It’s that time of year again. The start of a new school year waits for you, just around the corner, and all you can think is…
A new batch of students, all with different needs and expectations, are looking to you to lead each and every one of them down a path that will enable them to decide their own lives and futures. And you relish that work. You’re committed to educational equity, bringing everything you have to your work, making sure you do right by your students, because you love them.
But there’s no question, the transition back into the classroom can be a bit of a shock to the system. A lot gets put on your plate quickly. Raising the bar of rigor in the classroom, creating a space for your students to engage in productive struggle, adopting an aligned curriculum, examining bias and its role in your work and learning, committing to adaptive change within the shifts—this work is demanding.
We’re here to help! As we enter this 2018-19 school year, remember you have a rigor and equity partner in us. Our math and ELA curricular resources are free and available to support your standards-based instruction, including K-12 content guides to help you make sense of the standards for both subjects. We have resources to help teachers craft better text-based questions, to examine the role different types of communication play in math engagement. If you need to spread the message of equity on your campus or in your district, our bias toolkit can help facilitate discussions about race, bias and prejudice. And, when you need inspiration, we have that too.
You are a change agent for your students. So take a deep breath and let us help you transition back into the mindset you need to help improve the lives of all your students.