geralt / Pixabay

When I was in the classroom, some of the most effective lessons and individual conversations I had with students about behavior didn’t focus on any single student.  Rather, they emphasized the impact their behavior had on their classmates.

Here are some of the resources I used during those lessons and conversations, along with some new additions:

Missing Classmates and Attendance Patterns in Elementary Schools is a new study. Here is an excerpt:

Findings indicate that classmates’ absences increase a student’s likelihood of being absent the following day, and these effects persist even after removing absences attributed to illness.

A number of relevant materials can be found at The Best Ways To Deal With Rudeness In Class.

New Study Finds That Using Cellphones During Lectures Hurt Exam Scores, But That’s Not The Most Important Result

Study Finds Positive Student Classroom Behavior Can Have Powerful Impact On Peers

Focusing On The Impact Classroom Disruptions Have On Others, Not On The Students Doing The Disrupting

Study Finds Unique Way To Promote Student Self-Control

Bingo! There Are Issues With This Study On Grit & ELLs, But I Am Sure Going To Use It With My Students

geralt / Pixabay

I’ve just mailed out the April issue of my very simple free monthly email newsletter.

It has over 3,000 subscribers, and you can subscribe here.

Of course, you can also join the tens of thousands of others who subscribe to this blog daily: 7 WAYS YOU CAN SUBSCRIBE TO MY DAILY BLOG POSTS FOR FREE

These could be useful for a class discussion:

You will find more infographics at Statista

You will find more infographics at Statistan]

geralt / Pixabay

At least, for now, I’m going to make this a weekly feature which will highlight additions to THE BEST NEW – & FREE – ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE TOOLS THAT COULD BE USED IN THE CLASSROOM.

Here are the latest:

Color Joy AI is yet another coloring page generator.

Debate GPT lets you…debate a topic.

Draw To Video Generator is interesting.

Deep Song uses AI to create…songs.

Teachers are embracing AI tools to translate texts, modify reading passages, and create engaging language acquisition activities for English learners. But federal funding cuts and other issues could complicate that work.

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— Chalkbeat (@chalkbeat.org) August 12, 2025 at 2:00 PM

Using AI to Adapt English Speaking Tasks for Mixed-Ability ESL Classrooms is from English For Asia.

Some Things Need to Be Grown, Not Graded, and Definitely Not Automated has a lot of interesting rubrics (scroll down).

The AI Wolf That Education Must Face is from Marc Watkins. I’m adding it to A Beginning List Of Different Types Of Guidance Educators Are Giving Students About AI Use In Their Classes.

I would imagine something similar might happen to teachers who use AI to grade student essays

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) August 12, 2025 at 4:50 PM

K-12 teachers r finding the time to adapt, so I suspect professors can, too——-This Year Will Be the Turning Point for AI College www.theatlantic.com/technology/a…

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) August 17, 2025 at 6:03 AM

We shouldn’t be relying on AI to plan our lessons or find our teaching voice.

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— Chalkbeat (@chalkbeat.org) August 18, 2025 at 11:00 AM

How Process Checklists Support Student Writing Skills in the Age of AI is from Edutopia. I’m adding it to The “Best” Strategies For Creating AI-Resistant Assignments.

I’m adding this post to the same list:

The University’s Best Weapon Against A.I.: The 14th Century www.nytimes.com/2025/08/26/o… gift link

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) August 26, 2025 at 2:58 AM

New substack: LLM Chatbots Are the Inscrutable Unknown Variable in Lesson Plans
dtwuva.substack.com/p/llm-chatbo…

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— Dan Willingham (@dtwuva.bsky.social) August 27, 2025 at 3:51 PM

https For $65,000 a year, a teacher-less AI private school comes to Virginia wapo.st/3HDJVPv gift link

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) August 26, 2025 at 4:50 AM

Must read article of the day about Alph School & the next tech bro who is sure he can ‘fix’ education w/ his software—Class Dismissed. joincolossus.com/article/joe-…

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) August 22, 2025 at 9:04 AM

They will try this with teachers,too

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) August 21, 2025 at 11:54 AM

Here are some recent useful posts and articles on educational policy issues (You might also be interested in seeing all my “Best” lists related to education policy here):

Jewish and Muslim People Face a Wave of Hate. Can Schools Turn the Tide? www.nytimes.com/2026/03/23/n…

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) March 23, 2026 at 5:51 AM

Immigrant kids can attend school regardless of citizenship – some states are challenging this standard is from The Conversation. I’m adding it to THE BEST RESOURCES FOR LEARNING ABOUT THE PLYLER DECISION NOW THAT RIGHT-WINGERS ARE PLANNING A PUSH TO MAKE MIGRANT CHILDREN PAY TO ATTEND SCHOOL.

Since this continues to be the source of a great deal of elite misinformation, it’s worth noting that 4/4 polls this year, that I’m aware of, find that voters still tend to give Democrats an advantage on the issue of education.

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— Matt Barnum (@mattbarnum.bsky.social) March 23, 2026 at 1:27 PM

I’m adding this post to THE BEST RESOURCES FOR LEARNING ABOUT THE PLYLER DECISION NOW THAT RIGHT-WINGERS ARE PLANNING A PUSH TO MAKE MIGRANT CHILDREN PAY TO ATTEND SCHOOL:

Stephen Miller Asks Why Texas Pays to Teach Undocumented Children www.nytimes.com/2026/03/24/u…

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) March 24, 2026 at 4:45 AM

NEW: For the first time, ProPublica has been able to quantify how many U.S. citizen children have been directly affected by Trump’s immigration crackdown: more than 11,000 kids had a parent detained — and that’s an undercount. 1/ 🧵https://t.co/tE6pdG0h2l

— Mica Rosenberg (@micarosenberg) March 23, 2026

San Francisco Killed 8th-Grade Algebra. Now It’s Set to Come Back. www.nytimes.com/2026/03/24/u…

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) March 24, 2026 at 3:46 PM

California is spending more than ever on education . . . Why are so many districts going broke?
edpolicyhub.substack.com/p/california…

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— Morgan Polikoff (@mpolikoff.bsky.social) March 25, 2026 at 8:17 AM

I think this is a totally reasonable theory, but we should be clear it’s just that — a theory.

The size and direction of the effects of ed-tech and eased school-level accountability are both generally ambiguous empirically, imo.

bsky.app/profile/matt…

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— Matt Barnum (@mattbarnum.bsky.social) March 25, 2026 at 5:46 AM

I wonder if my old district will ever NOT be dysfunctional?

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) March 24, 2026 at 5:33 PM

Not the Onion ———Melania and the Robot www.nytimes.com/2026/03/25/u…

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) March 25, 2026 at 4:40 PM

Education Dept. to leave headquarters, give building to Energy Department www.washingtonpost.com/education/20…

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) March 26, 2026 at 5:58 PM

Because they’re racists & fascists. It’s still worth reading this article, though ——Why the Heritage Foundation Is Targeting Plyler v. Doe www.edweek.org/policy-polit…

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) March 26, 2026 at 2:45 PM

What to Know About the Push to Display the Ten Commandments in Classes www.nytimes.com/2026/03/19/u…

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) March 26, 2026 at 4:48 AM

Trump pressured states to limit undocumented high school students’ access to career education programs is from Chalkbeat.

This is appalling

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) March 28, 2026 at 5:57 AM

The incidents in Austin raise questions about how self-driving cars “learn” and adapt to their surroundings. www.wired.com/story/a-scho…

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— WIRED (@wired.com) March 29, 2026 at 4:06 AM

Chromebook Remorse: Tech Backlash at Schools Extends Beyond Phones www.nytimes.com/2026/03/29/t… gift link

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) March 29, 2026 at 4:34 AM

A judge dismisses DOJ lawsuit over Minnesota in-state tuition for students without legal status
apnews.com/article/minn…

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) March 28, 2026 at 9:33 PM

This was an interesting point about the possibility of building a coalition with rural, red state Republicans to protect public education:

www.hamiltonnolan.com/p/christian-…

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— Hamilton Nolan (@hamiltonnolan.bsky.social) March 30, 2026 at 5:28 AM

WCCUSD must hire qualified teachers, court rules, setting statewide precedent
apnews.com/article/cali…

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) March 31, 2026 at 4:02 AM

I’m adding this post to The Best Resources For Learning About The Role Of Private Foundations In Education Policy:

Sounds like the Gates Foundation is going all-in on AI for education. Considering the years of poor judgment they’ve shown in their school funding over the years, it tracks www.linkedin.com/pulse/doubli…

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) March 31, 2026 at 4:28 PM

I’m a big fan of having students do collaborative writing – especially if they can choose their own partners (see The Best Sites For Collaborative Storytelling).

A new study out of Pakistan found that students who worked on collaborative writing projects demonstrated greater writing fluency and skills than those who only worked on their own.

At first, it wasn’t exactly clear to me what the study did.  Then, I asked ChatGPT to review it for me.  After it answered some questions, I was able to go back to the study and confirm its answers.

Here are two questions I asked AI, followed by its responses:

QUESTION: This paper says that the collaborative writing group wrote much better than those who worked alone. What I’m not clear on is how it was assessed. Do they mean that the work that people did together was better, or do they mean that after the collaborating group worked together, they did an individual assessment and their individual writing was better than the individual writing of the people who did not collaborate?

ANSWER: The paper you linked is titled “Collaborative Writing as a Tool for Improving Narrative Essay Writing Fluency and Writing Proficiency in ESL Students.” It uses a clear experimental design with two groups:

Experimental group: Students who wrote collaboratively (i.e., working together in pairs or small groups)

Control group: Students who wrote individually (traditional, solo writing)

Both groups took pre-tests and post-tests of writing performance:

The pre-test was administered to both groups at the beginning to ensure they started at similar writing ability levels.

The post-test was administered after the treatment period (collaborative writing for the experimental group, individual writing for the control group).

Writing tasks were scored with a standardized rubric measuring skills such as fluency, organization, accuracy, and overall proficiency.

📊 What “doing better” means in this study

The study’s finding that the collaborative group “wrote much better” does not mean the group collectively produced a better group text.

Instead, it means:

✅ After the intervention, students in the collaborative writing group scored significantly higher on individual writing assessments (post-test) than they did on their own pre-test.

AND

✅ When compared to the control group, the students who had done collaborative writing showed greater gains in their individual writing performance than those who only wrote individually.
JALT

So the improvement was measured in individual writing performance — not just the quality of a collaborative product.

🧠 In other words

✔ Students wrote together during the treatment phase (collaboration vs solo).
✔ Then each student wrote an individual essay on the post-test.
✔ Their individual post-test writing was scored and compared to:

their own pre-test writing, and

the control group’s post-test writing.

The collaborative group’s individual post-test scores were higher, showing that the collaboration translated into better individual writing.

QUESTION: Can you tell me how they collaborated together – what specific activities?

ANSWER: Yes — from the actual text of the PDF you linked, we can extract how the collaborative group actually worked together, based on the authors’ description of the collaborative writing process they used (or referenced in the literature review).

🧠 How Students Collaborated Together

The article describes collaborative writing as a social, interactive process in which all members of the group participate in the entire writing process — not just dividing up tasks. Specifically:

1. Full involvement in all stages of writing

Students worked together through the whole composition process, from generating ideas to editing the final draft together.

The text explicitly says that collaborative writing begins with brainstorming and ends with editing as a group, not with splitting responsibilities.

2. Shared Brainstorming and Idea Generation

Collaborative writing in the study involved group members generating ideas together, talking through narrative themes and content, instead of each person planning individually before writing.

This generation of ideas as a group discussion helped with richer content and better organized thoughts.

3. Co-construction of the Text

All students in each group were equally involved in producing the final written document.

The article emphasizes that responsibilities were not divided (e.g., one student writes paragraph 1, another paragraph 2). Instead, the text was co-authored collaboratively.

4. Peer Feedback and Negotiation

During the collaborative process, students provided feedback to one another, helping group members refine sentences, organize ideas, choose vocabulary, and improve language use.

This peer interaction is described as a key part of critical narrative writing reflection — students didn’t just write; they actively discussed and revised each other’s text.

5. Shared Decision-Making

The groups engaged in collective decision-making about how the narrative should be structured, which language to use, and how to correct or improve draft versions.

The shared ownership element is emphasized — every group member contributed to the final document.

6. Social Interaction and Scaffolding

These collaborative activities included social scaffolding — stronger writers helping less proficient peers with sentence construction, vocabulary selection, and organizational features during the writing process, which in turn improved overall text quality.

📌 In Summary

In this study, collaborative writing was not just working in groups on separate parts, but rather:

✔ All group members brainstormed ideas together
✔ They co-constructed the narrative text collectively
✔ They provided peer feedback throughout
✔ They made shared decisions about content and language
✔ They edited the text together
✔ They scaffolded each other’s learning through interaction and negotiation

This means that the collaborative group’s activity involved continuous interaction and joint work at every stage of writing, not simply dividing up paragraphs or sections.

This is obviously just one study, but it seems to me its results could be applicable to English-proficient students, too.   It reflects my experiences in both types of classes.

I’m adding this info to Best Posts On Writing Instruction.

ADDENDUM: This post from InnerDrive shares more research on the effectiveness of collaborative writing.

I’m a big fan of alternative history.

And doing alternate history lessons in my IB Theory of Knowledge and ELL classes were some of my favorite times of the year – the creativity and deeper thinking exhibited by students was off the charts (see The Best Resources For Teaching “What If?” History Lessons).

But I felt like I had to stop doing them the last two years I was in the classroom because of Artificial Intelligence.   The assignment was very hard, and I loved my students, but I thought the temptation of ChatGPT was just going to be too much for many of them.

I remembered that sense of sadness when I learned about a new AI tool called What If History.

It’s free, and it’s a lot of fun to just invent a scenario and have it run with it.

Nevertheless, it’s a reminder of what we’ve lost over the past three years….

Ten years ago, in another somewhat futile attempt to reduce the backlog of resources I want to share, I began this occasional “Ed Tech Digest” post where I share three or four links I think are particularly useful and related to…ed tech, including some Web 2.0 apps.

You might also be interested in checking out all my edtech resources.

Here are this week’s choices:

GeoStats Game has lots of pretty original geography games. I’m adding it to The Best Online Geography Games.

oSlate is a free online whiteboard.

ASVAB Citation Generator does just that.  I’m adding it to The Best Resources For Learning Research & Citation Skills.

PuraPDF Tools and PDF Hub have lots of…PDF tools. I’m adding them to Not “The Best,” But “A List” Of Ways To Convert PDF & Word Documents.

Data Viz Kit lets you make lots of different charts and graphs.  I’m adding it to The Best Tools To Make Simple Graphs Online.

Guessify is a geography game. I’m adding it to The Best Online Geography Games.

Dataguessr challenges you by asking you a data question (“Which countries have the highest rates of children under 14”) and then you have to put those stated countries in order.

Each week, I publish a post or two containing three or four particularly useful resources on classroom instruction, and you can see them all here.

You can also see all my “Best” lists on instructional strategies here.

Here are this week’s picks:

Using Oral Assessments to Enrich Our Understanding of Student Learning is from Edutopia.

FLASHCARDS:TO SUPPORT TEACHING AND LEARNING is from Evidence Based Education. I’m adding it to The Best Tools To Make Online Flashcards.

14 Exceptionally Fun Math Games for Middle and High School is from Edutopia.

The Power of Slow Reveal Graphs is from Edutopia.

It seems to me these charts could be very useful in class:

Explain your ideology in one chart (okay actually three) pic.twitter.com/6QlzJqAWEb

— Caleb Watney (@calebwatney) September 16, 2025

I love the framing of “performing as yourself”: you’re both performing and attempting to maintain some level of authenticity/integrity. The performance element of teaching is one of the least appreciated aspects of the profession. For me (an introvert) all that is a large part of what exhausts me.

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— Nate (@jessenathaniel.bsky.social) September 21, 2025 at 8:08 AM

geralt / Pixabay

At least, for now, I’m going to make this a weekly feature which will highlight additions to THE BEST NEW – & FREE – ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE TOOLS THAT COULD BE USED IN THE CLASSROOM.

Here are the latest:

Storybookly lets you create storybooks like Gemini, but with no audio support.

Sitchat is probably a big future use of AI – create your own television shows and chat with them.

Snorkl: A Bigger Flip/Flipgrid with AI-Powered Feedback is from FLT Magazine.

I’m adding this post to The “Best” Strategies For Creating AI-Resistant Assignments:

As the school year begins with AI looming, here again are my notes encouraging us to administer oral exams: bit.ly/andrewhoccl

Oral exams were great even before AI. Now, I think they’re essential. Here’s where I talk about this in my @ncme38.bsky.social address: www.youtube.com/watch?v=QDQx…

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— Andrew Ho (@andrewdeanho.bsky.social) September 2, 2025 at 7:30 AM

If you’re feeling like a little academic reading this weekend—a deep dive review of empirical studies on #GenAI in #LanguageEducation. https://t.co/snJRZpqLDQ

— Seidlitz Education (@Seidlitz_Ed) September 5, 2025

I’m adding this post to The “Best” Strategies For Creating AI-Resistant Assignments:

Duke University pilot project examining pros and cons of using artificial intelligence in college apnews.com/article/arti…

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) September 6, 2025 at 4:59 AM

I’m adding this video to A Beginning List Of The Best Resources For Teaching About Artificial Intelligence:

Claude update I couldn’t wait to try. It can now create interactive presentations. Though they advertise that these can be downloaded in PPT format, this feature didn’t work for me. I guess they are still dealing with some glitches. Here’s my presentation.https://t.co/EYH2VhVFSu

— Blog de Cristina (@blogdecristina) September 10, 2025

This is getting better and better. You can now upload audio to Gemini. https://t.co/NNrOvw7JvN

— Blog de Cristina (@blogdecristina) September 9, 2025

MarkThomas / Pixabay

The U.S. Supreme Court is scheduled to hear arguments on the birthright citizenship case on April 1st.

You might be interested in:

The Best Resources For Teaching & Learning About The 14th Amendment

The Best Sites To Learn About The U.S. Supreme Court

I regularly highlight my picks for the most useful posts for each month — not including “The Best…” lists. I also use some of them in a more extensive monthly newsletter I send-out. You can see older Best Posts of the Month at Websites Of The Month (more recent lists can be found here).

You can also see my all-time favorites here. I’ve also been doing “A Look Back” series reviewing old favorites, too.

Here are some of the posts I personally think are the best, and most helpful, ones I’ve written during this past month (not in any order of preference) – also note that I group many updates on the Trump administration’s current attack on education and democracy in weekly posts you can find here):

Video: Bruce Springsteen Teams Up With ACLU To Support Birthright Citizenship

Here’s The Table Of Contents For Our New Book

We’ve Begun Work On A Third Edition Of “The ESL/ELL Teacher’s Survival Guide”

An Epidemic Of Uncurious People Who Think They’re Curious

Excellent Series Of Reflective Questions For Students & Teachers Alike

“Situational Agency” Is A New-To-Me Phrase For The Idea Of Removing Temptations Instead Of Trying To Overcome Them

“Speak Free” Is A Decent – & Free – Tool for Practicing English Pronunciation

Are State English Tests For ELLs Like WIDA & ELPAC Actually Valid? For What It’s Worth, Here’s What Google Gemini & ChatGPT Say

I Think It’s Okay Not To Teach Whole Novels In High School

I’ve Created Five Free Chatbots For Teachers & Others, And Some Have Become Quite Popular – Here Links To All Of Them

This Is Interesting: Foundations Putting A Bunch Of Money Into Creating AI Tools For English Language Learners

This Research About Teacher/Student Misalignment Is From Ghana, But I Think It Also Holds True In The U.S.

How To Teach About The Evil Acts Of Cesar Chavez?

NBA Coach Echoes Rita Person’s Famous Line About Teaching

Here Are My Google Slides Sharing Each Day’s Plan For My ELL Newcomer Class

In Many Ways, I Think “ESLvideo” May Now Be One Of The Best Examples For AI Education Use On The Web

“Padlet Arcade” Looks Like A Great – &, For Now At Least, Free – Place To Easily Create Online Learning Games

Who’d Have Thought? Students Who Prompt AI To Create Texts They’re Interested In Are More Likely To Want To Read Them

Online Game Leaderboards & Zero Sum Thinking

“Write In English” Is A New & Free AI Tool I Created That Is A Rough Approximation Of Something That Could Be Very Effective In Helping ELLs

Study Finds That Speaking An Additional Language Can Keep You Healthier Physically

It’s The Nineteenth-Year Anniversary Of This Blog!

“What Guidelines Should Teachers Provide for Student AI Use?”

“10 Ways to Scaffold Instruction for English Learners”

“Personal Touches Are Simple But Effective in the Classroom”

geralt / Pixabay

I thought readers might, or might not, find this new regular post useful.

Each week, I highlight several sentences, with links to their sources, that I find interesting/concerning/useful.  And they may, or may not, be directly connected to education.  I may also include my own comments or related links.

This regular post will join my other regular ones on teaching ELLs, education policy, Artificial Intelligence, infographics, and Pinterest highlights, not to mention sharing of my regular Education Week posts.

Here are this week’s sentences:

Research suggests effective SEL for students starts with social and emotional competence in teachers.

Schonfeld said common accommodations students with disabilities need in traditional classroom settings are provided to everyone — a key factor in the learner-centered system’s success. I always say good ELL teaching is better for everyone, and it’s probably safe to say the same for instructional strategies that work for students with learning differences.

Because of what’s happening at the federal level, people have permission now to kind of get rid of some of the programming that we know supports students and families who are learning English — or multilingual programs where students are learning another language.

For every 5% increase in the percentage of students living in poverty, a school had a corresponding 42% increased risk of getting flagged as seriously low-performing (a designation called “comprehensive support and improvement” school under the Every Student Succeeds Act, or ESSA, the primary federal school accountability and funding law).

Although quality data are sparse, the research that does exist suggests a different narrative—one in which kids are faring better in many ways than those of previous generations.

Nearly 7 in 10 middle and high school students say they are concerned that using AI for schoolwork is eroding their critical thinking skills.

Dictators, in reality, thrive not on love but on indifference.

In the first seven months of his second term, authorities arrested and detained parents of at least 11,000 U.S. citizen children — a number that, if the pace held up, will have roughly doubled by now. 

“They’re not required to be subject-matter experts in terms of teaching students, because our AI platform is able to provide that tutoring experience,” Price said.

“The most important thing that the grownup world can do to protect children’s development in light of ICE surges is to prevent this from happening again.”

She has repeatedly defended her advocacy under a simple mantra: “I see all children as precious and equal.”

Non-teachers would be amazed at the many decisions secondary school teachers make during their five 50-minute daily lessons or elementary school teachers during their five-hour school day.

Minnesota in particular appears to have caught them entirely off guard — a tendency toward docility, it seems, is their base-line assumption about everyone they oppose.

A constitutional order ultimately depends less on what judges are willing to say than on what people are willing to do.

I’m not a political consultant but i feel like dems could probably get a lot of leverage out of pushing for green technologies that would wean the us off being dependent on oil in this particular moment

— Adam Serwer (@adamserwer.bsky.social) March 21, 2026 at 8:55 AM

Wow given that Trump supporters are deeply offended by speaking ill of the dead, they’ll certainly abandon him after this and not enthusiastically justify it because dear leader must not be contradicted bsky.app/profile/atru…

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— Adam Serwer (@adamserwer.bsky.social) March 21, 2026 at 11:06 AM

And a statue of Christopher Columbus is placed at the White House the next week——-Lesson plans go ‘out the window’ as educators pivot on César Chávez amid abuse allegations www.latimes.com/california/s…

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— Larry Ferlazzo (@larryferlazzo.bsky.social) March 23, 2026 at 1:01 PM

shoutout to this c-span caller

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— jamelle (@jamellebouie.net) March 25, 2026 at 10:40 AM

Prawny / Pixabay

Here’s my regular round-up of new “The Best…” lists I posted this month (you can see all 2,575of them categorized here – you might also want to check out THREE ACCESSIBLE WAYS TO SEARCH FOR & FIND MY “BEST” LISTS).

Here are the lists from this month:

The Best Resources For Learning About Accents

The Best Resources For Teachers, Especially Those Teaching ELLs, To Learn About Google’s NotebookLM

The Best Resources For Using “Reactance” With Students To Help Them Learn About How Corporations Try To Manipulate Them

The “Best” Ideas For Teaching About The U.S., Israeli/Iran Conflict

Pixaline / Pixabay

There’s often  unnecessary angst in language education about accents.

I’ve shared a lot about it over the years, and thought I’d bring all those posts together in a “best” list:

Video: “Accent Expert Gives a Tour of U.S. Accents”

Video: “Accent Expert Gives a Tour of U.S. Accents – (Part 2)”

Video: “Accent Expert Gives a Tour of North American Accents – (Part 3)”

Video: “50 People Show Us Their States’ Accents”

You Have An Accent, I Have An Accent, Everybody Has An Accent….

Video: “We stigmatize accents, but language belongs to everyone”

Video: “This Map Shows Where American Accents Come From”

Second Statistic Of The Day: Many Cartoon Villains Speak in Foreign Accents

Video: “What Does Your Accent Say About You?”

Video: “Why Do We Have Accents?”

Video: “A tour of the British Isles in accents”

Copy and paste the url address to any article into Dulink, then click the language you want it translated into.

It will then produce an attractive version, with all the ads and whatnot stripped out.

It’s free, and appears to not have any limits.  You have to pay if you want to add audio.

It seems to me this might be useful to content teachers who have to translate materials for their English Language Learners.  The translated versions will certainly look nicer than using Google Translate and then copy-and-pasting it into a Google Doc.

I’m adding this info to The Best Sites For Learning Strategies To Teach ELL’s In Content Classes.

Every family has a history. Here’s how to make sure it’s handed down. is a Washington Post article sharing ideas for a good assignment involving students’ families.

In many ways, it’s similar to StoryCorps’ The Great Listen (see StoryCorps’ “The Great Listen” Is A Cool Oral History Project For Students).

However, if teachers do this kind of activity, they need to recognize that some students might not have access to their families – they might be in foster care, or most of their family members might be in a different country (though, if they regularly FaceTime with them, they could still easily do it), or family members could be incarcerated.

So, I think it’s always important to offer students a different option.  Perhaps they can research the family of a public figure they admire?

I’m adding this info to The Best Student Projects That Need Family Engagement — Contribute Your Lessons!

Eight years ago I began this regular feature where I share a few posts and resources from around the Web related to ESL/EFL or to language in general that have caught my attention.

You might also be interested in all my Best lists on teaching ELLs.

Also, check out A Collection Of My Best Resources On Teaching English Language Learners.

In addition, look for our latest book on teaching ELLs, The ELL Teacher’s Toolbox 2.0.

Here are this week’s choices:

How long it takes to learn English while learning the curriculum is a study from Australia.

This video is like an animated horror/slasher film starring a pig, but adolescent boys would love it. Use your judgment about if ELLs should watch it and then talk/write about what they saw:

The Reading Cycle Checklist is from On The Same Page.

New! Tips for School Nurses: Supporting ELLs and ELL Families

This article includes helpful tips, a tip sheet, and a free slide deck for turnkey training.https://t.co/JftoLzm2xj pic.twitter.com/73uoFVJmA1

— Colorín Colorado (@ColorinColorado) September 3, 2025

New publication in Research Synthesis in Applied Linguistics:

A Systematic Review of Research on the use of Shadowing for Second Language Pronunciation Teaching by Benen Whitworth and Heath Rosehttps://t.co/T7AQe0cnDM pic.twitter.com/LRTblfufuF

— Research Synthesis in Applied Linguistics (@RSALJournal) September 2, 2025

This is DEFINTELY not a funny video, but it could be an option to show it to ELLs and have them write and talk about what they saw:

Clarifying the Roles of Translating, Interpreting, and Translanguaging is from SupportED. I’m adding it to THE BEST RESOURCES FOR LEARNING ABOUT TRANSLANGUAGING and to The Best Resources Explaining Why We Need To Support The Home Language Of ELLs.

Here’s another video to show ELLs and have them talk and write about what they saw:

And here’s yet another movie to show to ELLs:

Twelve MFL Teacher Habits that Support Strong Classroom Management https://t.co/bcZ6aZoMOO vía @gianfrancocont9

— Sergio Lorca (@sergiolm21) September 6, 2025

Mohamed_hassan / Pixabay

I often write about research studies from various fields and how they can be applied to the classroom. I write individual posts about ones that I think are especially significant, and will continue to do so. However, so many studies are published that it’s hard to keep up. So I’ve started writing a “round-up” of some of them each week or every other week as a regular feature.

You can see all my “Best” lists related to education research here.

Here are some new useful studies (and related resources):

Making the Case for Reading Instruction with Adolescents is by Doug Fisher, Nancy Frey and Diana Lapp.

Stories in Education: The Importance and Application of Storytelling in Inclusive Education is a new study. I’m adding it to A BEGINNING LIST OF THE BEST RESOURCES ON TELLING STORIES WHEN WE TEACH.

The Impact of Feedback Methods on Student Achievement in Zhengzhou University, China: A Mediating Role of Self-Efficacy is a new study. I’m adding it to The Best Resources For Learning How To Best Give Feedback To Students.

The Impact of Digital Formative Assessment on Student Motivation and Learning Outcomes in the Technological Era is a new study.  I’m adding it to The Best Resources For Learning About Formative Assessment.

Application of the Jigsaw Technique to Enhance Student Motivation and Engagement in Vocabulary Learning is another new study. I’m adding it to THE BEST RESOURCES FOR LEARNING ABOUT THE JIGSAW INSTRUCTIONAL STRATEGY,

Willpower Doesn’t Work. This Does. is the headline of a relatively recent NY Times Op Ed by Angela Duckworth of “grit” fame.

It’s about “situational agency,” which is a new-to-me term referring to removing temptations instead of using willpower to overcome them.

Though the word is new to me, the strategy isn’t.  In fact, Dr. Walter Mischel of the famous Marshmallow Experiment talked about some of the children who were most successful in resisting eating the marshmallow were ones who hid it.

And, of course, teachers apply “situational agency” all the time – having students sit apart from friends who might distract them, asking them to put their cellphones in their backpacks so they can’t see them, etc.

I always found a key to making this a successful strategy was talking privately with students about their challenges, inviting them to share their ideas on how to overcome them, and my suggesting ways they could avoid temptations.  I’m not sure you can use the word “agency” to describe any strategy that involves a person in authority telling someone else what they should do.

I’m adding this info to Best Posts About Helping Students Develop Their Capacity For Self-Control.