All AboutRethinking

These are teaching topics that I used to think were great and now I've… had a change of mind. I hope I'm right this time!

Featured Articles

What Differentiation Does NOT Look Like

There's lots of faux-differentiation out there. In this article, I catalog a few anti-patterns: tactics that look like differentiation, but are actually quite the opposite.

Other Rethinking Articles

Beware Information! Look For Solutions.

As a teacher, I painted myself into a corner by constantly looking for more information. I’d read books by university professors, I’d go to conferences and listen to people talk, I’d subscribe to newsletters, and listen to podcasts. What did all of this information give me? Confusion. Anxiety. And the feeling of being overwhelmed. After […]

Keeping Interest Inventories Simple

Asking kids what they’re interested in should be simple, right? But look online for “interest inventories” and you’ll find multi-page documents with dozens of questions! Let’s keep this simple.

Too Much Grading

If you ask a teacher to list their top three complaints about teaching, “grading” will be on just about everyone’s list. I know that I absolutely despised all of the weekends lost to grading essays, tests, quizzes, projects, and so on. But, the thing is, I never stopped to ask myself: do I actually need to do all of this grading?

Beware “Real World Problems”

Why I stopped looking for “real world” problems and started aiming for “interesting.” The real world is often tedious and annoying. Interesting never is!