Tom Waters

In case you haven't heard, there's a collaboration going on between TeamTom Education , Nohea , and Schoolhouse 302 that is designed to support the work of newly hired principals and aspiring school leaders. What kind of resources are there for new principals? Webinars designed to increase school management skills . Monthly research-based leadership articles . And there are paid resources for new principals who wish to make serious investments into their professional growth and success: The 3 in 3, which delivers three years of leadership experience in three weeks of time. The principals' club and spotlight courses. As a reader of the Tom Waters' blog, you're invited to explore these resources for principals at Principals' Seminar . Teacher Resources: Ultimate Classroom Management Checklist Effective Transitions in the Classroom How to Teach Context Clues What is High Quality Teaching? Best Books for Teachers to Read Over Summer

Teachers R Heroes Be sure your teachers are reminded of this more than they are reminded of... lesson plans due dates meeting times dress code policy bus duty parent complaints ...and all the other minutia. Celebrate your heroes and how they impact students, families, your school, and the local community. Teachers impact lives (here are 17 ways teachers change lives ) in so many more ways than a mere test score. Never miss a chance to affirm, appreciate, and add value to your teachers - the investment pays immeasurable dividends for them and for students! Why are Teachers Important?  Because they're heroes. Consider sharing this message with an educator hero you know.

I'm proud to watch our team at TeamTom Education lead into another area of curriculum and instruction...Word Study! They are hard at work developing a free spiraling warm-up resource for reading teachers in grades 2-8. In just 10 days we've had almost 300 teachers sign up, and the list is growing by 5-20% per day. If you know a reading teacher, team, or department that could benefit from a streamlined approach to teaching word knowledge to young readers and writers, this free membership may be for them. The power in this resource is in the research-based video instruction and the spiraling curriculum. Daily word study warm-ups guarantee each student has hands-on practice and direct instruction with the following skills and concepts: consonant clusters vowel sounds vowel combinations multiple syllable words sentence fluency academic vocabulary word parts root words Our authors are at work developing the curriculum into all areas of word study to build st...

Teachers Really Do Amazing Things! It is so hard to adequately so thank you to the professionals who delicately and passionately touch so many thousands of lives! TeamTom Education is inviting teachers to access free resources as a part of TeamTom Testers. I think it is a valuable opportunity and a great way to give a little back to teachers. Teachers really do touch more than test scores! Read the article and the full invite on the  TeamTomEducation.com blog: Tap to read  Keep Calm and Thank a Teacher

I don't mention it much here on the leadership blog, but I've got to take a few sentences to say how proud I am of our publishing team. You author the best teaching resources! Keep up the great work. View their latest test prep resources on the teaching blog at http://teamtomeducation.com/reading-test-prep-summarizing-task-cards/ Be sure to recommend the blog to teachers you know! And teachers are saying the greatest things...which is always more than I can say! “My class loved using these!” -Natalie Asbury “My class started using these today. There are so many options and ways to use them!” -Jessica C. “This is great! Thank you ;)” -Elizabeth Liedtke “Great for workstations and exit tickets!” -Ms. W Creative Little Learners (TPT Seller) “This resource is great practice!” -Stacy B.

Challenge is the spark of learning. Failure is inherent in the process. Failure can also destroy the process. The educator's role then is to present challenges, gauge the support needed, and then provide the right amount of scaffolding. Here are four ways to scaffold challenges, so learning occurs. Challenge is the Spark of Learning. Learning theorists and psychologists from Bruner and Piaget to Gardner and Gagne speak of various forms of cognitive dissonance (take it for a quick Google ). Simply, challenges. We're not going any further into the annals of research or psychology. They all say varying degrees of confusion, questions, and problems form the basis of motivation for learning. Challenges give us two options: learn or walk away.  The educator's role then is to provide students with challenges. These come in the form of questions, problems, projects, or tasks. The difficulty is to match the degree of challenge to each students' readiness. That's a...