Is it spring break yet? I am exhausted. . . . Spring has sprung; the pollen has really created allergy issues for me for the last three weeks or so. I love spring; my floweringContinue reading
Author: oliviafulmer
Are You Using ChatGPT?
When I first started reading about OpenAI ChatGPT, I knew it would have an impact on education and pedagogy. Teachers of writing already have difficulty with plagiarism in the classroom, even when we teach usingContinue reading
Following: Instagram Accounts to Follow
I admit it: I am not good with social media. I have a Facebook account to keep up with my children and my grandson. In the last two or three years, though, I have beenContinue reading
Week Two with Lucy Calkins’s Units of Study
Last week, I dove into the pool’s deep end with a reading and writing workshop. It is HARD work! I’m using teaching points from Lucy Calkins’s Units of Study for middle school reading: A DeepContinue reading
Reading/Writing Workshop — Week 1
This is the end of the first week of reading and writing workshop in my classes. I am reading a couple of books–The Literacy Studio by Ellin Oliver Keene (she wrote Mosaic of Thought years ago,Continue reading
Revising My Thinking–and My School Year
I am halfway through the third quarter of the 2022-2023 school year. It has been another hard year: it is the year of our five-year accreditation evaluation; the learning “gaps” are becoming more obvious; it’sContinue reading
What’s Up with EQ’s?
Essential Questions. I first heard about them in the early 2000s when I took some Intel Teach to the Future training. We had to create a unit plan and portfolio using Microsoft products that weContinue reading
Standards and Mastery
One of the things I’ve struggled with this past year is assessment. I am not satisfied with the standard multiple choice test as a way of measuring students’ learning. They, as I did, often memorizeContinue reading
Curriculum Planning, Part I
One of my most important tasks as the academic dean is to collect and review the unit plans from the teachers in the “big school,” that is, grades 1 through 12. Let me tell you,Continue reading
How to Spend a Saturday
Sleep in. Sit on the couch and pretend you are doing “school work.” Read devotions. Make a chicken salad sandwich for lunch. Do income taxes. Find teachers to follow on Instagram. Stalk said teachers onContinue reading