You've sat through a lot of professional development: some of it really good, some of it forgettable, some of it the kind where you're just counting the minutes until you can get into your classroom and WORK. I think about that a lot when I design teacher trainings. I want every moment of the day to be truly valuable and practical, and to respect not only your time, but your expertise. For the 2026-2027 school year, that looks like three specific things I'm bringing in-person to schools: 1....
6 days ago • 3 min read
This was a transformative year for a lot of people's workflows, and not just in the education industry. We've been through this kind of profound shift before during the pandemic, when everything in-person was suddenly online, and we had to collectively reimagine our entire workflows. Eventually we adjusted, then things changed again, similar to how they were before, but still a "new normal." (Ugh.) And now AI has been doing something similar, except this time it's not one big shift you adjust...
13 days ago • 4 min read
Think about the last time you made something. Not for work. Not for a grade. Not because someone asked you to or because it was going to be evaluated. Just ... because you felt like it. If you can't remember, you're not alone, and there's a reason for that. We talk about creativity like it's a personality trait, like some people are born with it and the rest of us are meant to watch and admire and passively consume their output. But creativity is a practice, the same way movement is a...
20 days ago • 3 min read
The discounted price for Stay Human ends July 8, and I don't want you to miss it. Join us for a live virtual training on the mornings of July 13th and 14th called, Stay Human: Finding Your Ethical Stance on AI as an Educator. We meet from 10 am to 12:30 pm Eastern both days, so you're done by lunch with time to process and reflect in between sessions. Day one is about you as a teacher: your values, your own AI use, and how to make decisions you can actually feel good about. Day two is about...
about 1 month ago • 1 min read
If your gut has been telling you that most AI tools aren't actually good for student learning, the research is starting to back you up. Here's what we're seeing: when students use AI to complete their work, they often produce a better looking finished product, but the same regions of the brain aren't lighting up as they would if the student had done it themselves. And, there's no skill transfer. Doing something better with AI ten times doesn't mean they’ll be able to do it on their own the...
about 1 month ago • 3 min read
Summer is the busiest time of year for me, with lots of professional development and trainings around the country. I also tend to offer more online resources/trainings in the summer since I know that’s when educators are most likely to have the time and mental bandwidth. So, I thought I’d drop a short note to let you know what I’ve been working on and what’s coming up this summer … I just wrapped up a teacher retreat last weekend at the Himalayan Institute in Honesdale, PA, and I'm already...
about 2 months ago • 4 min read
Teaching gives you a lot of opportunities to look back and wish you'd done it differently. The kid you just couldn’t reach. The parent situation where you embarrassed yourself. The colleague you disappointed. The boundary you should have held but didn't.. And the end of the school year is when those regrets can weigh the heaviest. So, the newest episode of my Truth for Teachers podcast is about what to actually do with those regrets. I dug into Daniel Pink's book The Power of Regret: How...
about 2 months ago • 4 min read
You’ve probably heard me talk about the in-person retreats I’ve started regularly leading. They’re weekend experiences where folks can come together for restorative practices, time to reconnect with themselves and other likeminded people, and rest in a natural setting. However, I know there are many reasons right now why it may not be feasible for folks to travel or take a whole weekend away from home. So I'm trying something new this summer: a virtual retreat that brings the same practices...
2 months ago • 3 min read
I learned something in my conversation with Bee Wilson (food writer and journalist for The Guardian), that I can't stop thinking about. She's developed sensory food education in classrooms across the UK, and she’s finding that many kids have completely lost their connection to real food. When Bee asks children where food comes from, they used to say "the supermarket." Now they say "mommy's iPad." That’s a profound shift: it indicates multiple layers of removal from the origins of what we eat....
2 months ago • 4 min read