Columbia Spotlight

As we move to virtual learning, we have focused on online textbooks like OpenStax. Now that we have Canvas, we can plug in resources from websites to create an online textbook of your own! Here are three great resources from fantastic websites including Stanford , NYDOE , and Certell . Oh, and all of these are FREE! The Stanford History Education Group is a great organization that focuses on civic education. One of its best projects is the  Reading Like a Historian project that has student-centered lessons in American and world history. According to its website, "This curriculum teaches students how to investigate historical questions by employing reading strategies such as sourcing, contextualizing, corroborating, and close reading. Instead of memorizing historical facts, students evaluate the trustworthiness of multiple perspectives on historical issues and learn to make historical claims backed by documentary evidence. To learn more about how to use "Reading Like a Histo...

  As a young child, I learned American history around two dates: 1492 and 1620. We did crafts that focused on Columbus and Pilgrims, but we definitely never learned about 1619 -- the year slaves were first brought to what is now the United States.  That's right, 1619, one year before the pilgrims arrived, and yet that part of our history is quickly skimmed over, probably because it makes many uncomfortable. Fortunately, many organizations like Teaching Tolerance  took advantage of last year's 400th anniversary of American slavery as an opportunity for us to get it right. Today, let's focus on the NYT's 1619 Project , a major initiative that they "aim to reframe the country’s history, understanding 1619 as our true founding, and placing the consequences of slavery and the contributions of black Americans at the very center of the story we tell ourselves about who we are." My favorite piece in the 1619 Project? A new literary timeline of American history by accl...

Edutopia is a great resource supported by George Lucas' philanthropy. Here is this week's highlight's which focus on online learning: 8 Strategies to Improve Participation in Your Virtual Classroom   Educators share their best synchronous and asynchronous strategies to boost student participation during online learning.   9-12 High School Keys to Success in Distance Learning    Educators from around the country shared their advice about making remote instruction work for middle and high school students.   9-12 High School Connecting With Reluctant Remote Learners   Online classes make some kids anxious, but building relationships with them can go a long way toward helping them feel secure.   9-12 High School An Adaptable Framework for Project-Based Learning   The National Geographic Society has a five-step PBL model and resource library to foster deep learning whether students are in school or at home.   9-12 High School The Science of Keepi...

The Annenberg Foundation has a great media platform called Learner.Org that offers FREE educational videos with web and print materials. These resources help teachers increase their expertise in their fields and improve their teaching practice which will allow one to get PD hours without leaving the home. Many programs are also popular for classroom use too!  I want to be honest, some series are dated and may not be useful, but many series are brand new. You just have to check out the variety of programs  that are divided into subjects.  These are great videos that can help you FLIP your classroom instruction as we move into our virtual plan. The videos and interactive activities can also be embedded in a Canvas class too. Here's a tutorial Loom for you!

Our students are introduced to Microsoft software (i.e. Word, Excel and PowerPoint) and their Google cousins (Docs, Sheets and Slides) in elementary and middle school. However, they may need to reinforce those skills at CHS which is why the Google Digital Skills curriculum and classroom resources is an awesome set of free lessons!   Google Applied Digital Skills is a free online curriculum that can be accessed by individual learners or used in a classroom setting. Project-based units help students practice basic digital skills using Google's G Suite for Education applications (Gmail, Docs, Sheets, etc.). Lesson activities range from creating a budget spreadsheet to planning a trip to conducting research and writing a report. Some coding concepts are also integrated into the curriculum, such as programming a script to look for overused words. As you can see from the image below, teachers can even filter the nearly 200 lessons by grade-level and/or by the Google Suite tool you...

The New York Times has a great educator website called the NYT Learning Network . It is especially rich for Social Studies and literacy instruction.  For example, the NYT's own flexible writing curriculum for secondary students "based on the real-world writing found in newspapers, from editorials and reviews to personal narratives and analysis essays." In addition, these are some of my favorite resources from the NYT: 177 Questions to Inspire Writing, Discussion, Debate and Reflection 144 Picture Prompts to Inspire Student Writing Teaching With Graphs From The New York Times Webinar The best new feature is the "26 Mini-Films for Exploring Race, Bias and Identity With Students." These short videos can really help with discussions prior to book talks or class discussions. Furthermore, the NYT provides "a grab-bag of teaching ideas, related readings, and student activities ... t o help teachers make the most of these films."

Last year educators at Columbia High School focused on restorative practices . Although the Coronavirus pandemic may have paused our initiative, we look forward to continuing the implementation this year. Since I am new, I would love to go through the resources we used last year and I will be posting them here on this post. Please send me your "best practices" and we will highlight them under the " RestortativeJustice" label .  Until then, I will identify some key online restorative resources you may find useful!  Anytime I start researching an education topic, I go to the Cult of Pedagogy blog first. In this post, blogger Jennifer Gonzalez interviews Victor Small, Jr., a middle school administrator in Oakland, California. It is a great primer replete with key restorative practices.   Edutopia is another great resource when starting a search for educational practices. This post from Matt Davies is a great jumping-off point for restorative resources.  The...