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Podcast Series: Innovations in Education

Explore the full series of eSchool News podcasts hosted by Kevin Hogan—created to keep you on the cutting edge of innovations in education.

Educators, parents remain vigilant about protecting student mental health

Parents still voice overwhelming concerns for student mental health and online safety, according to a GoGuardian survey conducted by Morning Consult.

With the 2022-23 school year underway, parents and educators appear to favor online tools that protect students from harmful content and help detect student mental health concerns, according to the survey. 

The nationally representative group of nearly 2,500 K-12 parents, teachers, and administrators indicated both significant concerns for student mental health and a high level of support for schools using online technologies to help keep kids safe.…Read More

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Our district is battling a loneliness epidemic

Whether talking in-person or virtually, even small conversations play an important role in creating the connections students need. But it can be challenging to carve out time in our busy schedules to focus on building these relationships.

As educators, we must make the time to ensure that every student feels seen and heard. All of us need a support system, and this is especially important for students in their teenage years. Yet, many felt alone over the past couple of years because of pandemic-induced isolation. That isn’t OK, and studies have already shown the traumatic impact the loneliness epidemic is having on students across the country.  

At Classical Academy High School near San Diego, we’ve spent the past few years ensuring that every student has an educator in their corner. It’s become clear that using technology with a purpose is impactful and provides students more access to their teachers. …Read More

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5 tips to help students master foundational skills

English language arts (ELA) standards identify a set of foundational skills students must master in their progression to becoming skilled readers. These skills include alphabet recognition, concepts of print, phonological awareness, phonics, high-frequency words, and fluency.

To effectively teach foundational skills within the classroom, educators need access to engaging materials that offer the right level of challenge for students and provide ease of usability. Unfortunately, only 7 percent of K-5 teachers use one or more high-quality ELA material for their classroom instruction due to common roadblocks like long adoption cycles and costs associated with the materials. But that statistic may soon change.

The pandemic left a lasting, negative impact on the American education system. K-5 student test scores plummeted in math and reading nationwide this year, erasing two decades of progress. Now, many teachers, schools, and districts want to reassess their foundational skills instruction.…Read More

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Navigate360 Advances Whole-Child Student Wellness and Safety Suite with Latest Acquisition in Continuing Effort to End School Shootings, Teen Suicide and Bullying

RICHFIELD, OHIO (PRWEB) — Navigate360, the nation’s leader in K–12 student wellness and physical safety solutions, has acquired  PBIS Rewards, a SaaS platform that simplifies the implementation and management of the evidence-based, tiered framework for supporting students’ behavioral, academic, social, emotional and mental health. The acquisition expands Navigate360’s leading whole-child safety suite, giving district leaders the tools, expertise and confidence they need to create safe school environments for 50 million U.S. students and strengthen the academic performance of our youth.

PBIS, which stands for Positive Behavior Interventions and Supports, provides a framework for schools and educators to create a safe learning environment where students feel valued and connected through tiered support. With the addition of PBIS Rewards, Navigate360 is setting the new standard for whole-child safety through modern, holistic solutions that address school climate and culture, full-cycle emergency management, early detection, assessment and violence prevention—issues that all desperately require action in today’s schools.…Read More

Give teachers ownership to make computer science a success

Well-intended computer science initiatives are often met with reluctance and resistance before they even get off the ground. Teachers may see the new initiative as “just another thing” on their plate or may feel ill-prepared to tackle an entirely new discipline.

To ensure a smooth transition to teaching computer science, campus and district leaders will need to empower teachers with ownership of the change, versus simply asking them to comply with it.

Here are a few tips to ensure that your teachers are provided with space, support, and resources that will help them confidently assume ownership over the implementation of computer science initiatives.…Read More

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Rethinking your K-12 cloud strategy

The new school year is upon us, and IT teams are ramping up strategic tech investments and systems to help ensure a smooth year ahead. For many of these IT teams, challenges around cybersecurity are top of mind, with recent research revealing over half of lower education organizations were hit by ransomware in the past year. On top of this, concerns remain around cloud costs, including new limits on free cloud storage, leaving some wondering what they’re supposed to do and having to pay up.

In light of these shifts and growing risks, K-12 IT teams need to rethink their approach to cloud storage costs and security. We recently experienced challenges at Hotchkiss School with our past cloud providers in this regard. We could not obtain the amount of secure storage we needed due to not only data consumption and performance challenges, but also because of their egress fees. In order to modernize and innovate, education decision-makers will need to embrace hybrid or multi-cloud storage options that keep their data secure by moving away from mainstream, high-cost cloud providers.

Further, to meet growing demands on schools’ IT departments, IT leaders will need to adopt a flexible cloud mindset that enables them to effectively and securely store and leverage the growing deluge of data they are inundated with – everything from student health care data to device and research data. Let’s dive into how a high performance, multi-cloud approach can help K-12 schools check the following major pain points off their list.…Read More

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We can teach math better–here’s how

In 1997, the National Reading Panel issued a report on the findings of dozens of studies looking into the most effective methods of teaching and learning reading. The report offered specific recommendations for effective practices, such as intentional and explicit phonics instruction for all students.

Lately, there has been movement toward codifying science-based literacy learning practices into law, but it took 16 years before the first state to do so, Mississippi, took such action. In the meantime, many educators—and even entire schools and districts—continued using outdated teaching methods or only engaged in phonics instruction with students in need of remediation.

Something similar is happening in mathematics classrooms right now. A national mathematics panel has not been convened to lay out the science of how students most effectively learn math, but there is a large body of research available. Unfortunately, the math instruction most students receive is not based in the science of math—but it could be.…Read More

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Children’s mental health remains a major concern

The child and teen mental health crisis is still an issue in the beginning of the 2022-23 school year. While there is some indication that numbers might be stabilizing, remaining the same still means children’s and teens’ mental health are in a crisis. In fact, it is still a major concern that could have a lasting impact on the future of this generation of individuals as they grow and develop.      

The hard truth is that many children and teens need support to develop social skills, coping mechanisms, and emotional intelligence that are critical to lifelong well-being.  

Many of the same mental health challenges for children in the United States have remained consistent from the fall of 2021 to the fall of 2022, according to a new study titled Back to School 2022: The Mental Health and Wellbeing Impact on Children in America.…Read More

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Your classrooms might need digital assistants

AI has untapped potential in classrooms, from preschool through higher education. Digital assistants can transform how educators teach, giving them the freedom to teach from anywhere in the room.

When digital assistants are used in classrooms, the outcomes can be overwhelmingly beneficial.

Join eSchool News as a panel of experts shares the benefits of using AI digital assistants. …Read More

Dedication to STEM learning makes this eSN Hero Awards winner a standout leader

One of three eSN K-12 Hero Awards winners and nominated by Bluum, Kim Leblanc was selected for the innovative STEM learning initiatives she champions in her district and for her students.

Conventional wisdom would say that economically disadvantaged schools across the country would need to think twice before making a major investment in technology. However, not all districts in that predicament have a technology director like Kim Leblanc.

Calcasieu Parish School Board is the fifth-largest school district in Louisiana, resting in the southwest part of the state. In total, the district serves 29,500 students across 60 elementary, middle, and high schools. It is a 100 percent CEP district, which means that every student is eligible for free lunch based on the economic poverty data submitted to the federal government.…Read More

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