From the classroom.
Into the conversation.

Start here

The Reading Problem We Keep Building Into the Assignment

I have students who can talk to me about a historical event and explain what happened in their own words. They can make connections to something we learned the week before. They can tell me whether they think a ruler made a good decision, defend their opinion, and sometimes bring up something I had not even considered.

By Amanda Huber

A Strategy Can Be Research-Based and Still Be Wrong for the Lesson

When somebody tells me an instructional strategy is research-based, I want to know what the research actually measured. Student achievement? Retention? Reading comprehension? The ability to apply information independently? Those are different outcomes, and I don't think we should treat them as interchangeable.

By Amanda Huber

Students Are Not Always the Best Judges of How They Learn

“I learn better when I can just look back at my notes.” “I learn better when the teacher tells me exactly what is going to be on the test.” “I’m a visual learner.” “I don’t learn from quizzes.” “I understand it better when I just reread it.”

By Amanda Huber

Some Teachers Have Better Students. That Doesn't Make Them Better Teachers.

A good class roster can make a teacher look awfully good. I'm sure that statement won't sit well with everyone, particularly those who take pride in their students' academic success. But I think we've gotten a little too comfortable praising teachers for results without questioning how much of that success was already there before the students entered their classrooms.

By Amanda Huber

We Call It a State Test Score. But How Much of It Is English?

North Carolina just released its 2025–26 testing results. Across EOG and EOC assessments, 59.2% of students reached grade-level proficiency, the highest statewide result in the last three years. Biology jumped eleven percentage points in one year.

By Amanda Huber

Some Students Already Know the Rules

A teacher can hand the same assignment to twenty-five students and assume everyone received the same task. They didn’t. One student sees “Use evidence to explain why this empire became powerful” and already knows roughly what the finished answer should look like.

By Amanda Huber

The Most Engaged Student in the Room May Not Be the One Learning the Most

One of the strangest things about teaching is that I can see almost everything a student is doing and still have very little idea what is happening in their mind. I can see the Chromebook open. I can hear the discussion. I can watch someone highlight a reading, fill in notes, answer questions, move around the room, make a presentation and stay busy for an entire class period.

By Amanda Huber

When Support Becomes Dependence

There is a moment in teaching that is easy to misread. A student has been successful for weeks. They have completed the work, used the organizer, followed the checklist, answered the questions, maybe even improved their grade. Then one small thing changes.

By Amanda Huber

AI Didn’t Create the Learning Problem. It Exposed It.

AI did not create the student who could complete an assignment without learning much from it. That student existed long before ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, or any of the tools schools are now trying to figure out.

By Amanda Huber