Steve Barkley Ponders Out Loud - Weekly Updated Education Blog

Podcast for Teachers: Take the Time to Build Connections – Trust the Research

It takes time and conscious decisions on a teacher’s part to build connections with students. With the pressures of pacing guides and content coverage, teachers can feel uncomfortable dedicating the […]

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Introducing Peer Coaching

I had a request to assist a team of teacher leaders who had accepted the task of providing an introduction of peer coaching to teachers who are new to their […]

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Podcast: Being a New Leader

Dr. Mark Wilson, a past national principal of the year and a current coach to school leaders, shares insights and strategies from his new book, “What They Didn’t Teach You […]

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Podcast: PLCs as Constellations with Integration

How can “constellation thinking” (Matthew Barzun, “The Power of Giving Away Power”) increase the learning and creativity of school staff who currently are most likely engaged in pyramid thinking? Building […]

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Podcast for Teachers: Building a Quality Learning Environment

What do students experience in your classroom that they would identify as indications of caring? When would they identify the tasks that they have been given as useful? When and […]

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Decreasing Problem Saturated Conversations

Marie-Nathalie Beaudoin writing in an ASCD article connected me to the term “problem saturated conversations.”  She states that what teachers talk about during their lunch break can have dramatic implications; […]

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