The Educational Triage Podcast

Buses and Alternative Education

People have discussed the apparent link between school buses and school schedules for years.   Why are the schools beginning at a particular time?  Why do they end at that time?  Questions parents, students, teachers, and other folks in the community pose quite often.  

Well, there is a link. Students need transportation to school, but is it beneficial? Does riding ...

Sports and Alternative  Education

Contrary to popular belief, students in Alternative Education programs/schools have the potential to excel in school sports. However, this potential often goes untapped due to the lack of sports facilities and coaching staff unless they are part of a school or district that values their participation.  Whether or not the district or the community makes these determi...

Are Teachers the New Therapists? 

Even before the pandemic, teachers were asked to check on students’ mental health, which was a realistic request. However, since then, schools, districts, and communities have demanded that more be done in the classroom under the guidance of the classroom teachers to ensure the students are “doing well mentally.” 

Teachers' roles have been demanding for years, if not decades. With faculty inclu...

Peer Pressure

What is Peer Pressure, and how does it work?  What’s interesting about this topic is that we are all privy to its guiles and effects, but few truly understand it and how it works.   The biggest question of the week is: How Can We Use Peer Pressure in Teaching?  Or can we?  

We discuss the implications of peer pressure, studies demonstrating its power, and how it manifests itself in c...

Lessons in Langauge Learning with Alexis Buschert

This week, we have the luxury of hosting Alexis Buschert, a World Languages Trainer, who indulges us with insights on language learning - both from the perspectives of teachers who work with students struggling to learn English in their classrooms and as students of another World Language.  What prevents us from learning more rapidly?  How can we cre...

The Parent Dilemma

Every day, there are posts about entitlements coming from parents and students.  Absurd requests or demands, and apparently, these are backed by the administrators.  What is a teacher to do?  OR are these the exceptions to the rule?  What do parents genuinely want - the vast majority and not those snarky few? 

This week, we delve into parents' intentions: wants, needs, and hopes. ...

Who Is Generation Alpha 

This week, we undergo an examination of Generation Alpha - those who were born in 2010 and beyond (thus far).  These students are entering the hallowed hallways of the secondary schools, but they’ve already impacted the elementary and middle schools.  

What makes them different from other generations?  Well, they are the first generation to have technology always available...

Blurred Lines Part Two: Teaching Critical Thinking v To the Test

In this week's episode, we dive into this meaty topic.  Are our children being taught to excel on a test without the necessary tools of Critical Thinking?  What are the differences?  What are the consequences?  While rote learning may be beneficial as a foundation, why are students being drilled on topics without more consequential deepe...

Blurred Lines: What is Going On in Education? 

This week, we delve into where many boundaries and lines have been blurred in education.  

Let’s look at some facts.  Who Are Paraprofessionals  Digest of Education Statistics

We talk about hiring practices, qualifications, expectations, administration, learning, red flags, and othering of students.  Take your pick.  It’s a potpourri of issues.  

...

The Intertwining of VocEd, Career & Technical Ed, and Project-Based Learning

During our discussions of Project-Based Learning (PBL), Career and Technical Learning (CTE), and Vocational Education (VocEd), it became pretty evident that one cannot honestly exist without the others - or the allusion to the others.  

This week, we discuss using our brains as the whiteboard where we create our own c...

Bias in Grading and Assessment 

This week, Philip and Tony delve into biases affecting grading and assessment outcomes.  Are there any assessments or grading systems that are without fault?  Are there any of us who are without our own prejudgements when we score work?   How do we begin to mend those systems, and ourselves? Can we?  Should we?  

#ReducingBiasinEducation #StudentEmpowerment #Differe...

Assessment & Grading 

This week, Philip Summers takes us through the labyrinth that holds types of assessments and grading processes  - those we use too much and many we underuse. We attempt to address the questions: “What are the most effective means to assess in various situations?” and “What methods fail to accomplish what we’re after?”  

To be honest, we had to give in on some - just for a...

This week, we begin to explore Project-Based Learning.  We look at the reasons to pursue this learning mode and the pitfalls.  We learn more about what it isn't, as well.  

Why should you consider PBL?  What are the benefits? What are the expectations?  How much work do you need to put in before the first lesson?  These and many more questions are posed and possibly answered! 

Resources: 

• Buck Ins...

We talk a great deal about how students can/cannot read or do math, and we continue to focus on the skills.  But are we focused on what makes a student successful outside of school?  Remember, according to the SAS report of 2014 schools account for only 1-14% of academic outcomes.  Maybe you don't like that number, but it's a bitter pill we need to swallow. 

So, what are you teaching students? What are you modeling? What is the dis...

The differences between alternative education and mainstream education are beginning to become wider.  More students are falling behind in Maths, Reading, Writing, and Sciences.  The system demands that teachers do better, but then they add more layers to the equation - they demand teachers also include lessons in Social Emotional Learning and demonstrate equitable lessons and grading systems.  They believe teachers should be socia...

The differences between alternative education and mainstream education are beginning to become wider.  More students are falling behind in Maths, Reading, Writing, and Sciences.  The system demands that teachers do better, but then they add more layers to the equation - they demand teachers also include lessons in Social Emotional Learning and demonstrate equitable lessons and grading systems.  They believe teachers should be socia...

Why hasn’t Education Evolved for the 21st Century?

Let’s examine what the present looks like in education and ask the question, given the furious pace of advancements in technology, why does it look like it did in the 1950’s?  Maybe a better question would be why is the same model used since the early 1800’s still in use and considered effective?  Subconsciously proclaiming the inability to meet with cries of, “Zero and ones and A...

Why Do You Think That? Common Misperceptions of Alternative Education

“The only issue with Alternative Education is that those in the mainstream tend to dismiss it as an [illegitimate] mode of education.  That is what Alt Ed really needs to work on, itself.  Most have fantastic programs that tailor to the needs of the students, and they work with the families, as well – they tend to be comprehensive in that sense.  That is what r...