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When election rhetoric threatened their district culture, this group of California teachers organized a “Teach In.”

Student journalism can promote tolerance and inclusion.

This week as the 10th anniversary of 9/11 approaches, I plan to gather my third-, fourth- and fifth-graders around me. I will tell them, "Our country is a beautiful place." I’ll keep this in mind as I think of the moments when we were clearly afraid.

When this teacher asked newly-minted sixth-graders how they want to treat themselves, others and their communities during middle school, paper airplanes made for a creative way for these students to offer answers.

A civil rights lawyer contemplates hate in schools.

"I just don’t know what to do about Jordan," confessed Mary, whom I’d just met. I don’t know if she was confiding in me because I teach English or because that’s just what one does at a nail salon. “Last year, he spent hours filling his journals and talking about being a writer when he grew up. Now he hardly writes at all. He says he’s not any good at it.”

An eventful taxi ride home after a challenging day gave this teacher perspective on her life’s work.

The presidential election controversy has affirmed the durability of our democracy.

Every school year, my incoming students receive a welcome letter. Included in their packet is something a little different: a snack-sized baggie of sand. One student may receive some black volcanic sand from Japan; another gets green sand from Hawaii; still another receives the silky sand from Florida’s west coast; while another may get the pink sand found on Bermuda’s pristine beaches.

In our kindergarten classroom, there are no desks. Instead, we have three large, child-sized tables, around which 20 children and three teachers can fit. We call it the writing table. Here, students can draw, write and complete phonics-based workbooks. One morning, Greta was drawing a picture of something that had happened the day before: She and her friend Lily had made bird nests during outside recess and had placed them all throughout the yard. Greta was illustrating herself and Lily making nests. Her classmate Ellie watched her create the drawing.