This podcast goes out to all the overwhelmed teachers out there! Today we are dedicating this time to teachers who want to improve some aspect of their practice but might be feeling frustrated and not sure where to start. We should also note that the ideas we talk about today are things we continue to practice and work on. As classroom teachers ourselves we are constantly growing, evolving, and improving our practice. It might be a good idea to give this a quick listen, apply what you can now, but also revisit it at the beginning of this next school year to help get into a healthy mindset around planning and prioritizing. 

Visual supports allow students to participate in classroom activities and routines. Not only do they support students in daily tasks, but visuals support struggling students, diverse learners, and students with social emotional needs in specific situations. When creating visual supports, whether it is addressing a specific routine or supporting a student need, we must first ask ourselves WHY are we creating this visual? What purpose does it address and how will students use it? Sure, visuals look great, but they must have meaning behind them and be adaptable to meet the needs of various learners in your classroom. In this episode we explore questions you should ask yourself when creating visuals to support the learners in your classroom, the importance of visuals, and how you can use them to better support your students in and out of the classroom. 

In this podcast we will explore strategies to build a safer and more trusting classroom community where mistakes are used to teach and push students to grow as opposed to avoidable errors that lead to failure. We will provide you with three strategies that encourage students to learn through making mistakes, two challenges around mistakes in learning WITH a few solutions, as well as one wonder! If you like what you hear in this episode, be sure to check out website and our Instagram @differentiationdive. 

Movement and Mindfulness is such an important part of our school day and it has been for a very long time. These breaks are strategically planned, or spontaneous depending on the mood of the classroom, and essentially work as a refresh button for students and teachers. We’ve found that movement and mindfulness breaks are most effective when they are integrated into learning activities and should take place before students hit their max or overload. In this episode you'll learn three strategies to ensure the  movement and mindfulness breaks you plan are effective as well as explore a few challenges our readers have shared regarding movement and mindfulness and, of course, our wonder! 

Grading. Ugh. The worst. Time consuming. Does it even matter? Why do people even care about grades in first grade? Just a few of the thoughts that dance around in our heads when hearing that one specific word. The only time in my career ever excited about grading was during the first few months of teaching. A fresh set of flairs, some cute stickers and ready to go until...the piles of work student work began to appear. So stressful and overwhelming something that many teachers still experience. It was at that point in time that we both started to really dive into grading- looking at what I should be grading, how I should be grading, and why it was important to involve my students in the process. Today we explore three grading strategies to speed up your grading process, two challenges facing teachers around grading (with solutions!), and one wonder we have! 

In this episode we  explore one of our favorite topics- problem solving to alleviate executive functioning challenges. Executive functions enable us to move through the day productively, planning, organizing, and completing tasks. Individuals with executive functioning difficulties need support creating and following a plan to complete even the most simplest of tasks. 

School is what we would typically rely on as a constant, we looked to our classroom for stability. Parents and students looked to the school, the teachers, and the classroom as a support, a constant. More now than ever, we need to establish strong lines of communication. It is important to find a way to communicate with our families that establishes and maintains trust. In this episode we dive into that 3-2-1 all about establishing and maintaining communication with the families of our students. We start with the 3 moves we plan to make as we establish strong lines of communication, the 2 common challenges (and possible solutions), and finally our one wonder! Like what you hear in today's episode? Check out www.differentiationdive.com for more ideas and of course, freebies! 

Last May with the death of George Floyd we saw the nation erupt in protests and unrest. Differentiation Dive made several commitments to acknowledge our personal biases, we've been working together to sit with uncomfortable feelings and have also spent time listening, learning, and reflecting. We continue to seek out professional development that fosters growth in teaching children of all races. We made these commitments for our students, our colleagues, our communities, and ourselves. We have worked to learn about racial inequalities that surround us, are nowhere near done, and have some much more work to do but we are here to share our learning. We are committed to creating a more equitable learning environment for our students. Please note that we are not here to teach you how to be antiracist, nor are we experts. We believe learning about racial injustices and antiracist teaching MUST come before anything else, including academics. We encourage you to take control of your learning by following, listening, and reading some of the Black antiracist educators, authors, and influencers on your own. Check out our website for a few of the resources that we have found helpful over the course of our learning. 

Differentiation Dive is a podcast about ways to differentiate common teaching strategies or skills in the classroom. With many schools and communities moving to online learning or the hybrid model, we are focusing much of our work on planning for remote instruction. We miss our students and classroom/school community but are excited and ready to focus our energy on this new adventure. Change is never fun and often brings on more work but we are ready for it! Our work and material is intended to support your learning community to provide unique and meaningful learning experiences for students. This episode we will dive into two groups we want to share strategies to build community with: Staff, students, and parents! We will also share solutions to two obstacles we face in remote learning: too much support from home and how to increase opportunities for observing students during play, transitions, or working independently. We will leave you today with a wonder. Don't forget to check out our blog for some freebies as well as give us a follow on instagram! 

The goal of this podcast is to educate our community of followers with the current hybrid learning model proposed by our district (and many more) and what a typical day will actually look like for students and staff. We want to recognize the team of educators, parents, and administrators that have worked tirelessly to create this hybrid model. We sincerely appreciate their work and value the time and energy they put into creating this plan. We are NOT here to create additional anxiety, complain, or minimize the work that has been completed. However, we do think it’s important to talk out the plan and be educated before moving forward. We are excited to get back on track after this post and refocus our lens on what we love to talk about-  best practices and strategies that work with whatever the adopted plan may be. We remain dedicated to providing teachers and families with strategies to differentiate and learn in (and out) of the classroom!