In relentless pursuit of our mission to help all kids learn, the Policy and Advocacy team at NWEA elevates five key areas in which we seek to influence decision-making: informing the recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, driving equity and innovation in assessments, supporting the reimagining of accountability, building and supporting a diverse educator workforce, and expanding opportunities to learn.

In this conversation, we venture into the domain specific ways we, as educators, can empower students within our classrooms.

This episode will explore elements of culturally responsive teaching, supportive environments, and the actions that educators and leaders can take to create a space where students belong, feel valued, and thereby are more likely to take risks, make mistakes, and build a sense of self-efficacy that will serve them well in their academic journeys and in their lives beyond school.

This session examines elements of student ‘voice and choice’ as critical enabling elements needed to build in students that kind of self-efficacy that will help them thrive and meet their full potential as learners.

Teachers have tremendously complex jobs and a constantly shifting ecosystem of expectations, yet despite shifts across so many other areas of educational practice, building student agency remains a key desired classroom outcome that educators generally recognize as an area of need. This conversation will give teacher voice to the importance of student agency, varied practitioner views on the opportunities and challenges related to building student agency, and a frame for the season that will prepare listeners to hear about topics ranging from supportive environments and goal setting to meeting the unique needs of students with disabilities and emergent bilinguals.

With a focus on formative assessment, providing feedback, encouraging student-led goal setting, and more, professional learning courses help teachers create a supportive environment for students.

Early readers and their teachers deserve all the support we can give them. Here are five strategies to make reading assessment more effective.