Joel, an excellent blogger, over at So You Want to Teach? posed some interesting questions regarding absences and make-up work for students, and I thought I’d post my ideas here. 1. How do you handle make-up work for students? I have a couple systems in place in my classroom. Besides having an online calendar with every assignment [...]

I’m currently in my 9th year of full-time teaching, and I’ve learned a great many lessons the hard way as I’ve navigated my way through administrative minefields, labyrinthine bureaucracies, challenging curricula, and diverse students. Here are the five best lessons I’ve learned in the classroom as a teacher: 1. Due dates ...

Thousands of high schools around the country participate in the Day of Silence each year, which includes my own high school. However, in my state the bulk of the media’s attention centered on Mt. Si High School because Rev. Ken Hutcherson, pastor of Antioch Bible Church in Redmond, called for 1,000 “prayer warriors” to protest ...

Is it possible to create a culture of failure? My school is currently being asked to discover why the Freshman failure rate is so high. 1/3 of the Freshmen failed a class during their first semester in high school, and statistically speaking 30% of Freshmen who fail a course in their first high school year do [...]