The Continuing Educator

What are the habits we know that enable teachers to be effective no matter the environment? And how do we build and sustain professional and personal practices that help us rise to every challenge? NWEA Senior Account Manager Piper Nichols stops by to talk to Kailey and Jacob about her new book she co-authored, "Habits of Resilient Educators."  Grab your copy here: https://us.corwin.com/...

Today, Jacob is joined by an Alaskan and a Texan: Moon McCarley, Principal at Nondalton School and District Testing Coordinator for The Lake and Peninsula School District, located on the Alaska Peninsula; and Ashley Cruz, State Professional Learning Consultant at NWEA. They discuss how NWEA partners with districts across Alaska to create high-impact professional learning opportunities to expand as...

Robyn & Sarah, a mother & daughter teaching duo, stop by to chat with Jacob about what each generation has learned from the other, what’s better about teaching today, and what’s more challenging. They also talk about Sarah’s alternative certification process and why Robyn left teaching—and then came back! 

For this episode, we're once again joined by  Dr. Chase Nordengren, principal research lead for Effective Instructional Strategies at NWEA to talk about teacher-led approaches to academic recovery. Chase works closely with leading scholars from around the globe to turn theory into actionable practices to drive instructional improvement. His latest study, High Growth for All, captured ways tea...

“Professional learning should be intensive, collaborative, job-embedded, and data-driven.”  Jacob hops from the host’s chair to the hot seat as he sits down with Kailey to discuss his journey through the education world to become a leader in professional development for teachers. Starting with his time working with abused & neglected children, Jacob realized how much he would need to continue...

Kailey & Jacob are joined by two educators and NWEA content specialists who have thought a lot about how to improves student experiences in science. Kim Baker has been at NWEA for 13 years, and Megan Kuehl has been here for eight. We discuss challenging assumptions about the science classroom and unpack the notion that science is inherently impartial. 

Get ready for a blast of youthful energy and insight in this one-of-a-kind episode of The Continuing Educator! Join Kailey and Jacob as they dive into an engaging discussion with two bright young minds, Harper & Amelia, who are gearing up for their journey through middle school. These two students share their thoughts on how teachers can create a supportive classroom environment and explore wa...

Send your back-to-school tips as a voice memo to social.media@nwea.org — we’ll play them on air. Lots of great teaching stories and tips in this one! Two teachers (and longtime friends) join Kailey to get the tea on getting back to school.  They talk back-to-school routines, first week tips, introducing yourself to new families, hitting the wall, relationship-centered learning, and more. And of co...

Kailey chats with actor, comedian, and NWEA professional learning lead consultant Nicholas Joe about how, why, and when teachers get laughs in their classroom. Along the way they discuss strategies like how to pivot in the classroom with a “Yes, and…” mindset and how to utilize comedy in your lesson planning. And yes, Nick gets Kailey to do improv!

What a great crowd for our first live show! After discussing their Georgia roots, Jacob and Kailey chat with their guests about choosing the best summer professional learning opportunities and what gets them motivated at a conference. Next, they turn to the new school year and discuss the biggest challenges ahead, including how to scale success across schools and districts.  Kailey also asks a few...

This was a fun one... because we got to talk to you, our listeners! In this episode: We see how Mr. Potato head can motivate students, one additional limb at a time. We open a big box of costumes in the middle of class. We learn about a teacher who calls students' parents to share good news, and how one student wanted to return the favor.  And finally, we get to hear some incredibly touching...

As a teacher, Misty Hodge wondered: Who makes these assessments I give my students? Are these companies listening to the teachers who use them, or are they just throwing darts in the dark? So she came to NWEA to make sure that teachers like her had a seat at the table. Misty shares her work leading NWEA’s partner advisory board and building something teachers can actually use. Then, Kailey and Mis...

Melissa Lim is a Technology Integration Specialist at Portland Public Schools, but she sees herself first and foremost as a teacher, not an IT professional. In this episode, Melissa chats with Kailey and Jacob about showing kids and teachers what’s possible with technology ,and how she makes them more comfortable using it. They cover ChatGPT and its uses in the classroom (like writing better quizz...

The science of reading is both a body of research and movement in literacy education. How do we keep those two things connected when they’re not always aligned? What are most common myths about literacy instruction, how do we fight them? A roundtable of educators and specialists from NWEA join Jacob & Kailey to talk about how the science of reading works best in classrooms and where both the m...

The elusive practice of classroom differentiation has historically had lots of “shouldas” and “couldas” from experts, but it's always been difficult to do well at scale. Disruptions in formal schooling for all students and educators have only increased the need for good differentiation in the classroom, but there’s no easy button. We discuss how differentiation works today — is it getting eas...

What’s it like in classrooms right now? The only way to know is to ask a teacher, so we sat down with a first-grade elementary teacher and a sixth-grade social studies & science teacher and listened. Topics include: Modeling respect, making everyone feel included, and being your authentic self in the classroom. We hear stories about how kids (and parents!) can hit you right in the feels and th...

We're back for Season 4! Yes, *we* — on this episode, Jacob Bruno interviews our new co-host, Kailey Rhodes, about how to establish a real rapport with your students and build a classroom culture where they can trust and thrive. The first step? Ask your kids how they want the class to work for them, and be honest about what you expect in return. Kids can smell inauthenticity. Plus: Tips for w...

Thanks for listening! Please rate & review The Continuing Educator on your favorite podcast platform. Season 4 is coming in 2023. In this bonus episode from Season 3, we talk to a working educator about the importance of family literacy and strategies for increasing it. Our guest Martin Silverman is the principal at Salinas Elementary School in Universal City, TX, and has worked as a teacher i...

The ALA defines digital literacy as "the ability to use information and communication technologies to find, evaluate, create, and communicate information, requiring both cognitive and technical skills."  We discuss the many other definitions of the term and get into what responsibilities educators have to cover this topic. Disciplinary literacy aims to apprentice students into the specia...

“The essence of family literacy is that parents are supported as the first teachers of their children.” Family Literacy is the idea that long after diapers and baby steps, our children have so much to learn by watching, observing, and collaborating with trusted adults at home, particularly when it comes to building a strong foundation for reading with confidence. On this episode, we dive deeper in...

On this episode, we explore literacy instruction, the science of reading, early childhood literacy, and the differences between skills-focused and knowledge-focused classrooms. Our two guests are passionate leaders in the field: Dr. Lynne Kulich, Director of Early Learning at NWEA, and Natalie Wexler, an education writer and author of “The Knowledge Gap: The Hidden Cause of America’s Broken Educat...

Let’s take a trip to where it all begins, at least academically, with early literacy and numeracy. On this episode, early learning experts Dr. Cindy Jiban and Dr. Tammy Baumann join us to share classroom strategies to help young learners navigate this important season of life. How do we help children master the critical constrained and unconstrained skills necessary to build a solid foundation for...

For episode 4, we head to Las Vegas and the nation’s fifth largest school district. NWEA and Clark County School District are longtime partners who recently engaged on developing a robust and holistic professional learning program that could have major implications for school districts throughout the country. Two members of the NWEA professional learning team, Angela Morton and Lindsay Prendergast...

“For many, learning mathematics leads to perceiving the subject as a collection of procedures that are disconnected from any big picture. It’s much like filling a box with puzzle pieces, yet never building the puzzle.”  For this episode, we are joined by Dr. Ted Coe and Anita Brown of NWEA to discuss how educators move beyond "doing math" to thinking about mathematical concepts, with a f...

Welcome to Season 3 of The Continuing Educator, a professional learning podcast for K-12 educators produced by NWEA.  This season, we are bringing in experts in math, ELA, and unfinished learning to examine the bold, creative action teachers and school leaders are taking to help students get back on track academically, socially, and emotionally.  Two years on from the start of the pandemic and we’...