In this talk given at Faith Builders Teacher's Week 2010, Pete Peters reflects on the distinctiveness of Anabaptist education when studying cultures. The two kingdom concept, reminding us of our citizenship of a heavenly kingdom, will run...

In this talk given at Faith Builders Teacher's Week 2010, Pete Peters shares stories from his thirty years of teaching relating his burden for students to grow up as true disciples of Christ. The ways we think of competition vs teamwork...

How can you help your elementary students master the abstract concepts of math? In these two videos, Ruth Anna Kuhns describes two ways to help students visualize math, and make connections: rekenreks and read-alouds. Rekenreks allow...

Your students know if you care, and I think they know if you don't care, and I think they know if you don't care and you try to fake it. Their radars are pretty good with that. So I would encourage you to do everything you can to prepare...

Introduction So I made half of the class the immigrants, and I said, "All right! All of you have a job, and your boss isn't paying you very well and you have to work 16 hours a day. And so you get tired of it. And so you go on strike, and...

If you feel lonely in front of your camera, Trennis has an idea: Hire some small assistants. Trennis writes:At first I started really simple by using them as a little intro to my videos to break up the boredom. But as I progressed and...

In this talk given at Faith Builders Teacher's Week 2010, Glendon Strickler identifies numerous ways for teachers to shape the character of their students, such as establishing rapport, modeling character, developing relationships with...

I feel that affirming a student is very important to their success. I think it's important because for a student to feel successful, they need to feel built up. I generally don't say, "No, that's the wrong answer", but instead, I try to...

In this talk given at Faith Builders Teacher's Week 2010, Glendon Strickler goes over some practical advice for keeping good relationships between teachers and parents, and for healing poor relationships. Things like good communications,...

The bell rings and the students rush off home and the teacher is left with his desk and sometimes a literal mountain of work. Be Your Own Boss One thing that's different about teaching than some other jobs is that the teacher is his own...

What does it mean to be a school of grace? Schools of grace give children unmerited, transforming love and acceptance; they have conversations that bless and honor parents, authorities, and the marginalized; and they orient their...

You heard about the teacher that sent a note home with the Rufous, and it just simply said, "Rufous stinks. Please give him a bath." And the parents sent a note home, not home, sent a note back to school that said, "Rufous ain't no rose....

In this talk given at Faith Builders Teacher's Week 2010, Anthony Hurst talks about the need for things like consistency, balance, diversity, and student connection, as well as some pitfalls, like expecting the worst or expecting...

Perhaps you've heard about Temple Grandin. She was one of the first people to give a voice to or speak about what it's like to have autism. In 1991 was the first time that autism was labeled or identified as its own category in special...

"Read for a full mind, write for a precise mind, and speak for a ready mind." Sir Francis Bacon (modified)In this talk given at Faith Builders Teacher's Week 2010, Jonas Sauder helps us rethink the importance of speech for education....

How can we get our students to see history as moving, as seeing, as being visual, as responding, communication, information going both ways? Stories In the Dim, the temple in North Africa, the boy repeated the words, "I will hate Romans. I...

This scene is familiar in the lower elementary classroom: students gather around their teacher or the librarian on a carpet, looking at the pictures, and listening to the story. Or maybe they are sitting at their desks after lunch, relaxed...

We look forward to fresh-faced students eager to learn showing up at our classroom door in a few weeks. Hopeful faces and inquisitive minds thrill a teacher’s heart that, hopefully, this year children will easily absorb puzzling fraction...

Photo by Patrick Fore on Unsplash I’m tired, Lord. As our year winds down, we are all tired and weary. I’m weary of drilling math facts. I’m weary of listening to halting readers. I’m weary of checking books. And I am weary of the constant...

“Maybe God is giving you challenges this year, so you don’t get bored after all your years of teaching!” Maybe so. Over here, we have the child who is throwing things and ramming his chair into someone. Here’s one who told me he needs...