Lesson Planning

We recently expanded this blog post – check out our Review Strategies blog post. Don’t forget that all students need time for strategic classroom lesson review. This might mean for semester or final exams, or it might mean after a series of related lessons. When it’s time for review, don’t revert back to the “old…

Why does the Learning-Focused Instructional Framework work so well? The highest achieving schools in the nation all use a proven framework for instruction based learning. An exemplary instructional framework, such as The Learning-Focused Instructional Framework, provides a structure that connects all of the lessons learned from exemplary schools and address major concerns in schools and districts. Connecting…

How does background knowledge impact student learning and achievement? If you are like many educators, you can read this passage fluently, yet still, struggle to comprehend what it means. This, of course, is because many people have never played baseball, or followed it in any way (despite the fact that it is America’s game). So,…

Using a single research-based strategy or a single exemplary practice effectively in a lesson will yield positive results for learning for most students. And depending on the strategy or practice, it produces much, much more learning than not using it! Usually, teachers have a few strategies that they like to use with students. Choosing whether…

Are you asking the “just right” questions to increase student achievement?  Are you answering your own questions, or are students interacting with the questions being asked?  Are your questions well planned and do they have a purpose and intent? How are these questions being monitored? Focus Questions are the different types of questions that are…

How do you determine if the students have learned what you want them to? One important aspect of teaching is making sure the information is getting through, processed, retained and understood. There are ways of finding out if they have learned anything from your efforts. The first consideration is to set up Collaborative Pairs in…