The Source

A digital magazine focused on education thought leadership.
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Topic: Teaching & Learning

Language Matters When Describing Achievement

Language Matters When Describing Achievement

Providing students with descriptions that indicate opportunities for expanding knowledge and skills is an immediate opportunity that can support equity. The Maryland State Department of Education (MSDE) is taking action and exploring the language used to describe achievement levels in order to provide language that encourages students to improve their... Read the full article >
Cognia’s New Teacher Observation Tool Helps Teachers, Schools, and Districts Measure Learner-Centric Classrooms

Cognia’s New Teacher Observation Tool Helps Teachers, Schools, and Districts Measure Learner-Centric Classrooms

But classroom observations can be challenging to implement at the school, district, and state levels. Some research on the effectiveness of classroom observation raises concern about potential bias in ratings and questions the tools’ alignment with what they purport to measure or what matters to improve learning. Equally significant, many... Read the full article >
Pandemic and Academic Recovery Are About More Than Loss

Pandemic and Academic Recovery Are About More Than Loss

Educators across the country are formulating plans to address so-called “learning loss.” As a teacher in Washington, DC, I see every day the losses that students, families, and teachers face due to Covid-19. But I also see how resilient our communities are—and how harmful it is to focus solely on... Read the full article >
Propelling Change by Individualizing Professional Development for Teachers

Propelling Change by Individualizing Professional Development for Teachers

The report argued that moving forward, diversity would not be an unsolvable problem in current industrial-era education, but would become the driving reason for transformation. Diversity and a focus on child development would help make education more relevant and supportive of students with different academic, social, and emotional abilities. The... Read the full article >
Character, Care, and Respect Build a School Community

Character, Care, and Respect Build a School Community

The Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL) defines social and emotional learning as “the process through which children and adults understand and manage emotions, set and achieve positive goals, feel and show empathy for others, establish and maintain positive relationships, and make responsible decisions.” Social and emotional learning... Read the full article >
Creating More Equitable Assessments

Creating More Equitable Assessments

Increasingly, district leaders are turning to Cognia™ to determine whether assessments and test items are equitable, and whether they provide valid information about how well students are making progress toward standards. Often, district officials want to be sure that the data they collect from their assessments accurately reflects what is... Read the full article >
Lessons from Online Schools

Lessons from Online Schools

Online schools provide insights into what makes for effective transitions to remote learning. Surveys conducted by Cognia™ in spring of 2020 reveal the academic, personal, and emotional challenges that students, teachers and parents face in the dramatic shift to remote learning that is likely to continue throughout this school year.... Read the full article >
The “T” in STEM: Moving from Stuff to Skills in the Learning Ecosystem

The “T” in STEM: Moving from Stuff to Skills in the Learning Ecosystem

Among many other things, the term “STEM” brings to mind requisite skills such as critical thinking, making connections to the real world, and competency in interfacing with technology. Recent months have put into stark relief the nature of problems in our world, as well as the role of digital technology... Read the full article >
Are Teachers Ready for School?

Are Teachers Ready for School?

Despite the incredible progress made, educators remain similarly united in confusion and concern over a sustainable path forward through extended remote or hybrid learning periods. In thinking about this transition, we must make key mindset shifts from what historically have been reliable conventions to much more iterative, flexible models. These... Read the full article >
One School's Response

One School's Response

I can recount question after question as we then (and still) continued to receive daily updates regarding the severity of the pandemic, and our response as a charter network and school community. Initial curiosities and complexities surfaced regarding assessments, grading, professional development, hiring, end of year trips, finances, athletics, and... Read the full article >