Blog - Visionary Teaching

How To Play ‘Would You Rather?’ During a Virtual Lesson

Would You Rather? is both a classic ice breaker game and a powerful educational activity. I find that many teachers are aware of Would You Rather?, but have not considered how it can be used academically. The rules are simple. The...

Opportunities to Respond That Improve Engagement & Learning

Opportunities to respond (OTR) include instances where teachers elicit answers or responses from students. Unfortunately, the traditional OTR involves teachers calling on one student at a time to answer a question. When we call on a single student, it makes it easy...

Choice Boards: A Powerful Way to Engage & Assess Your Students

Using choice boards just makes sense! Every individual student represents a unique blend of strengths, interests, needs, experiences, and background knowledge, so it stands to reason that a one-size-fits-all approach to assessment is not ideal. Giving students some...

How to Engage Your Whole Class with Pinch Cards

Teachers are always looking for new ways to engage and educate students. Pinch cards offer simple, but powerful opportunities for students to respond to teacher questions or discussion points. As discussed in a previous blog post, the traditional model of one student...

Science Choice Boards: A Formula for Authentic Assessment

This post will be short on theory and long on materials that you can use with your class. We have previously discussed the why and how of using choice boards for assessment. As follows are 5 choice boards that you can use for...

Browse Posts by Category:

Multisensory Instruction: Powerful Strategies for All Learners

Have you ever smelled something that instantly took you back to another time or place? Perhaps you have tasted a particular food, felt a texture, or heard a song that brought back distant, but powerful memories. If one particular sense can bring back such memories,...

Powerful Would You Rather Questions for Virtual or Face-to-Face Experiences

This blog has allowed me to share ideas with educators across the United States and around the world. It has been very interesting to note which topics have been the most popular. Without a doubt, the most popular blog post on this site is How to Play Would You...

Formative Assessment vs. Summative Assessment: Which is Better?

In classrooms across America, summative assessment is the reigning, undisputed champion when it comes to collecting data on what students have learned. But should this be the case? Does summative assessment do what we need it to do? Is formative...

More Brain Breaks That Energize, Engage, & Focus Virtual Students

As follows are a few more exciting brain breaks that students of all ages might enjoy. You may also notice that although these particular brain breaks are well-suited for virtual learners, they will also work well in face-to-face or hybrid situations.

The Practical Side of UDL: Ideas That Will Engage & Inspire

Let's explore the 3 brain networks associated with UDL. As related posts, videos, and resources are published, they will be hyperlinked below. The items that are not currently hyperlinked represent great content that will be offered in the near future, so please bookmark this post and check back often.

Become a Better Teacher by Embracing Universal Design for Learning

Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is a hot topic in education. Many UDL-related books, websites, and research articles are long on jargon and short on practical ideas that you can use with your students. This series will grow over time and offer...

Let’s Go! Ten of the Most Amazing Virtual Field Trips

Field trips are one of the great joys of school for many students. They get to leave school and generalize learnings by interacting with artifacts, witnessing demonstrations, or meeting with experts. Unfortunately, COVID has denied opportunities to...

The Pause Procedure: Offering Learners Time to Process & Reflect

Teachers tend to know a lot. It can be too easy to try cramming too much content into short amounts of class time. Research tells us that we should periodically pause during our lessons and allow students time to process and reflect. This strategy is important for all educators, whether teaching in K-12, lecturing for a college, or training adults.