea Burston is a former high school teacher turned elementary school counselor. She is the school counselor for Wake County Public Schools and works at JY Joyner IB Magnet Elementary School in Raleigh, North Carolina.

Field trips have been a staple of the American education system for a long time. Getting students out into the community and the world-at-large helps them to see and study content firsthand. But field trips aren’t always possible. Besides being expensive, the process of boarding a bus, travelling to a far flung location, corralling a bunch of students, organizing lunch and bathroom breaks, and sometimes doing all of this without additional chaperones or adult help can be stressful for both teachers and students alike. When visiting a museum, a student who develops an interest in a particular artist gets rushed through the exhibit hall. At the zoo, a student who is fascinated by a certain habitat has to hurry up, read the plaque, and move on. Students don’t get a chance to move at their own pace and explore their interests during field trips.

But they can during virtual field trips.

Thanks to technology, virtual field trips of locations all over the world are available at the click of a button. Some virtual fields trips are simple photographic tours, while others are complex combinations of video and audio media that are more immersive. Let’s look at some of the benefits of using virtual fields trips in your class this year!

As teachers, we mentor, manage and guide the most valuable gems of any parent: the children. Having a successful relationship between teachers and parents means understanding diverse personality types. We’ve written about 5 distinct, general personalities that are commonly observed by teachers.

Kids learn in a variety of different ways. Some may be auditory learners, while others may be visual learners. Each child is different so it is important to teach in a multitude of ways to engage each and every sense. Multisensory environments not only cater to each individual student, but it is also known to improve the development of thought, intelligence, and social skills. It gives them more than one way to make connections and learn concepts. Particularly in younger students who have not fully developed all their senses, multisensory environments can improve concentration, alertness, memory, mobilization creativity, and communication. Each of these aspects promotes learning and retention to help students grow and succeed in the future. As teachers, this is all we want for our students. So, here are some ways you can create a multi-sensory space that promotes learning.

Online education has been experiencing remarkable growth, and improvements in technology will only serve to increase the trend. In the 2014 – 2015 academic year, there was a 3.9% increase in enrollment in online courses. Over a quarter of all students were enrolled in at least one online course, and of those, almost half (2.85 million of 5.8 million students) were enrolled entirely online.