Teacher Problems

If your gratitude thoughts are always the same, try these ideas.

Adopting a grateful attitude can impact almost every aspect of your life in a positive way. Learn more about gratitude and questions for your daily journal.

Gratitude Prompts – Journaling Ideas or Conversation Starters You’ve probably heard about the benefits of keeping a gratitude journal, but you might have been faced with a blank page and wondered what in the world to write down. These gratitude prompts are perfect journaling about ways you are grateful. Not only are they good for gratitude […]

As I've shared before, relationships are not the point of a teacher's work, but they are one of teaching's most fundamental currencies and most gratifying rewards. With more American schools than ever before launching into all-online starts, many teachers are concerned with just how to build strong relationships with students from afar. The good news […]

One of the big things we discovered during the COVID closures of spring 2020 is that many of our students are presently motivated by carrots and sticks: credit or no credit, GPA boosts or GPA reductions, prizes or penalties, incentives or consequences. Most educators did not find this surprising. This “play the game” mentality is […]

Note: I wrote this months before the COVID closures, and upon rereading it recently, I found it as relevant today as it was back then. The teacher who works in an undisciplined manner — without boundaries, with no constraints — will experience chronic stress. It's like a law of human nature. There is no way […]

Dear educators, There was life before COVID-19, and there will be life after. We didn’t choose to have our schools and colleges closed; our carefully ...

In a caustic age of casually scathing public rhetoric, great organizational cultures are built one edifying communication at a time. It is the case that good emails accrue their cultural benefits slowly and incrementally, but bad emails can extract their cultural deficits rapidly and semi-permanently. So the skill of writing good, kind emails is an […]

The other day, I shared a video with my ninth graders made by a Michigan high school teacher and author, Chase Mielke. Chase had sent the video to me a week or so before, and I thought it connected well with a pair of burning questions my students and I had been pursuing of late: […]

Last time, I wrote about how our relationships with students are sure to break down. This is why I've added “Repair” to the CCP of teacher credibility that I wrote about in These 6 Things, Chapter 2: Care, Competence, and Passion. If you cannot identify and repair faltering student-teacher relationships, you're bound to be befuddled […]

Derek McCoy of Georgia's Grady County Schools says engaging young teens during the awkward transitional years is about shifting how learning is viewed and embracing options.

Identifying one’s principles is a good exercise. Here are some I hold that you might, too: All students have value as human beings. All students possess yet-to-be-tapped long-term flourishing potential. All students possess likable qualities. It’s good to know what you stand for, what you value. And, as I’ve written before, research suggests it’s helpful […]

My mom had us do this when we were little. *Teacher give students bottles and tells them to empty them, then to put the stuff back in, when they can't the teacher explains, "In the moment, you were so consumed with what you were doing that you didn't realize the mess you were making. Then, after it was so quickly and easily poured out, you realized it was impossible to put it all back in. Remember this for the rest of your lives when it comes to words that come out of your mouth."

Corkboard Connections is a blog written by Laura Candler who enjoys connecting terrific teachers with amazing resources!

There’s never been a better or more crucial time to implement mindfulness practices into middle school classrooms, says author-consultant Dr. Thomas Armstrong.

In my Advanced Placement World History: Modern course, I attach this page to the syllabus, and every month or so I have students read it. What's interesting is how at the start of the year, students glaze over this thing with boredom. In theory, it is mundane to them. They've seen things like this before. […]