The Cult of Pedagogy Podcast

In too many classrooms, our students aren't really thinking. What they're doing instead is more like mimicking, and my guest Peter Liljedahl is determined to change that. In this episode, we'll learn about his Thinking Classroom approach to instruction, where students are up on their feet, actively and collaboratively problem-solving, in a format that has taken the math world (and beyond) by storm.  Thanks to Listenwise and Wipebook for sponsoring this episode.

Anticipatory sets — quick preludes to your lessons — are a creative way to get students interested in what's to come. They are not an absolute necessity, but if you can work them in, they make a lesson just a little more special. ------------------- You can find full written versions of these tips at cultofpedagogy.com/edutips. ------------------- Thanks to The Modern Classrooms Project for sponsoring this episode. -------------------

To learn any concept well, students need to experience multiple, varied examples of that concept, and coming up with those examples can be a time-consuming task for teachers. ChatGPT can help you get it done in a fraction of the time. In this episode, Stanford's Chris Mah and Sarah Levine show us how it works. Thanks to Listenwise and Wipebook for sponsoring this episode.

Many teachers give out copies of their slides as a supplement to a lecture or presentation, but this practice leads to terrible slides and ultimately, ineffective teaching. In this EduTip I'll share a better alternative. ------------------- You can find full written versions of these tips at cultofpedagogy.com/edutips. ------------------- Thanks to The Modern Classrooms Project for sponsoring this episode. -------------------

After years of listening to shallow, perfunctory student discussions, ELA teacher Jessica Cannata found a way to make those conversations more natural, more interesting, and more real. In this episode, Jessica explains how her Real Talk strategy works, and how you can use it in lots of other courses outside of the English classroom. Thanks to EVERFI and Parlay for sponsoring this episode. You can learn more from Jessica Cannata at EB Academics.  

In episode 178, we learned about an approach to school change called Street Data. I believed so strongly in this methodology that I asked the two authors of Street Data, Jamila Dugan and Shane Safir, if they would allow me to produce a video series documenting teachers in two schools as they worked their way through the Street Data process, so that other teachers could learn from it. In today's episode, I talk with Jamila and Shane about the project, and we hear from teachers Amanda Liebel and Araceli Leon about their experiences. The video series is now available at cultofpedagogy.com/streetdataseries.

The time students spend in your classroom may be the only opportunity they have all day to engage with other humans in any meaningful way. And it's such a shame to waste that by letting them stay in some sort of Matrix-like environment where they're only plugged into devices and rarely even look to the left or to the right. So take deliberate steps to help them get to know each other. ------------------- You can find full written versions of these tips at cultofpedagogy.com/edutips. ------------------- Thanks to The Modern Classrooms Project for sponsoring this episode. -------------------

A messaging platform that translates messages into any language, a daily curation of current events, the one everyone's talking about that writes essays for you, and more: Here are six tools we think are worth a look this year. And while you're listening, you can grab a brand-new copy of the 2023 Teacher's Guide to Tech here. Thanks to JumpStart and Hapara for sponsoring this episode.

Learning requires us to be vulnerable, and in order to do that, we need to feel safe. In this episode, I talk with Elena Aguilar, author of The PD Book, about how professional development facilitators can make that happen for teachers. Thanks to JumpStart and Hapara for sponsoring this episode.

Two factors have given lectures a bad name: overuse and poor execution. In this episode we'll deal with both of these issues, considering when a lecture might be the best choice, then looking at ten things you can do to make sure the lectures you do give are outstanding.  Thanks to EVERFI and Hapara for sponsoring this episode.