In recent “we really do work for robots” news, Jen reports:  Our school is starting a new initiative with competency based grading and common assessments. While the initiative largely does not affect me (only math, science, English, Social Studies), we are undergoing a process of rewriting all of our course competencies. This is great news! […]

Here is Alisa’s idea for generating class reading materials – instead of buying books – in order to, each year, expand the class library at the elementary level. I bet that this idea would work at any level. I will add examples as soon as I get them from her: Instead of the comic books

We need to share more pics. Remember when we sent in what our morning commutes looked like? I really enjoyed seeing them and I know others did as well. Stephen shared his in Fresno, we had two from downtown Chicago from Carmen and Sean and a nice one from New Hampshire from jen. So send

Robert’s recent response to Mele’s question has been added to the Primer articles (hardlink above). I am humbled at how Robert has educated us here over the years with such articles. Now there are 33 of  them by him collected over ten years – far more than any other Primers contributor including Mr. Motormouth Me.

There are two ways to create readings: (1) use the Story Writer, which I prefer and (2) using Write and Discuss, which Tina prefers. They are explained below: The Story Writer  Next to the artists in Hub A is the Story Writer, whose job is simply to provide the teacher with a synopsis of the

Laura shares this conversion chart, which I think many in the group are going to like: On a 4 pt. scale: Conversion chart 4pt scale

I had asked long time PLC member Keri Biron to share the following with the Connecticut group and thanks Keri! – Good Morning, Ben asked me to share with you all Mike Peto’s comic book idea. Basically, once you have created a story with your class (either from a One Word Image, which is a

Jeff asked Alisa: Hi Alisa, I would like to learn more about the listen and draw activity you described in your comment yesterday. What is the more detailed version of the protocol you use?  Alisa responded: Hi Jeff: Let’s say that together you came up with a Cake, for the OWI – and it did

New to our group, Brielle Grover reports from Connecticut: Dear Ben, Thank you so much for taking the time to coach me in Connecticut!! It’s really only since finding you and Tina this summer that I finally feel like I am enjoying my job and my kids are learning. For the first time, I do

Our group member Julie is in Canada: Hi Ben, Just wanted you to know that I attended a French meeting this morning about how to increase literacy in the fsl classroom. Well, you could imagine that I was bursting at the seams to share my success with the Invisibles! Once I mentioned that we create

We had an excellent artist in CT but at the end of the workshop we found that a very quiet  teacher happened to have a lot of talent as well. He was drawing a one word image we had created about a sad pair of glasses:   It goes to show how we never know

Over the past ten years Robert has posted 1,076 times. Those of us who have been on the PLC for those ten years are 1,076 times richer for Robert’s sharing. Here is the latest from Robert, on grading theory: Standards-Based Grading and “Power Grading” are something that Robert Marzano has popularized. Scott Benedict has done