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This year our school district launched an iPad initiative for the kindergarten teachers and students at our Title I elementary school.

What’s your go-to text by an indigenous author? This educator calls attention to the limitations of using only Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko, and offers a detailed list of suggested additional readings.

When I was a kid, I attended two different elementary schools in the same town. They were very different. One was large, suburban and within walking distance to downtown. The other was very small, outside the city limits in an agricultural area and had a significant number of Spanish-speaking students.

Picture books can help 5-year-olds explore social justice topics and nonviolence. The resulting discussion is the start of a peace curriculum.

Many kids listen to music as often as they possibly can. Educators can tap into students’ interests in music by teaching them to critically read the lyrics they are listening to—and promote social justice through that examination.

Sonia is a quiet girl with a shy smile who never raises her hand in my class. Recently, she told me that she is bisexual. Sonia shared this during a conflict resolution meeting conducted for her and another girl in the class, Katie. She had a crush on Katie and had been pursuing her through frequent text messages. Sonia had persisted even though Katie had made it clear she only wanted to be friends. At the end of our meeting, Sonia agreed to stop texting Katie. By the end of the day they appeared to be friends again.

We were encouraged to see that the school system in Durham, N.C., last week agreed to end discriminatory practices that prevent Latino students from receiving an adequate public education.

The free college tuition movement is gaining some traction.

I had lunch with my preschooler recently. In line with my daughter was a little girl dressed in an embroidered churidar suit, a traditional garment in Southeast Asia. As she walked, the decorations around her collar and the gold bracelets around her wrist jingled merrily with each step. I told her how I loved her outfit. The assistant teacher leaned over and explained that the little girl was celebrating something, “I think the birthday of a god.” She looked down at the girl, “Isn't that right?” The girl looked blankly back. I then quickly interjected, “Honey, are you celebrating Diwali?” At that, the little girl nodded, grinned widely and skipped over to her table. The assistant teacher looked up at me and stared perplexed, “How did you know that?”

Poet Adrienne Rich once asked: How can we connect the process of learning to write well with [a] student’s own reality, and not simply teach her/him how to write acceptable lies in standard English? The question appeared in her 1979 essay, “Taking Women Students Seriously.” Last week, Adrienne Rich passed away, leaving today’s educators to ponder alone a question that remains as pertinent as ever.