The Beautiful Struggle

What's your favorite teacher movie?  Which one inspired you and why?  Today, we go over the ones we love and how they helped up in our own teaching careers

Well, should you?  Why would you even consider giving up your teacher desk?  We talk about the pros and cons of a traditional desk and the new in thing happening. What do you think?

Sharon found the question of the day (QOTD), how do you motivate a failing student? We tackle this and try to simplify it into three major categories: Student Engagement, Parental help, Child Study Team (or the variation of).  Though it can be more complicated to be sure, we try to get the possible ways on how we can engage and help the student academically as well as socially. Join in and hear wh...

The question of the day (QTD) is: What do You do on the First Day, to Set the Tone for the Year?  Well, there are several, wait, actually many ways on how to handle this. The first day of school definitely important and can make or break your school year. Yet, can the tone only be set on the first day only?  How crucial is it to set it then?  Can it be fixed at a later time? We'll explore this and...

I interview Kira Shaw.  Kira has taught Kindergarten, 4th Grade and lead our school Drama and Musical plays this year.  Kira shares how acting is a key skill for any teacher to have.   Share and leave us an honest rating on iTunes!  We really appreciate it!

Sharon and I, were able to get away from our boys with the help of our sister.  (Thanks Carmela!). We then headed out to a restaurant as we were hungry and to reflect on the ups and downs of this past school year.  We talk about our wins, our challenges and the tweaks and new goals we have for next year.  This is our time to share what we're thinking and what we want to do with you. Share and subs...

Today, I chat with my former colleague Patricia Monticello Kievlan. She is a writer and educator based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.  She spent eight years working in independent schools as a teacher and administrator, and she now works as the Program Associate for Community Building at  The Sprout Fund , a nonprofit that enriches the Pittsburgh region's vitality by engaging citizens, amplifying vo...

Sharon and I go over the biggest take aways I learned from presenting at the ATLIS 2016 conference in Atlanta a couple weeks ago.  I share some things that happened, how I felt, and how its important to trust teachers in major changes like having a makerspace in schools.

Coming live from Atlanta, GA at the Association of Technology Leaders in Independent Schools Conference ! On this special episode, I interview Leigh Northrup from the Cannon School in North Carolina and Nicholas ColeFarrell from the Brandeis School in San Francisco and we discuss what maker spaces in schools is all about and why and how it can be a game changer. I never met either Leigh or Nichola...

We chat with Amabelle Sze, who I worked together with as teaching associates.  Since then, she has extensive experience teaching in the lower grades and has attended several highly coveted PD projects (Lucy Calkins at the Teacher's College in Columbia in NYC, and at Howard Gardner's Project Zero at Harvard).   Amabelle shares deep insights in being a teacher in a Quaker school and gives us a look...

Today, our guest on our podcast is Merve Lapus, Western Regional Education Director of Common Sense Media (commonsensemedia.org). I got to know Merve a few years ago, as my school was implementing a digital citizenship program. CSM, goes way beyond from just being a program, to become a trusted resource for schools and parents on all things digital resources and media in education. Merve and I cha...

Today, our special guest is Kristin Monfredini.  Kristin is the K-8 Spiritual L.I.F.E. Director Liturgy, Interiority, Faith, Engagement at Convent & Stuart Hall, Schools of the Sacred Heart in San Francisco Kristin shares her story from working at Tiffany & Company and her experience rising from being a teacher associate, stay at home mom and becoming part of the Campus Ministry program which focu...

My former colleague, Caroline Zoba, is our guest on this episode.  She and I chat about her teaching journey from public school, private school, single sex classrooms to co-ed classroom.  An avid runner, Caroline also shares her experience teaching in Ghana, Africa for a summer. Join us to get Caroline’s amazing insights and valuable tips on how to be a great teacher.

We're excited to feature Alicia Tapia in this week's episode! Teacher, Librarian and Pop-Up Library/Cyclist (so cool!) extraordinaire of  bibliobicicleta.com We chat about the importance of connecting with your students, her passion project called BIBLIOBICICLETA and how her "Ta-Da" moment inspires her.  She then shares that one of her "Ta-da" moments with students include helping her students cre...

[UPDATE: Kellie Mullin is now a Head of School in the Bay Area] Kellie Mullin is our guest today and she teaches 7th and 8th grade science.  She does an amazing class project called the  20% Project.   The students find a real-world problem and develop possible solutions using the Design Thinking process. We talk about the challenge of teaching Empathy as part of Design Thinking process with middl...

Corinne Corrigan is a fourth-grade teacher who has a unique experience where she started in the classroom and moved to the computer lab, started her family, came back and established our maker space studio, and is now back in the classroom–in a new grade. Whew! She has a wealth of teaching resources and tips for everyone. I learned everything about teaching from Corinne (and Zoe Ley) when I was he...

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