Heather

[Heather @heathererose]

@bannon1975 This year’s favorites were The Eyes and the Impossible, and The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet.

[Jen @jenteach13]

You want to fix education?

Fix #4: Let teachers remove disruptive students.

Let me break down Fix #4.
This is the fix that makes people uncomfortable because it sounds like giving up on a child. It is not. It is recognizing that a classroom is not a one-person environment and that what we allow one student to do to thirty others is a choice with consequences for every kid in that room. The student who flips desks, screams at the teacher, refuses every redirection, and makes it impossible for anyone else to focus is not being served by staying. Neither is anyone around him. Keeping him in the room does not help him. It just makes sure everyone loses together.

What does it mean in practice?
It means a teacher has the authority to remove a student who is actively disrupting the learning of everyone else without having to justify it to three administrators, fill out four forms, and wait for a response that may never come. It means the removed student goes somewhere with an adult who can address what is actually happening with him, not to a hallway to sit unsupervised until the period ends. It means the thirty students who were trying to learn get the class back. It means the teacher does not have to choose between managing one student's behavior and teaching everyone else, because right now that choice is made for her every single day, and it never goes in the classroom's favor.

How does this help kids?
Every minute spent managing a student who has refused every available intervention is a minute not spent teaching. Multiply that by a class period. Multiply that by a semester. The kids who came ready to learn, who needed that instruction, who deserved that teacher's full attention, paid for every one of those minutes with their education. We talk endlessly about the student being removed. We rarely talk about the thirty who stayed and what they lost. They matter too. Their time matters too. Their right to learn in a room where learning is possible matters too.

How do we make this happen?
We need discipline policies that give teachers real authority instead of the appearance of authority. We need administrators who back removal decisions instead of sending the student right back to the same room twenty minutes later with no intervention in between. We need alternative settings that are staffed and resourced to actually address what is driving the behavior, because removal without support is not a solution. It is a delay. We need to stop treating every removal as a civil rights violation and start treating the disruption of thirty students' education as one, too. And we need to be honest about what the current system communicates to every student in that room when nothing happens. It tells them that the adults are not in charge. Once they know that, you have lost the room.

The goal is not to discard any child. The goal is to make sure that getting help for one student does not come at the cost of an education for thirty others.
You want to fix education?

#YouWantToFixEducation

[Heather @heathererose]

@howie_hua Of our lifetime!

[𝐁𝐫𝐚𝐝 𝐉𝐨𝐡𝐧𝐬𝐨𝐧 @DrBradJohnson]

Teachers: Want to take something off your plate and help your students?
Throw out homework in elementary school.
Let kids go home, run, play, and just be kids.
Then read a little before bed.
They’ll return recharged instead of burned out.
And so will you.

[Laura @technologylaura]

Non-educators don’t understand the day-to-day realities of teaching.

[𝐁𝐫𝐚𝐝 𝐉𝐨𝐡𝐧𝐬𝐨𝐧 @DrBradJohnson]

If teachers only had to teach…
But they’re also social workers, counselors, nurses, mentors, mediators, tech support, and more.
They carry the weight of a system, not just a subject.
Appreciate them—for all the roles they fill daily.

[James A. Furey @JamesAFurey]

Children raised on constant stimulation will struggle to read a book, follow a lecture, or sit with an idea long enough to understand it.

Schools should be training students to think, to ponder, to formulate, not encouraging their addiction to distraction.

Limiting screen time in class is a necessity.

[Heather @heathererose]

@AllisonETEC Also can’t/won’t read the analog clock.

[tetheredtoed @tetheredtoed1]

I hate dress up days. Dress up as teachers and students. The end.

[Sassafrass84 @Sassafrass_84]

Nailed it. Gen x is a totally different breed. FAFO

[Dr. Camilo Ortiz 👨🏼‍🎓 @DrCamiloOrtiz]

Stop:

-getting your kids water
-laying their clothes out for them
-unpacking their backpacks
-asking them what restaurant they want to go to
-having snacks available all the time
-laying down next to them at night until they fall asleep
-doing their homework with them every night
-planning their weekends for them
-driving them to school
-carrying their sports gear for them
-staying with them at birthday parties
-attending all sports practices
-making them something different for dinner
-cutting their food

[Heather @heathererose]

@ChristyObalek This is lovely and bright! My dad passed this morning and it reminds me so much of our relationship.

[Heather @heathererose]

@howie_hua I’ve used this with my fifth graders and it’s fantastic! I change up the pairings, but usually at some form of alternate ranking.

[Heather @heathererose]

@DaniellaCarlisi Opal

[eli 🕯✨ @nienna121]

I must agree with this. I really hate the rise of Trunk or Treat. Sterile, soulless practice that exists because people fear their neighbors. We have to get back to being comfortable with knocking on our neighbors’ doors. This is how we build and preserve community!

[Andrew Old @oldandrewuk]

It's accepted that the worst-behaved children and the most selfish and incapable parents soak up a huge proportion of schools' time and resources. However, nobody ever really analyses how much worse this makes school for the average child.

[Kamala Harris @KamalaHarris]

Our kids should be able to concentrate on learning, not worry about where they would hide from an active shooter in their classroom.

It does not have to be this way.

We must end the epidemic of gun violence in our country once and for all.

[Heather @heathererose]

@fklein907 @heymrsbond It is such a gift that you have this! You should have it printed on tea towels.

[Sean Morrisey @smorrisey]

There was a recent post blaming teachers for Ss attendance. Does anyone have an idea how I can be more engaging than a hockey tournament or Disney World?