ED Surge

NOVEMBER 17, 2023

As a math educator at the high school and middle school levels, I lived for the moments when students’ furrowed brows ever-so-slightly began to unfold and smiles emerged. Many of those luminations surfaced because the lessons my students engaged with were designed to promote student inquiry and prioritize cultural relevance.

Cultures 136

Cultures Civic Engagement Civics Pedagogy 136

The Hechinger Report

JANUARY 6, 2022

Before I became its leader, my school was one of the only middle schools to make the state’s persistently dangerous list, which meant that in the previous year it had at least 20 reported physical assault offensives, along with incidents of weapons and drugs. Later, I’d teach others to implement these practices.

Middle School 119

Middle School Leadership Cultures Pedagogy 119

ED Surge

FEBRUARY 1, 2024

Districts have taken a wide range of approaches, as documented by the Manpower Demonstration Research Corporation, a nonprofit that studies how government policies impact low-income families. Others are applied more broadly, like mentorship programs or culturally responsive curriculum. I always think of it as Maslow's.

Cultures 140

Cultures Junior High Middle School Tutoring 140

The Hechinger Report

JULY 14, 2019

I first was assigned to an elementary school in a middle-class suburb of Philadelphia. Then I got to a middle school in the same district in a neighborhood with kids who were less economically advantaged. Here’s what is missing in music education: cultural and social relevance.

Cultures 111

Cultures Education Middle School Tradition 111

TCI

NOVEMBER 12, 2024

History in elementary and middle school; also require at least one year of U.S. History and one semester of civics in high school. It has enabled states to expand access to culturally relevant content, address equity concerns, and enhance students’ digital skills and civic readiness.

Civics 98

Civics Teaching Civic Engagement Social Studies 98

The Hechinger Report

JUNE 10, 2024

LIFO is not very good for kids,” said Dan Goldhaber, a labor economist at the American Institutes for Research, speaking to journalists about expected teacher layoffs at the 2024 annual meeting of the Education Writers Association in Las Vegas. Losing promising new talent is painful. Sign up for Proof Points and other Hechinger newsletters.

Research 138

Research K-12 Middle School High School 138

The Hechinger Report

MARCH 11, 2025

This is the prevailing mission for the pluralistic CivxNow Coalition , whose more than 370 members span the country, and whose contributors include classroom teachers, school leaders, curriculum providers, out-of-school clubs and organizations and cultural institutions. Naturally, spending class time on civics helps.

Civics 78

Civics K-12 Middle School High School 78

ED Surge

MARCH 19, 2024

Research shows that everybody finds things like that annoying, but if you're a first-generation college student, those start to trigger worries about belonging, because there's a belonging uncertainty there,” he says. Walton has spent decades researching how to foster a stronger sense of belonging in education settings.

Research 140

Research Psychology K-12 Artifacts 140

Digital Promise

FEBRUARY 5, 2019

After just one year, research suggests the DLP is changing school culture, as teachers are more collaborative and more open to trying new things in their classrooms. The DLP seems to have taken hold and has been embraced by everyone,” said Teresa Engler, technology coach at McGuffey Middle School in Pennsylvania.

Cultures 97

Cultures Middle School Critical Thinking Teaching 97

ED Surge

DECEMBER 10, 2024

Researchers have shown that districts around the country dont use the same criteria when grouping students into higher or lower math classes. The Board of Supervisors voted to bring back middle-school algebra, and a city ballot measure to reinstate eighth-grade algebra passed with about 82 percent of the vote.

K-12 116

K-12 Tutoring Advocacy Private School 116

ED Surge

FEBRUARY 27, 2023

While the edtech market continues to grow with innovative ways to engage students, not many companies provide products rooted in three decades of cognitive research that continue to provide solid returns on investment. So research, data and learning science have always been at the core of what we do. I am very proud of that fact.

Research 102

Research K-12 EdTech Middle School 102

Active History Teacher

MARCH 16, 2023

I have tried several projects over the years: Oral History projects, “pick a topic from this year and research deeper”, Instagram summaries, etc. Students will research a decade and create images for a variety of topics that relate to that decade. They love the ability to have free research time and that they can be creative.

History 195

History Oral History Middle School Cultures 195

The Hechinger Report

MARCH 11, 2019

“Grit,” a best-selling book by University of Pennsylvania professor Angela Duckworth, may have swept parenting and education pop culture but research scholars say they are finding mounting evidence that it doesn’t add up. The criticisms range widely, from statistical and methodological errors to bad survey questions.

Research 112

Research Psychology Elementary School Humanities 112

A Principal's Reflections

MARCH 27, 2014

Speaking of journeys, today I traveled to New Jersey with my middle school principal, Luis Pena (@principalpena) and high school principal, Glen Zakian. Within a few minutes of us arriving students flooded the Library, a space for conversation, research, learning and inventing.

Library 267

Library Leadership High School Middle School 267

The Hechinger Report

APRIL 9, 2025

RIGBY, Idaho Four years ago, a sixth grader in Rigby, Idaho, shot and injured two peers and a custodian at a middle school. The tragedy prompted school officials to reimagine what threat prevention looks like in the approximately 6,500-student district. She suspects it boils down to implementation.

Humanities 56

Humanities Middle School High School Research 56

The Hechinger Report

SEPTEMBER 30, 2024

These are not schools where students post the highest test scores, but schools where kids learn more each school year than students typically do. The researchers found that at 28,000 of the 51,000 elementary and middle schools in the database, students entered third grade or middle school below grade level.

Charter School 144

Charter School K-12 Middle School Archiving 144

The Hechinger Report

JUNE 16, 2021

. — By his own account, Oscar Tendilla was a horrible middle school student, unmotivated and indifferent. I did poorly in middle school because I didn’t care,” Tendilla told me. Related: What does career readiness look like in middle school? Last month he became his family’s first college graduate.

High School 145

High School Middle School Social Studies Teaching 145

Digital Promise

SEPTEMBER 30, 2021

Similarly, during the 2019-2020 school year, San Antonio Union School District (California) created the first-ever student board member position. Following interviews and selection, the board member—a middle school student—acts as the voice for the district’s student population.

Advocacy 168

Advocacy Public School Leadership Cultures 168

The Hechinger Report

JUNE 13, 2024

The number of college-educated women in the workforce has now overtaken the number of college-educated men, according to the Pew Research Center. Women who go to college are also 7 percentage points more likely than men to graduate , the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center reports. It had such a weed-out culture.

Middle School 142

Middle School Leadership Advocacy Cultures 142

The Hechinger Report

MAY 25, 2023

Every eighth grader in those schools takes a two-hour workshop class once a week for six weeks, learning everything from how to succeed in an office culture, to developing their strengths and learning how to shake hands in a professional setting. Tejani, 13, is an apprentice for Julia Mejia, one of Boston’s city councilors.

Middle School 139

Middle School Library Government Humanities 139

The Hechinger Report

AUGUST 1, 2021

Under a first-in-the-nation law that took full effect this year, students from across the state must take part in at least two “student-led, nonpartisan civics projects” — one in eighth grade, and another in high school. Peyton Amaral, an eighth grader at Morton Middle School in Fall River, Mass., Credit: Christopher Blanchette.

Civic Engagement 142

Civic Engagement Civics Teaching Middle School 142

Digital Promise

APRIL 21, 2021

Adolescents are ready to move beyond simply stating ideas in writing, and are learning to craft their writing for specific audiences and purposes: to tell stories, build arguments, and make meaningful connections to their own culture, values, and identities. ” – “Monica Castro, Principal, Puentes Middle School.

Middle School 127

Middle School High School Cultures Leadership 127

ED Surge

JUNE 28, 2023

Everyone has a memory about feeling lost on the first day of school — figuratively or literally. Yes, it can be, according to two groups of researchers who have tested how programs aimed at fostering belonging have impacted students’ academic performances. Middle School Blues It’s not just your imagination.

Middle School 113

Middle School Psychology Humanities Research 113

Digital Promise

JULY 10, 2019

Memorizing formulas and drilling in the “proper” approach through repetition too often take precedence over conceptual understanding and experiencing multiple strategies, both of which are important according to research. Hear from Dr. Gerardo Ramirez on How to Help Students Build Positive Mindsets Around Math.

Heritage 133

Heritage Pedagogy Psychology Cultures 133

Psych Learning Curve

JANUARY 31, 2020

Researchers say that reducing the burden of teaching experienced by so many teachers is critical to improve student success — both academically and behaviorally. The outsize influence of your middle-school friends (The Atlantic) The intensity of feelings generated by friendship in childhood and adolescence is by design.

Middle School 52

Middle School Psychology Critical Thinking Cultures 52

The Hechinger Report

NOVEMBER 9, 2023

The program trains educators at K-12 schools whose students include Native children on different ways they can introduce young people to programming, robotics and coding. But computer science lessons like the ones at Dzantik’i Heeni Middle School are relatively rare.

K-12 129

K-12 Heritage Middle School Cultures 129

The Hechinger Report

AUGUST 23, 2021

One widely used program called CHAMPS was recently tested in a study involving more than 100 teachers and almost 1,500 middle-school students in a randomized controlled trial — the kind of gold-standard experiment that is common in medicine but not in education. Many popular programs haven’t been evaluated by outside researchers.

Classroom Management 121

Classroom Management Middle School Charter School Psychology 121

The Hechinger Report

MAY 13, 2021

What I learned surprised me and convinced me that their voices must be part of any decisions made about what school should look like not just next fall, but now and in the future. To my shock, Kamron Freeman, a seventh grader at La Quinta Middle School in La Quinta, California, told me, “Remote learning has helped me focus.

High School 144

High School Middle School Cultures Teaching 144

ED Surge

MAY 8, 2023

That’s the question the middle school class was struggling to answer. Fractions hadn’t really connected with the students, says John Barclay, a teacher in Richmond Public Schools in Virginia. Poor teacher support and inadequate training, researchers suggest, may be contributing. Is 2/7ths larger than 4/11ths?

K-12 135

K-12 Critical Thinking Middle School Pedagogy 135

The Hechinger Report

OCTOBER 5, 2020

Research evidence certainly backs a phonics approach when first teaching kids how to read words but students need a lot more than word recognition to become good readers. Middle school students were asked to read a passage about a half inning of baseball and then reenact the action using wooden figures on a model field.

Social Studies 145

Social Studies Civics Geography Elementary School 145

The Hechinger Report

MARCH 5, 2019

I remember another white parent, when she learned that my son was not going to the most selective, predominantly white middle school in our district, looking at me in disbelief and saying, “I thought he had high tests scores?”. In his middle school mind, being selective in and of itself did not make a school “good.”

Public School 111

Public School Sociology Middle School Cultures 111

The Hechinger Report

NOVEMBER 19, 2018

“It’s so fun,” said Ayiana, who comes from the Iñupiaq culture and lives in Kotzebue, a coastal town just north of the Bering Strait. Sam, who is also from the Iñupiaq culture, loves math. Most of the 11 distinct Alaska Native cultures are represented among ANSEP’s students. It’s not up to interpretation,” he said.

Middle School 111

Middle School Cultures High School Economics 111

The Hechinger Report

JUNE 12, 2023

So it makes sense that some teachers who answered the survey want to know how high-performing countries are teaching math, along with what cultural barriers might be in the way. “Are Are there schools that replicate best practices of countries like Japan and Finland and demonstrate better outcomes?” So did the issue of U.S.

Education 142

Education Middle School High School Economics 142

ED Surge

MARCH 16, 2023

The typical teacher works a median of 54 hours a week, according to a nationally representative survey from 2022 administered by the EdWeek Research Center. Even if schools have high-quality curricula that can take some lesson-planning off teachers’ shoulders, they can’t use it if they don’t have time or aren’t trained on how to use it.

Professional Development 145

Professional Development Lesson Plan Middle School Teaching 145

Digital Promise

MAY 6, 2019

With support and collaborative input from the LEGO Foundation, Project Zero embarked on an exploration of the pedagogy of play in 2015, in partnership with the International School of Billund in Denmark, which has made play a key part of its approach to learning. It’s possible to play with a purpose.

Pedagogy 110

Pedagogy Cultures Middle School Research 110

The Hechinger Report

JULY 21, 2022

Nicholls State’s department of teacher education, in partnership with Louisiana State University’s school of education and the Louisiana Sea Grant program based at the university, was awarded a two-year National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration grant for the project.

Controversial Topics 119

Controversial Topics Education Lesson Plan K-12 119

Digital Promise

NOVEMBER 29, 2016

Before Chute Middle School undertook a digital transformation , many of its students did not have an internet connection or access to technology at home. Because of this, teachers weren’t able to assign homework that required students to use technology or conduct internet research outside of school.

Lesson Plan 110

Lesson Plan Middle School Cultures Research 110