Teachers' Lounge

On a new Teachers’ Lounge podcast, Rheon is an educator who writes children’s books based on his experience as a school counselor. But those social emotional lessons? They’re not just for kids! We talk about his Dizz Wizz book series AND how writing books about fathers and sons has changed him as a father.

On a new Teachers’ Lounge, David Gray! He’s a social studies teacher at Logan Jr. High in Princeton, Illinois.

One-room schoolhouses, coal mines, watermelon seed spitting contests, and a traveling bookmobile. That’s all on a new Teachers’ Lounge!

Chicago assistant principal Charles Williams jumps into Teachers' Lounge to talk about how he's trying to change how people think about education. We also get seasonally scary with his show Spooky School Stories!

LIGHT Education Initiative founder Nick Haberman joins the show. LIGHT is meant to be a movement to empower students to become leaders in their own community in Holocaust, genocide & human rights education. Remember these tragedies and try to advocate for real change in their schools and beyond.

We're diving deep into the Teachers' Lounge archive to bring you a globe-trotting chat with bilingual education professor James Cohen!

We’ve talked with students before, we’ve talked with teachers, we’ve talked with teachers who just finished their student teaching -- but never any students still in the midst of their classes on how to become a teacher.

"Adults, people with families, people with jobs: lifelong learning happens well beyond this discrete moment in your life when you're 18-20 years old. And people can reap the benefits of continuing education and furthering their certifications and degrees and experiences for their entire lives," Illinois Valley Community College instructor Delores Robinson.

WNIJ's Peter Medlin takes a trip back to his hometown to talk to a P.E. teacher who he helped teach with nearly 10 years ago.

“One of the questions I learned to ask early in my career as an educator is, was my experience, maybe not everybody's experience, or was it?"

We're reflecting on speeches from the Class of 2020 as we near the 4th school year impacted by the pandemic.

“I was really terrified this year, this was my first year to put it where you say you got it,” she said. “I don't know for sure that meaningful, relational, creative learning yields test results. I know that people of my belief in academia say that. I know there's a lot of literature that says that, but you don't know you’re going to get that.”

Rachel joins Teachers' Lounge after a busy few months between getting a Master’s Degree, securing her first full-time teaching job, and finishing up student teaching AT HER OLD HIGH SCHOOL!

Our classroom correspondent tells the story of his school year – a year in the life of a teacher -- the ups and downs, holidays, tests, all of it. It's a month-by-month trip through the 2021-22 school year.

"When I started teaching, as a teacher, you were extremely isolated. You were closed in this room with them. In my second year of teaching, I had 50 3rd graders!"

Destiny Hudson was in 5th grade when COVID-19 shut down schools back in 2020. Now, she’s finishing up 7th Grade. Devin Snow was a sophomore when it all went down and now he’s graduating high school. They’ve both been through this weird learning experience, but at very different points in their education journey.

The 2022 Illinois Teacher of the Year joins Teachers' Lounge to talk about what it means to her, being a small-town educator, teaching new languages, and much more!

We revisit our conversation with the teacher, author and creator of the class-sourced novel: Jay Rehak!

We revisit our conversation with the teacher, author and creator of the class-sourced novel: Jay Rehak!

University of Illinois music professor Lamont Holden AKA producer TheLetterLBeats talks about crafting the school's new fight song and forging new traditions.

"I remember telling my high school pastor that I thought about being a pastor. I'll never forget his response, actually. He told me, 'Well, I've only known two women in my life who I thought could do this work.' And he said 'You might go from a funeral in the morning to a youth group party in the evening and most women can't navigate those emotional changes.' I looked up to him, he was the pastor....

In an episode unlike any we've had before, Dr. Kadi Billman tells us about teaching her class "Caring for the dying and bereaved" at the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago.

Kevin Beverley is a retired teacher -- and current substitute teacher! We talk a lot about what it’s like as a sub during the pandemic. Unfortunately for weary listeners, no substitute host.

Mark Klaisner tells us how the teacher shortage became personal for many families this year.

Peter and English teacher Erik Czerwin discuss some of the biggest issues in education this year