In today’s rapidly changing world, the ability to take risks, adapt, and grow from failure is more important than ever — for students and educators alike. As an elementary principal, I believe that one of the most powerful things we can do in schools is to create a culture where failure is not feared, but embraced as a critical part of the learning process. Encouraging risk-taking and celebrating failure starts with leadership, but it flourishes when everyone — from the youngest student to the most experienced teacher — feels empowered to learn boldly.

The Power of Modeling

One of the most effective ways to encourage risk-taking is through modeling. As a principal, I make it a priority to be transparent about my own challenges and growth. Whether it’s trying a new school-wide initiative or admitting when something didn’t go as planned, I openly reflect on what I’ve learned in the process. When leaders are honest about their imperfections and willing to take risks publicly, it gives others permission to do the same. It shifts the narrative from “we must always succeed” to “we’re always learning.”

Tip: Start staff meetings or newsletters with “failure highlights” or “growth stories” — brief moments where staff (and admin) share what didn’t go as planned and what they learned.

Giving Teachers Space to Experiment

Risk-taking cannot thrive in an environment where people feel micromanaged or punished for trying new things. Teachers need the freedom to explore new strategies, test creative ideas, and reflect on what worked — and what didn’t — without fear of judgment. As a leader, I aim to create an atmosphere where experimentation is encouraged and support is guaranteed.

Tip: Implement “innovation cycles” or “teacher labs,” where educators are encouraged to try something new in their practice, document the process, and share their reflections with colleagues in a safe, supportive space.

Redefining Success

Success in a risk-taking culture looks different than in a traditional model. It’s not about perfect scores or flawless execution. It’s about growth, reflection, and resilience. When we redefine success as a journey rather than a destination, we open the door for meaningful learning and transformation.

Tip: Celebrate growth over outcomes. Use student portfolios and teacher reflections to showcase progress, creative thinking, and perseverance — not just final results.

Building Psychological Safety

For both students and staff to take risks, they need to feel safe — emotionally, socially, and professionally. This involves building strong relationships, creating inclusive environments, and encouraging vulnerability. When mistakes are met with curiosity rather than criticism, people are more likely to take the leap.

Tip: Use restorative conversations after a misstep rather than punitive measures. Encourage phrases like, “What did we learn from this?” and “What would we try differently next time?”

Encouraging Student Risk-Taking

For students, risk-taking often means stepping outside of their comfort zones — raising a hand when they’re unsure, trying a new strategy in math, or presenting in front of peers. These are courageous acts, and they need to be acknowledged and celebrated.

Tip: Create classroom cultures that value the process. Use “risk-taker of the week” awards or classroom reflection walls where students can post what they tried and how they grew, regardless of the outcome.

Culture Comes from the Top

A culture that encourages risk and celebrates failure doesn’t happen by accident. It must be cultivated intentionally, consistently, and with heart. As leaders, we must go first — modeling vulnerability, supporting innovation, and redefining what success looks like. When we do, we not only empower our teachers and students to take bold steps, we build a school community that thrives on curiosity, resilience, and authentic growth.

Dr. Paterson is the recent recipient of Temple University’s prestigious Part-Time Faculty Excellence in Teaching and Instruction Award for 2024–2025. With over 20 years of teaching experience at Temple University, he is recognized for his dedication to student learning and academic excellence. In addition to his work in higher education, Dr. Paterson serves as the principal of Clarence B. Lamb Elementary School in the North Hanover Township School District, a role he has held for the past six years. Under his leadership, the school earned the New Jersey Department of Education’s Purple Star School designation, honoring its strong commitment to supporting military-connected children and their families. Outside of his professional life, Dr. Paterson enjoys rowing, reading, and painting.

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A Principal’s Perspective on Building a School Culture of Growth was originally published in Inspired Ideas on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

In March 2019, Ryan Baker gave a keynote talk at the 9th International Conference on Learning Analytics and Knowledge (Baker, 2019). In that talk, he presented six challenges for the field of learning analytics: the (BLAP) challenges. Baker emphasized that addressing these challenges would help the learning analytics field get “closer to achieving its full potential of using data to benefit learners and transform education for the better” (Baker, 2019). He framed the challenges as a contest, where the winners would need to demonstrate measurable progress towards solving any of the six challenges based on concrete criteria.

The first of the six BLAP challenges, “Transferability: The (Learning System) Wall,” focuses on transferring inferences between learning systems. In this challenge, inferences generated by one system are incorporated into a second system, which then adopts and applies them effectively. The goal is for the second system to use these inferences to influence user behavior and produce meaningful change.

, launched in 2022, integrates insights from various products like , , , Redbird, and Achieve3000 Math to generate a universal proficiency estimate for specific skills. These products play distinct yet complementary roles in supporting student learning: Reveal Math serves as a core curriculum with digital components aligned to state standards, while ALEKS is a supplemental adaptive learning platform that personalizes instruction based on a student’s current knowledge state. Together, they provide diverse data inputs that enhance McGraw Hill Plus’s ability to compute a universal proficiency estimate. This universal proficiency estimate is what drives personalized learning recommendations within Reveal Math. In this paper, we demonstrate that incorporating the universal proficiency estimates derived from Reveal Math and ALEKS data enhances the predictive accuracy of Reveal Math summative assessments and drives changes in Reveal Math through recommendations, thereby meeting the requirements of BLAP Challenge #1.

Proficiency Profile Management and Recommendation Systems

McGraw Hill Plus is a tool designed for educators to track student proficiency in skills and state standards, enabling them to quickly identify which students need support and in what areas. It also helps teachers access tailored resources to provide personalized instructional recommendations, ultimately empowering them to guide each learner on a unique path to growth.

At its core, McGraw Hill Plus functions as a proficiency management system for disparate products. It computes a universal proficiency from student performance data in multiple products. While it does not need data from every product to compute a proficiency estimate, incorporating data from multiple sources enhances the proficiency estimate. As illustrated in Figure 1, it first computes a proficiency estimate with data solely from Reveal Math or ALEKS. A universal proficiency estimate is then computed by combining the two product-based proficiency estimates, which in turn is exploited in Reveal Math to surface recommendations for standards and lessons. When a student engages with a recommendation such as a practice assignment in Reveal Math, that data is used to refine the universal proficiency estimate, which in turn creates a feedback loop that continuously enhances recommendations.

Improving Prediction Using Universal Proficiencies

Product-Based Proficiencies and Universal Proficiencies

Reveal Math and ALEKS both measure progress on state standards. McGraw Hill Plus leverages a decomposition of these standards into fine-grained, measurable skills that span across products and can be mastered over time. Product-based proficiency estimates are computed using a DINA model (Junker & Sijtsma, 2001). The model assumes that correctly answering a question requires mastery of all associated skills, allowing us to infer skill proficiency as a probability of mastery based on question responses. It evaluates the fine-grained skills across all measurement moments, with parameters calibrated to account for varying signal strengths across different assessment types. For instance, tests in Reveal Math and knowledge checks in ALEKS carry greater weight than practice assignments or learning-mode measurements, respectively. To ensure current skill level representation, older data is down-weighted or excluded, preventing outdated information from skewing proficiency estimates.

Universal skill proficiency combines product-specific proficiencies using weighted factors accounting for stability and recency. Stability reflects measurement consistency within a product. Low stability may result from unreliable measurement when few questions are present for a skill. Recency factors adjust weights to align with expected learning pace, forgetting, and re-measurement intervals. This approach balances measurement reliability across products with anticipated changes in student proficiency over time that can result from learning opportunities.

Results

We found that the predictive accuracy of summative assessments in Reveal Math can be enhanced by the universal proficiency estimate. We evaluated the ability to predict student performance in Reveal Math summative assessments using universal proficiency estimates that incorporate Reveal Math and ALEKS versus the Reveal Math product-based proficiency estimate.

Our analysis focused on three benchmark tests in Reveal Math that are administered at the beginning, middle, and end of the school year, as well as one end-of-year test. Each summative assessment targets multiple key skills within the course, with each skill typically assessed by a single question. To assess predictive power of proficiencies, we examined how well a student’s performance on a summative assessment question can be predicted by their estimated proficiency in the relevant skill(s). For each summative assessment question, we used only data collected prior to the assessment to calculate student’s proficiency in the relevant skill(s). Proficiency was calculated using either Reveal Math data alone (Reveal Math proficiency) or Reveal Math and ALEKS (universal proficiency) for comparison.

The analysis included data from 45 districts that utilized Reveal Math and ALEKS during the 2023–2024 school year. The dataset included data from 2,366 students who completed at least one Reveal Math summative assessment during the school year.

Table 1 presents the prediction results for an elementary school in Riverside, California that was identified as one of the most engaged schools in using Reveal Math’s digital summative assessments.

To demonstrate that proficiencies in Reveal Math already perform well on their own, we evaluated the prediction power of Reveal Math proficiency against Reveal Math proportion correct as a baseline comparison. Reveal Math proportion correct refers to the proportion of questions a student answered correctly on a skill prior to a summative assessment question targeting that skill. Reveal Math proficiency outperformed Reveal Math proportion correct, emphasizing the value of Reveal Math proficiency. Next, to demonstrate the added value of calculating proficiencies from both Reveal Math and ALEKS data, we evaluated the prediction power of the universal proficiency against Reveal Math proficiency. Universal proficiency showed improved prediction accuracy of student performance, highlighting how McGraw Hill Plus enhances proficiencies in Reveal Math by incorporating ALEKS data.

McGraw Hill Plus categorizes universal proficiency into five levels for reporting: Very Unlikely, Unlikely, Inconclusive, Likely, and Very Likely. These categories help teachers assess student mastery of skills and serve as input for generating targeted instructional recommendations. The Very Unlikely and Unlikely categories help identify skills where students need additional support, while the Likely and Very Likely categories indicate skills students know well, allowing recommendations to reinforce or extend learning as necessary. The universal proficiency outperformed Reveal Math proficiency across the five reporting categories, providing teachers with a more reliable tool to assess student learning and offering a solid foundation for personalized recommendations.

Proficiency-Informed Recommendations

McGraw Hill Plus uses the universal proficiency estimates to propose personalized recommendations for a given student in Reveal Math. In particular, the universal proficiency is used to identify which skills a student may or may not know. Once the system knows what the student needs, it finds the appropriate asset to recommend. For example, if the universal proficiency says the student is unlikely to understand a given skill, then it recommends an asset associated with that skill (or a prerequisite skill).

The recommendations empower teachers to design their instruction to meet student needs. Rather than assigning the same activity to every student, teachers can leverage these recommendations to provide assignments that align with each student’s proficiency level. In addition to providing recommendations, McGraw Hill Plus provides teachers with a clear, intuitive visualization of universal student proficiencies through the Standards and Skills Graph, supporting informed instructional decisions (see an illustration in Figure 2). The universal proficiency is crucial for synthesizing insights from various sources and ensuring instruction is personalized.

Educators have shared their experiences, highlighting the impact of these tools in classrooms today. For example, a 6th grade parent noted that:

“My daughter never liked math. She didn’t think she was a math person. After following her data in the Standards and Skill Graph and her teacher assigning her lessons exactly on her level, her confidence grew. Now she is looking at careers in Math.”

A director of Elementary Education noted that:

“The biggest impact about McGraw Hill Plus in Reveal Math is that teachers have it all right there in front of them — the data says this is what your students need today.”

Discussion

The impact of universal proficiency as a better predictor of summative assessments in Reveal Math demonstrates how McGraw Hill Plus breaks down barriers between learning systems, specifically between ALEKS and Reveal Math. This integration aligns with the objectives of BLAP Challenge #1 by enhancing predictive accuracy and driving actionable recommendations that improve teaching practices and student learning outcomes. To fully realize its potential, scaling professional development for teachers is essential. As educators become more familiar with McGraw Hill Plus and gain confidence in its capabilities, they can leverage it more effectively in their classrooms.

A deeper understanding of engagement across digital platforms can further refine how we advise educators and demonstrate the value of universal proficiency. For instance, analyzing engagement signals — such as how seriously students approach digital assessments — can provide insights into how universal proficiency estimates impact learning at scale. These signals will enable greater transparency, enhance personalization algorithms, and empower teachers with actionable recommendations to optimize instructional strategies. By addressing these challenges, McGraw Hill Plus continues to advance the goals of BLAP Challenge #1, paving the way for more effective and personalized education solutions.

References

Baker, R.S. (2019) Challenges for the Future of Educational Data Mining: The Baker Learning Analytics Prizes. Journal of Educational Data Mining, 11 (1), 1–17.

Junker, B. W., & Sijtsma, K. (2001). Cognitive Assessment Models with Few Assumptions, and Connections with Nonparametric Item Response Theory. Applied Psychological Measurement, 25(3), 258–272.

Angelica Gonzalez is a mathematician and data scientist with industry experience doing data analysis, data visualization, mathematical modeling, and algorithm development. She earned her PhD in mathematics from the University of Arizona where she gained experience teaching and collaborating with K-12 teachers.

Yuning Xu is a data scientist and psychometrician specializing in educational measurement and statistics. Her work focuses on the methodological investigation of psychometric models and their applications to K-12 assessments. She earned her Ph.D. in Measurement, Statistics, and Methodological Studies in Educational Psychology from Arizona State University.

Special thanks to Dr. Gregory Gunn for his contributions to the analysis and to the McGraw Hill Plus Team at McGraw Hill. Special thanks to Dr. Josine Verhagen for her foundational work and Dr. Ryan Baker for his invaluable support to our research.

Breaking the Learning System Wall with McGraw Hill Plus was originally published in Inspired Ideas on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

As an English Language Development (ELD) Specialist at an Elementary School with a student population of 50% English Language Learners (ELL), and with a growing number of newcomers, supporting our multilingual students is incredibly important. We are constantly reevaluating how to best serve our students. These conversations involve many key faculty, including general education (Gen. Ed) classroom teachers, ELD specialists, literacy and math specialists, and administrators. None of us felt comfortable about students essentially having to ‘pause’ their education because they couldn’t access the content in English. However, we had to balance that with the fact that we are not a dual language school and therefore don’t have the resources to teach content in another language. A majority of the options available to us to aid our language learners are digital programs that keep students in front of a screen for long periods of time. We wanted to find an alternative to this.

We decided to focus our attention for now on English Language Arts (ELA). For our core literacy instruction, our school uses the curriculum by McGraw Hill. After questioning if they have resources available in Spanish during one of our meetings, and quickly searching and finding out that they do in fact have an entire Spanish program to mirror called , we decided to use the remainder of this year to look into a few of these resources and see if they could be a solution to some of our struggles for the subsequent school year. While some of the steps we’ve taken (described below) are specific to using these programs, alternative suggestions will be given when needed as well if you are utilizing other programs.

Small Groups

Our first step was creating a schedule so that ELD teachers or instructional assistants could work with small groups of 3–4 newcomer students at a time, 3–4 times a week. We focused our resources on providing these groups for grades 3–5, as students in LK-2 naturally have more language supports present in their classrooms (many visual aids, for example). Our newcomers all have varying levels of literacy in their home language so that is something to take into account as well when creating your groups. Do you want homogenous groups so you can provide specific supports to your entire group or heterogeneous groups so students can offer each other support during the lessons? My group has three students, all with varying degrees of proficiency in reading and writing in Spanish, and I find that to be very useful. Let’s be honest, they enjoy learning from one another more than they do learning from me!

Frontloading Content: Beginning with Vocabulary

This is how we begin our weekly lessons. We have worked out a schedule so that I can preview with my group in Spanish the text that they will be seeing in their Gen. Ed. classroom the following week. Going through each vocabulary word, we use graphic organizers to list the word, its definition, and its synonyms and antonyms (in Spanish). I am able to find the vocabulary cards (the word with a related visual aid) in the Maravillas curriculum and am able to do this activity with students using some minor aid from a . At the start of every lesson, every day, for the entire week, we review the same handful of vocabulary words (it’s usually 5–7 words), and we practice saying them in English.

Listening to the Stories in Spanish

Maravillas has this integrated into their program, so it’s easy to pull up the texts, click the audio button, and have it read aloud to students in their home language. This allows them to get the same content that their grade-level monolingual peers are receiving, opening up their access. We focus first just on listening, with no other academic demands. If you’re using a different program, there are websites you can find via Google that will do text-to-speech in Spanish. AI tools like ChatGPT are also providing a lot of options in this area.

Help Students Identify Cognates

After listening to the text at least once, I help students go through and find cognates, the words that appear very similar from Spanish to English. This is a skill that can help them pick out some key details or information, even when they aren’t fluent in reading text in English yet.

Answering Prompts

Finally, Wonders and Maravillas have questions or prompts that accompany their readings. I work with students to search the text evidence to answer these questions (in Spanish), and then we convert simple sentences and main ideas into English. We do this in their Wonders Reading/Writing Companion, which goes back to class with them. Now they have the notes from our small group, as well as the knowledge from listening to the text in Spanish, to prepare them for whole class discussions. If you’re using a different program, I suggest giving students a notebook to keep with them where they can keep cognate lists and do their question-and-answer responses; that way, they can reference these in class.

Conclusion

Doing these small groups and frontloading the key content before our newcomers see it in class allows them time to become comfortable with the content and gives them a leg up on the key vocabulary terms they will hear their classmates using. It also allows them to build up the language needed to make their own contributions to the discussion and to feel confident and supported in doing so. Additionally, this builds class community, as students are able to participate and engage more throughout their day. We all want to give our students the best chance to succeed and to build strong relationships.

As educators, we are not strangers to trial and error. Here’s to trying new things and learning from our mistakes.

Let’s keep problem-solving and finding solutions to promote a supportive and academically rigorous environment that keeps students continuously curious about the world around them while always validating their unique place within it.

Eliana Belle is a passionate educator who has explored many different areas in the field. The majority of her experience has been as a general education classroom teacher for grades K-2. Her current role is as an ELD Specialist for grades K-5. Additionally, she teaches part-time as an adjunct instructor for two local colleges, teaching courses on math instruction, diverse children’s literature, and elementary science. Outside of the classroom, she enjoys working on curriculum and course development, as well as creating and facilitating teacher professional development.

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Supporting Newcomers in English Language Arts was originally published in Inspired Ideas on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

“Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.” — William Butler Yeats

Creating a positive classroom environment where students are motivated, respectful, and engaged can be a challenge. However, using a structured, consistent, and rewarding approach to behavior management can transform the classroom dynamic. One system that has proven successful in my K-5 classrooms over the years is the Marble Jar system.

Foundation of the System

The system is simple yet powerful. I purchased two large jars, one empty and one filled with marbles. Over the course of about two months, I focused exclusively on emphasizing and reinforcing positive behaviors. Each time I noticed a student exhibiting a positive behavior, either I or a student would place a marble in the empty jar. More importantly, I only rewarded behaviors I wanted to reinforce, such as keeping hands to selves, taking turns, or using polite words like “please” and “thank you.”

As these foundational behaviors became routine, I adjusted my focus to acknowledge and reinforce new, more advanced behaviors. These included completing assignments, working cooperatively with peers, and demonstrating leadership by following expectations even in less structured environments like hallways, recess, and the library. Over time, I increased the spacing of rewards, as positive behaviors became the norm rather than the exception. This shift helped students develop intrinsic motivation (Deci, 1985), rather than relying on external reinforcement.

Concrete-to-Abstract Learning in Action

The Marble Jar Reward system serves as a concrete-to-abstract learning experience, a best practice in education that helps students internalize concepts through tangible experiences (Bruner, 1966). Initially, students engage with the physical act of placing marbles in the jar, allowing them to see their positive actions accumulate toward a shared goal. This hands-on interaction reinforces behavioral expectations in a concrete way. Over time, as the system progresses, students transition to understanding the abstract concept of intrinsic motivation and collective responsibility, making this approach an effective developmental tool in behavior management (Piaget, 1952).

As William Butler Yeats once stated, “Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.” The Marble Jar system embodies this philosophy by inspiring students to take ownership of their learning and behavior, igniting a lasting passion for growth and leadership.

Building Buy-In

From the outset, student input was integral to the success of the system. Prior to launching the program, I facilitated a discussion where students suggested various types of rewards for filling the marble jar. This buy-in created a sense of ownership and excitement. Suggested rewards ranged from movie and popcorn days to extra recess, robotics activities, craft projects, and even cooking experiences.

To keep the process fair, a student would blindly select a reward from the premade class party list each time the jar was full. Over the course of the year, every student had an opportunity to draw the reward, ensuring equity and motivation. The parties were held at the end of the school day, approved by the administration, and often supported by families who volunteered or provided treats.

A key principle of the Marble Jar Reward system was that all students participated in the earned reward, regardless of individual infractions. If a student had a minor behavior issue–even on the day of the celebration–they were still included. This distinction was crucial because the class, as a whole, had earned the reward. Instead of exclusion, any behavioral concerns were addressed through one-on-one restorative justice discussions, focusing on learning and growth rather than punishment.

Meaningful and Thematic Celebrations

Each marble jar party was intentionally designed to be interactive and hands-on. Themes varied based on student interests and seasons. Some examples included:

• Cooking Individual Pies: Students read a social-emotional learning (SEL) book related to teamwork, then wore student-made chef hats while making their own pies.
• Pirate Fort Building: Students dressed up as pirates with mustaches and student-made pirate hats and worked collaboratively to construct forts from classroom materials.
• Movie & Ice Cream Social: Students enjoyed a movie while making their own ice cream sundaes.

No matter the theme, the goal was always the same: engagement, celebration, and reinforcing the positive classroom culture that students had helped build.

Lasting Impact

The greatest success of the Marble Jar system was not just in the celebrations themselves but in the transformation of classroom culture. Students became invested in maintaining a respectful, responsible, and positive learning environment. Instead of focusing on negative consequences, they became motivated to contribute to a culture of leadership and learning. Over time, positive behaviors became habitual, intrinsic motivation increased, and a sense of community flourished.

By implementing a system that highlights and rewards positive behaviors, educators can create a classroom where respect, engagement, and leadership become the norm. The Marble Jar system not only fosters good behavior but also nurtures a supportive and enthusiastic community of learners–one marble at a time.

References

Bruner, J. (1966). Toward a Theory of Instruction. Harvard University Press.

Deci, E. L., & Ryan, R. M. (1985). Intrinsic Motivation and Self-Determination in Human Behavior. Springer Science & Business Media.

Piaget, J. (1952). The Origins of Intelligence in Children. W. W. Norton & Company.

Yeats, W. B. (n.d.). Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire. [Attributed].

Dawn is a passionate educator at heart. She has over 15 years of experience serving organizations across the globe. Dawn specializes in crafting creative learning solutions. Her expertise spans instructional design, training & development, facilitation, and teaching & coaching, enabling her to deliver impactful, learner-centered programs. Some of her favorite K-12 areas to teach include technology, literacy, and language. She has a master’s degree in education and several professional certificates in areas of specialization. She was nominated for teacher of the year in two organizations and has won several distinctions and honors. Over the course of her career, she has served in suburban, inner-city, and overseas school systems where her love for learning blossomed.

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The Marble Jar: Cultivating a Love of Learning & Leadership was originally published in Inspired Ideas on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

At McGraw Hill, our work is informed by the experiences of the many former educators on our staff. This series highlights their perspectives.

If you’re in education, you’ve probably heard whispers of “project-based learning” in the halls. But what is it? Project-based learning is often misinterpreted to mean a typical unit that culminates in a student creation, like an art piece or performance. While I’m not knocking the benefits of a good diorama project, the idea of project-based learning goes beyond that.

I like to think of project-based learning (PBL) units as giving students a real-world job. Most jobs require us to solve problems. Plumbers fix toilets, chefs fill empty bellies, doctors heal ailments…you get the idea. Like these jobs, a good PBL unit should encourage students to identify an issue in their world and solve it.

In my 5th grade Bilingual Language Arts class, I facilitated a project-based learning unit that assigned them the job of an Activist. They were asked to identify and actually solve a problem in their community, the Logan Square neighborhood of Chicago. They identified problems in their neighborhood, debated and chose which issue to take action on, and finally tackled littering with an educational poster campaign and a letter to our local alderperson.

My school also happened to be a STEAM school with an emphasis on Design Thinking, a mindset for solving problems. Design Thinking encourages designers to empathize with their end users (in this case, the members of our local community) and think about how people interact with their environments. It also emphasizes an iterative, trial-and-error process to design solutions. All of this lent itself very easily to our PBL Activism unit.

This PBL unit had so many benefits for my students. They collaborated. They used cross-curricular skills and knowledge. (After all, most jobs don’t require us to know just one subject area.) They used critical thinking skills to problem-solve. They practiced empathy in considering what problems existed not only for themselves but for their greater community. The kids were excited to make real change in their neighborhood, and as the project lent itself to a lot of student choice, they really took ownership of the process. What I found especially impactful was that, for the first time in their school journey, they were learning about and discussing the immediate area in which they lived. (And I learned some things right alongside them!)

So how did we do it? Here’s a quick outline of the steps I led my students through:

Ask Questions

Great activists don’t just wake up knowing what changes need to be made. They get out and find the issues. So that’s what my students did.

First, we did an observation walk. Students took their “field journals” with them and sketched out what they saw. They identified concerns- construction, smog, littering, etc. Then they took what they learned from that walk and created a Google Forms survey for the community, asking things like, “Is construction in our area a problem for you?” I helped them link this using a QR code so they could share it with our community on printouts and emails. We received 40 responses from community members!

Research

My students also did research on issues in the Logan Square area through a series of resources I chose. They examined news articles and video clips about construction, gentrification, trash, and rat infestations (a surprisingly engaging topic with 5th graders). They also analyzed a poem by local poet Luis “Logan Lu” Tubens, called Searching for Home, about the impacts of gentrification on himself and his neighbors.

Define the Problem and Decide on a Solution

First, my students reviewed their field journal notes, analyzed the community survey results, and identified key details from their investigation articles. We discussed various ways to take action in your community — poster campaigns, holding a rally, teaching people how to do better, contacting someone in power, etc. Then they searched for patterns in their data, had group discussions, voted and debated, and voted again until they had finally landed on a problem and solution. They decided to tackle littering with an education poster campaign and, at their request, a letter to our local alderperson.

Plan, Create, Improve

Before they began creating their posters, I had my students sketch out their ideas and provide each other with feedback. Sometimes, this meant erasing and redoing parts or going back to the drawing board completely. Going back to our STEAM school motto, I reminded them that we are Design Thinkers, and that means learning from mistakes. Some of my students got frustrated, but also somehow more determined, during this step.

They also drafted the letter to the alderperson by first creating letters in groups and then picking their favorite bits to put together one class letter.

Share

Finally, students shared their hard work. They posted their signs around the neighborhood and took pictures with their posters to attach to the letter to the alderperson, which we sent via email.

If you decide to take on a project-based learning unit of your own, here are some tips I humbly offer:

1. Relinquish control: This is so hard to do with the pressure of standards and assessments and scope and sequences and a million other things on our shoulders, but it is so rewarding, too. PBL units lend themselves to lots of student choice, which I found exciting and terrifying. For instance, I had been hoping that they might focus on the problem of construction as it seemed like a more important issue to address, but in the end, they chose littering and got plenty of standards-aligned learning out of it.
2. Keep it community-based: My students really enjoyed learning about concerns that directly affected them and their community. They didn’t know the word gentrification, but they had plenty of examples of it from their own life experiences once they learned. They had also seen a rat or two in their alleys. (And they giggled a lot at a quote in a news article in which a neighbor called the rats of Chicago “super-rats.”)
3. Actually do the things: PBL units are revered for their authenticity and real-world opportunities. But you have to actually bring the activities to the real world and not just practice them in class- take students on the walking field trip, send their survey to real community members, post up the posters, and email the politician! This was a little intimidating for me at first, but when we got those survey results from actual community members- school staff, families, neighbors- I knew it was worth it to step out of my comfort zone.
4. Don’t forget to scaffold: Each step above took about 1 or 2 lessons. I created models for each product I expected students to create, as well as opportunities to try one together. For example, we analyzed a survey about ice cream that had both good and biased survey questions. One big obstacle for me was finding articles about local issues that were at appropriate reading levels for my students. I searched EdTech sites that offer texts differentiated by Lexile, such as , Newsela, and CommonLit to help with this. I also used videos to help students access information.
5. Pick and choose what you grade: I only graded the things that were related to my subject area’s (ELA) standards. I gave participation points for other aspects of the project. The activities that I did decide to grade, I was sure to spend more time on, setting expectations and providing scaffolding when needed. For instance, I graded students’ summaries of the research articles and the poem. But I gave them (and myself) a pass on things like the observation sketch and anti-littering posters. I felt it gave my students a little more artistic freedom and me a little fewer papers to take home.

Kylee McIntosh is an Academic Designer for K-5 Literature at McGraw Hill and a former 5th-8th grade teacher. She holds an English Language Arts teaching certificate with specialties in Multilingual Learners and Bilingual (Spanish/English) Education. She completed her courses for a Master’s in Education Management at the Universidad de San Andres in Buenos Aires. She currently resides in Chicago, IL.

How to Use Project-Based Learning to Empower Students as Community Activists was originally published in Inspired Ideas on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

I’ll never forget the first time I made a mistake in front of my kindergarten students. I was in my first year of teaching, eager to prove myself and execute every lesson to perfection. I had carefully planned my activities, reviewed my materials, and walked into the classroom ready to give my best. Everything was going smoothly; until I made a simple, yet obvious, mistake.

And my students? Oh, they noticed! Not only did they notice, but they wasted no time correcting me, right out loud, without even raising their hands.

For a moment, I felt flustered and embarrassed. I was supposed to be the expert in the room, the one guiding their learning. And yet, here I was, getting something wrong in front of a group of five-year-olds. But then, something unexpected happened — we all laughed. In that moment, I realized something important: mistakes weren’t something to be ashamed of; they were part of learning.

That experience shifted my perspective on mistakes; not just for myself but for my students as well. From that day forward, I made it a point to embrace errors in the classroom, using them as teachable moments rather than something to hide from. Now, I tell my students the same thing I had to learn for myself: It’s okay to make mistakes when you’re learning. In fact, that’s how you get better!

So many students fear making mistakes. They hesitate to speak up, avoid difficult problems, and sometimes choose the easy route just to avoid getting something wrong. But here’s the truth: growth only happens when we challenge ourselves. If we always stay in our comfort zones, we miss out on opportunities to improve.

If you’re a student reading this, I want to remind you that mistakes are not failures. They are stepping stones to success. Here are three key lessons I’ve learned about embracing mistakes and how they can help you grow:

See Mistakes as Part of Learning

One of the biggest barriers to success is the fear of failure. But think about this: every expert, every leader, every successful person you admire has made countless mistakes along the way. The reason they succeeded isn’t that they avoided mistakes, it’s because they learned from them.

Imagine learning to ride a bike. You probably didn’t get it right on the first try. You fell, wobbled, and maybe even scraped your knee. But each time you got back on, you learned something new; how to balance, how to steer, how to pedal more smoothly. The same principle applies to academics, sports, art, and every other skill in life.

Instead of seeing mistakes as failures, see them as opportunities. Each one gives you valuable information about what works, what doesn’t, and what you need to adjust. The more mistakes you make, the more you learn.

Challenge Yourself and Explore

It’s easy to stick with what you already know, but real learning happens when you step outside your comfort zone. Some of the most rewarding experiences come from taking risks, trying new things, and pushing yourself to explore unfamiliar territory.

Think about the times you’ve felt most proud of yourself. Chances are, those moments happened when you overcame a challenge; not when things were easy. Whether it’s tackling a difficult math problem, speaking in front of the class, or trying a new sport, pushing past your fears is what leads to growth.

If you avoid challenges because you’re afraid of getting things wrong, you limit yourself. The best way to grow is to embrace difficult tasks and approach them with curiosity rather than fear. If you try and fail, that’s okay; you’ll have learned something valuable for next time.

Focus on Effort, Not Just Results

Success isn’t about getting everything right the first time. It’s about persistence. Too often, we judge ourselves based on final outcomes: grades, test scores, winning or losing, rather than the effort we put in. But effort is what truly matters.

Think about an athlete training for a marathon. They don’t start by running 26 miles in one go. They train, little by little, increasing their endurance over time. Some days are harder than others, but every step they take, every early morning run, every sore muscle; brings them closer to their goal.

The same applies to learning. If you focus only on results, you might get discouraged when things don’t go perfectly. But if you focus on effort, you’ll see progress in everything you do. Keep pushing, keep trying, and trust that every bit of effort adds up.

Win in Your Mistakes!

Taking risks in learning can feel scary, but that’s where growth happens. If you always stick to what’s safe and easy, you won’t push yourself to reach your full potential. But if you embrace mistakes as part of the journey, you’ll become stronger, more confident, and more capable than you ever imagined.

So next time you make a mistake, don’t beat yourself up. Instead, ask yourself: What can I learn from this? How can I improve? Every mistake is a lesson in disguise. The more you embrace them, the more you’ll grow.

So go ahead: take that risk, speak up, try something new. You might just surprise yourself.

Precious is a dedicated educator with a passion for teaching and mentoring the next generation. With a B.S. and an M.A. already in hand, Precious is soon to complete an M.S., furthering their commitment to both personal growth and academic excellence. Known for fostering a supportive and engaging learning environment, she strives to inspire students and help them reach their fullest potential, both in and outside the classroom.

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Embracing Mistakes: The Key to Growth was originally published in Inspired Ideas on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

As an educator who spends most days outdoors with children, I often witness moments that remind me of the natural brilliance of childhood — the kind that doesn’t need coaxing or a curriculum. The most powerful learning moments don’t happen during planned lessons or guided activities. They unfold in the “in-between” spaces — during spontaneous games, muddy adventures, quiet bug hunts, or unexpected problem-solving missions.

Just last week, two six-year-olds in our community began building a city using anything they could get their hands on: jigsaw puzzles, paint bottles, books, and boxes. What started as a collaborative urban design project quickly evolved into a fortress. Soon after, the duo invented catapult-like devices, declared war, and gleefully invited me into their imaginary battlefield — as their enemy, of course. It was spontaneous. It was unstructured. And it was brilliant. In that playful chaos was everything we aim to foster in education: collaboration, critical thinking, creative design, negotiation, and joy.

What Happens When We Step Back?

Unstructured play is often underestimated because it doesn’t come with instructions, assessments, or bullet-pointed objectives. It’s what happens when we step back and allow children to follow their curiosity and imagination. And that’s exactly where its power lies. It allows children to lead, to make decisions, to imagine what doesn’t yet exist. While it may look like “just play” to the untrained eye, decades of research show that these moments are foundational to healthy cognitive, social, and emotional development.

According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, unstructured play is “essential to the cognitive, physical, social, and emotional well-being of children and youth.”

It’s not simply a break from learning — it is learning, in one of its most powerful forms.

When children are given time and space to play freely, they begin to solve problems on their own, generate creative ideas, and think critically — not because someone told them to, but because the environment invites it. Yet, despite the research, schools around the world continue to prioritize structured learning over play, often reducing recess time or filling after-school hours with adult-led extracurriculars.

We forget that children don’t need constant instruction to grow — they need space.

Problem-Solving and Negotiation, One Rule Change at a Time

There’s a boy in our community who, for a long time, would only play games he invented. He’d often shift the rules to guarantee his win, much to the frustration of the other children. It created conflict, naturally. But over time, something shifted. Instead of abandoning the game, some of the older children began proposing new rules and gently calling out the unfair ones. Slowly, he began listening. These small negotiations became opportunities for growth — for learning to share power, compromise, and reflect. No adult lesson could have taught that better than the real-time feedback of peers in play.

Play as a Pathway to Creativity

That same openness to change is what fuels creativity. A group of children discovered a handful of moths floating in a small pool. Initially assumed dead, the moths began fluttering back to life as they were lifted from the water. What followed was an impromptu rescue mission. The kids took turns “saving” them, beaming with wonder each time a moth stirred. It was a reminder that nature offers its own curriculum if we’re willing to pause and pay attention. This moment didn’t require a lesson plan. It was full of empathy, inquiry, and awe — all vital elements of a lifelong love of learning.

When we talk about creativity in education, we often treat it as a separate subject. But children are constantly being creative when we let them play freely. They’re making something from nothing. They’re building worlds.

They’re learning that their ideas have power.

Overcoming Fear Through Curiosity

We also have a girl who used to be terrified of almost everything, especially insects. Even plastic ones. But over time, as she watched the others play, something shifted. After observing other children play fearlessly with toy lizards and rubber bugs, her curiosity began to eclipse her fear. She started by watching. Then touching. Eventually, she began collecting real bugs — little weevils — and making tiny homes for them, complete with leaves and food. Now, she proudly shows them off, letting them crawl across her hands.

Unstructured play allowed her to safely confront fear at her own pace. Through observation, imitation, and eventually interaction, she learned not just about bugs but about her own courage. That’s one of the often overlooked gifts of unstructured play: it gives children space to grow emotionally, not just academically.

Why Educators Must Advocate for Play

So why does unstructured play remain on the margins of most educational systems?

Partly, it’s the pressure to meet academic benchmarks. But often, it’s rooted in outdated beliefs that real learning must be adult-led or content-heavy. This mindset ignores what we know from brain science, psychology, and child development: that children learn best through exploration, experimentation, and social connection. Unstructured play builds the very capacities children need for long-term success — not just in school, but in life. Play is not just about skill-building. It’s about joy. Agency. Discovery. Being allowed to wonder, to take risks, and to follow your own ideas, even if they lead you off the expected path.

Dr. Stuart Brown, founder of the National Institute for Play, writes that “nothing lights up the brain like play.” In fact, researchers have found that during play, the brain is just as active — sometimes more active — than during traditional classroom learning. The difference is in the engagement. In play, children want to learn.

Holding Space for What Really Matters

Unstructured play doesn’t mean chaos or neglect. It means trusting children enough to let them lead. It means designing environments rich in possibility, where children can follow their instincts and where adults resist the urge to step in too quickly.

When I watch children construct a make-believe world out of sticks, crates, or math manipulatives, I’m reminded that our job isn’t always to teach — it’s to hold space for discovery.

When I see children rescue moths with absolute seriousness or finally say “I’m not playing this game because it’s not fair” — I see thinkers. Designers. Future leaders.

These are the moments when the real magic of education happens.

And I also see kids. Just being kids.

Unstructured play isn’t a luxury. It’s not a pause from learning. It is learning — alive, authentic, and deeply human.

And maybe, just maybe, if we allow more time for this kind of play, we’ll not only help children develop the skills we say we value — creativity, collaboration, resilience — but also preserve something far more precious: their natural joy in learning.

Nikki Wineera is an educator, writer, and founder of a holistic learning community in Mexico. With a background in traditional schooling and a heart rooted in Indigenous wisdom, mindfulness, and play, she now advocates for education that honours children’s autonomy, emotional well-being, and natural love of learning.

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You can view the McGraw Hill Privacy Policy here: . The views and opinions expressed in this blog are those of the author, and do not reflect the values or positioning of McGraw Hill or its sales.

How Unstructured Play Fosters Problem-Solving, Creativity, and Critical Thinking was originally published in Inspired Ideas on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Self-efficacy — the belief in one’s ability to succeed on a task — is a pivotal factor in student achievement. This concept, rooted in Albert Bandura’s Social Cognitive Theory, emphasizes that students’ beliefs about their capabilities can significantly influence their academic outcomes and behaviors.

What is Self-Efficacy in Education?

Self-efficacy refers to an individual’s belief in their ability to successfully perform and achieve their desired result on specific tasks or goals. Self-efficacy is specifically task-oriented and doesn’t refer to general beliefs.

Self-efficacy for learning includes not only achieving the results on a learning task, such as a test or an assignment but also the students’ belief in their ability to use their skills and knowledge to achieve the desired result. In other words, it’s not merely about possessing skills but about the confidence to apply them effectively and achieving the result.

Self-efficacy has been shown to be predictive of achievement. If we believe we can, we’re likely to. Students with high self-efficacy are more likely to embrace challenging tasks, persist through difficulties, and recover from setbacks. Conversely, those with low self-efficacy may avoid challenges and give up easily when faced with obstacles.

In a , we explored how educators can foster self-efficacy in students. Here’s a quote from Doug on the nature of self-efficacy:

“As teachers, when we attend to self-efficacy, students start to say, ‘Oh! That worked — when I put forth that effort, I got that outcome, and my teacher recognized it. I’m going to try that again.’ It’s a belief system, fed by evidence that we’re improving because of our efforts.”

The Link Between Self-Efficacy and Self-Regulation

Self-efficacy is a prerequisite for self-regulation. Students with high self-efficacy are more likely to engage in self-regulated learning behaviors such as setting goals, monitoring their progress, and reflecting on outcomes — and smaller things, like charging their devices or coming to school with supplies. When students trust in their ability to manage tasks, they take ownership of their learning, which further reinforces both motivation and academic achievement. As students build self-efficacy, their capacity for self-regulation naturally increases.

Self-efficacy enables effort, persistence, goal-setting, and self-regulation.

Self-Efficacy and Academic Risk-Taking

One of the most powerful outcomes of strong self-efficacy is a student’s willingness to take productive academic risks. When students believe in their abilities, they’re more inclined to step outside their comfort zones — tackling difficult problems, participating in discussions, or attempting new learning strategies. This risk-taking is crucial for growth and innovation in the classroom. Teachers who support self-efficacy foster a culture where students view mistakes not as failures but as essential parts of the learning process.

Doug, who has been conducting research in academic risk-taking, puts it this way:

“Do you generally believe that when you put forth effort good things happen? If so, you are way more likely to engage in academic risk-taking, which is highly associated with learning. If you don’t have high levels of efficacy, you probably don’t want to put yourself out there, because you don’t believe that anything that you do is going to make a bit of difference at all.”

Five Strategies to Build Self-Efficacy in Students

Here are a few actions educators can take to help students build self-efficacy:

Provide Mastery Experiences. Success builds confidence, and students can learn just as much from success as from failure. Design tasks that are achievable yet challenging, allowing students to experience success through effort. This reinforces their belief in their abilities and encourages them to tackle more complex tasks over time.

Provide Vicarious Experiences. In other words, model the tasks students are asked to do. Students can also often look to peers for cues. Create opportunities for students to collaborate and use student work to demonstrate thinking. Seeing someone similar succeed can bolster a student’s belief that they too can achieve.

Utilize Verbal Persuasion. Be sure to offer students positive feedback and encouragement. Constructive feedback that emphasizes effort and improvement fosters a growth mindset. Encouraging words can motivate students to continue striving, even when tasks are difficult.

Consider Affective States. Affective states simply refer to how students feel. When people feel joyous, happy, comfortable, and safe, they’re much more likely to have higher self-efficacy than if they feel anxious, afraid, or scared. This of course ties back to risk-taking. An environment that encourages risk-taking without fear of ridicule promotes self-efficacy. When students feel safe expressing ideas and making mistakes, they’re more likely to engage deeply with the material.

Create Imaginative Experiences. The idea here is that we can support students in building mental models to imagine themselves being successful. This idea is not fully researched, and experts have differing opinions on its relevance or relation to efficacy. But I think it’s worth mentioning. When students can use mental models to imagine their success or clearly “see” what success looks like, they are more likely to believe in their ability to succeed.

The Role of Clarity in Instruction

Doug puts the importance of clarity this way:

“Clarity in the classroom is when students know what they’re learning, why it matters, and how they’ll know when they’ve learned it.”

Clarity helps students form accurate expectations about their performance, reinforcing their belief that they can succeed with effort and persistence. When educators communicate goals clearly and support students in reaching them, it directly contributes to a culture of confidence and achievement.

Outcomes of Self-Efficacy in Students

When we prioritize fostering self-efficacy, here are some traits we can expect to see our students exhibit:

1. Task Selection: Students with strong self-efficacy tend to choose tasks that challenge them, viewing difficulties as opportunities to grow.
2. Effort and Persistence: High self-efficacy leads to greater effort and resilience. Students are more likely to persevere through challenges and maintain motivation.
3. Response to Failure: Those with robust self-efficacy interpret failures as learning experiences rather than reflections of their abilities, leading to constructive responses and continued effort.

In my conversations with teachers and administrators over the past few years, we talk a great deal — particularly in a post-COVID world — about levels of effort. I hear a lot of concerns about apathy among students. We talk about whether or not students are achieving, but we’re not talking about how self-efficacy can be at the center of this. We’re not evaluating our students and how efficacious they are. Instead, we’re trying to manage all the symptoms when we could be going to the root of the problem.

For a deeper exploration of these concepts, consider watching my full conversation with Doug Fisher: .

Matt Strader, Ed.D. is Director of Academic Design at McGraw Hill. He has served as a teacher, building administrator, and district leader for schools in Kansas City and New York City. In addition to his extensive work in academics and curriculum, Matt has coached teachers internationally and is a thought leader on effective motivational processes in digital instruction that support student achievement. Matt holds a Doctor of Education in curriculum and instruction from Texas A&M University and his research interests center of self-efficacy in digital learning.

For more, read:

• Why Instructional Routines Work
• Using the Science of Learning to Support Cognitive Skill Acquisition
• Brain-Based Learning Strategies to Try in Your Classroom Today
• How to Motivate Your Students to Learn with Self-Determination Theory

Empowering Student Self-Efficacy to Drive Achievement was originally published in Inspired Ideas on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Think back to when you first stepped into a leadership role. What did you envision for the future of your school or district? What changes did you set out to influence?

In your wildest dreams, what kind of school did you create?

For many school leaders, the answer might look something like this: A place where every student feels that they belong, has what they need to succeed, and truly enjoys learning. A place where teachers are empowered to be creative and have the time and space to connect with students on an individual level. A place where every community member is challenged, engaged, and, ultimately, successful in their chosen path.

In your work, you’re likely chipping away at micro-changes across your district that get you a bit closer to this vision every day. Some days are likely better than others, and some feel like a big setback. This article offers a new lens through which to consider how you can influence change. An often-overlooked element of a thriving school is its receptiveness to risk-taking. That ideal school culture described above? It isn’t possible to create without giving students and teachers the permission and safety to take risks in their journeys as teachers and learners.

In other words, your school community won’t be successful unless you allow its members to take a risk, fail, fail again, and even celebrate that failure.

Here’s why and how you can create a culture of empowered risk-takers who embrace failure in the pursuit of success.

The Brain Science of Risk-Taking, Failure, and Learning

Let’s start with a quick look at how the brain responds to risk and failure. In this blog for teachers, Learning Scientist Anne Snyder describes the relationship between failure and neuroplasticity:

“If we examine learning at the neural level, we find clear evidence that failure is an essential part of the biological processes behind learning. Take the example of neuroplasticity — the overarching term for the remarkable ability of the brain to change through learning. Our brains are constantly creating new neural connections at a rate and a level of complexity that is staggering, but this doesn’t happen because we succeed at everything. In fact, what happens is a sort of complicated dance between success and failure, all in relation to the stimuli receive from around us as well as our emotions, our thoughts, and even the things we already know.

Sometimes those neural connections are strengthened through successful encounters, but an equally important part of the cognitive process involves what happens when things break down. Sometimes the things we learn are incorrect or not useful, or we simply need to change course…. In the case of failure, rather than strengthening connections and holding on to old information, the connections weaken through a process called .

What would happen if our brains never built failure into the process, and instead just held on to all the information that leads to correct answers? Research suggests that this simply doesn’t work. In fact, experiments with mice have demonstrated that when synaptic pruning is prevented or , the mice end up with more synaptic connections in the brain, but at a severe cost: those connections are weaker, and their brains are unable to free up space for anything new. These mice then engage in odd repetitive movements, and demonstrate negative social behaviors and, strikingly, are unable to learn new information. By building failure into the process, the brain actually makes success more likely.”

Some learning scientists even argue that educators should . That’s where a culture of risk-taking comes in. Empower students and teachers to take risks, allow them to embrace and celebrate failure, and watch as they experience deep, conceptual learning and lasting growth.

As with any school change, it all starts at the top — with school leaders modeling and enabling risk-taking. Here are six ways you can begin to foster a culture of risk-taking and productive failure in your school:

#1: Model Risk-Taking as a Leader

Again, as with so many school transformations, change starts at the top. That means modeling risk-taking and embracing failures as a leader! Take the plunge on a creative initiative you’ve been considering but were afraid to embrace. Be transparent with your staff that you know the initiative presents some opportunities for failure, and when you inevitably run into obstacles or even find that you’ve outright failed in what you set out to do, be transparent about that with staff, too. If you expect teachers to model risk-taking and failure in the classroom (which is critical to influence student behavior and shift school culture), then prove to teachers that it’s safe for them to do so by modeling those behaviors yourself.

#2: Talk About Failure, Risks, and the Brain with Students and Teachers

None of this is a secret or a trick — so be transparent! Give staff some background on the connection between failure and neuroscience. Offer some engaging professional development on risk-taking and a growth mindset, if possible. Instruct teachers to have conversations with students about the science of failure, too. A growth mindset is an important topic to discuss with students — just telling students about growth mindsets, (perhaps by explaining that the brain is like a muscle, ready to be strengthened) can actually help students adopt a growth mindset. Principal Dr. Traniece Brown-Warrens says,

“Teaching students about productive struggle, what it looks or feels like, and teaching tools they can use when they face failure helped students to start to normalize failure as part of the learning process. Students then started to build the muscle of overcoming failure, so that they are now taking more risks and embracing failure as a way to show their thinking.” -Dr. Traniece Brown-Warrens

Get everyone on the same page and give them all the background knowledge you have to get them on board.

#3: Trust Your Teachers and Your Students to Experiment

We want teachers to model risk-taking for their students. So, encourage your staff to take risks in their practice. During staff meetings or through online conversations, have your teachers share their most experimental lessons, projects, and approaches. Reinforce shared knowledge about the science of failure to make it crystal clear that there is just as much value in sharing what didn’t work as what did. Some examples of risks teachers might take include interdisciplinary, passion-based, or project-based learning; launching new clubs, courses, or pilots; or adopting new technology.

The key here is trust. Creating a culture of risk-taking that celebrates failures requires a tremendous amount of trust between teachers and students, as well as between staff and leadership. To share failures requires vulnerability, and many members of your community may be uncomfortable with it until they see firsthand that their school community really is there to catch them when they fall.

Principal Gerald Paterson suggests,

“Implement “innovation cycles” or “teacher labs,” where educators are encouraged to try something new in their practice, document the process, and share their reflections with colleagues in a safe, supportive space.”

#4: Get Creative with Technology to Make Risk-Taking Inclusive

Technology can help you create an environment where taking risks is an accessible exercise to all students and teachers. In this blog, EdTech expert and educator Stacey Roshan describes how she uses online participation tools in varying modalities to give hesitant or shy students an opportunity to participate and engage. She says,

“Sometimes, disconnected students come to life online.”

When you’re asking teachers — or when your teachers are asking their students — to be vulnerable and embrace the possibility of failure, consider how you can use multimodal learning or online forums to scaffold steps to greater risks. Offer students and teachers lots of choices for expression and experimentation.

# 5: Redefine Success as a School

Perhaps the greatest challenge in creating a school culture that embraces risks and failure is to confront the deeply entrenched notions of success that undergird the long-standing infrastructure of your school. Students understand that their success is measured by grades and GPAs; teachers understand that their success is measured by student performance measures like grades, test scores, and even graduation rates. For many of the students and teachers in your community, the stakes feel impossibly high. Without a real investment in changing how success is defined, any conversations about celebrating failure will feel hollow and risks will continue to be avoided.

Of course, change at that scale is anything but simple. Start small by encouraging teachers to hold 1:1 progress discussions with students that include non-academic indicators of growth (grit, collaboration, self-direction) and a focus on progress. In your own conversations with staff, emphasize some of the same measures over class averages. When possible and within reason, implement policies that allow for flexibility in grading or retakes to reinforce a growth mindset.

#6: Adopt a Transformative Instructional Model

No matter the language you use in conversations with students and the priorities you review with your staff, challenges to aligning a risk-tolerant culture with one that leverages a traditional instructional grading model will remain.

However, if you are in a place where you can pursue lasting, structural change, consider adopting a transformative model like or standards-based grading to flip notions of success and failure on their heads for good.

These models, which shift emphasis from performance to mastery, grouping and progressing students not by age but by need, inherently encourage risk-taking. They encourage students to experiment and explore by allowing the demonstration of learning in multiple ways. Standards-based and competency-based models are interconnected with personalized or individualized learning, where students and teachers partner closely to set goals, monitor progress, and work toward mastery of content and skills.

Of course, adopting a transformative instructional model for your school or district is one of the greatest risks you can take as a leader. Perhaps you can fulfill the first strategy on this list with the final one! What better way to model risk-taking than by placing trust in your students and teachers to take learning into their own hands?

What’s one small risk you could take this month to shift your school’s culture? Share with us in the comments.

Six Ways Education Leaders Can Encourage Risk-Taking in Schools was originally published in Inspired Ideas on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

I have been a teacher for nine years now, and I am fortunate enough to have experience teaching both general education and special education. I taught my first year as a special education consultant teacher for kindergarten students. I then spent the next two years teaching general education second grade and switched to general education kindergarten for the next two years. In my time as a general ed teacher, I had students in my classroom with IEPs and special needs. Since then, I have been teaching a 3rd/4th grade 6:1:1 class. Throughout my experience, I have learned ways that general ed teachers can support inclusion students, which in turn helps all students in the class.

Use Visuals

My first tip for supporting special education students is to use visuals as much as possible. If the child is an elementary student, the more visuals, the better. Visuals can explicitly show students what is expected of them. In elementary classrooms especially, there should be visuals posted of all the classroom expectations.

For example, visuals showing what the routine is when they enter the classroom should be posted for all students to see (picture of a backpack being hung up, folder being taken out, etc.) I have found that if you can take pictures of the actual students following the routines and post those, it can be effective for them to see themselves following directions.

Pictures of the whole class can be posted (such as them all lined up with their arms at their sides, facing forward). For individual special education students, you can also have a clipboard or folder that is easily accessible where you can quickly show them a picture of themselves following the expected routine (“look, you’re showing me here in this picture that you know how to have a safe body. Can you show me that now?) Visuals can help all students, especially those who are non-readers.

Know the IEP

As straightforward as it may sound, make sure you as the general education teacher have taken a good look at the IEP of each student in your class. You should have an understanding of what their goals are, what accommodations they receive, and any other special information. As a gen ed teacher, I found it beneficial to spend some time looking through the IEP and including the must-know information on an “IEP at a glance” form. You can find these on teacherspayteachers for free. You can copy and paste the info from the IEP right into the form. You can then have this form handy, especially when working with the student one-on-one or in a small group.

Collaborate with the Special Education Teacher

Again, this may sound like common sense, but make sure you are in constant communication with the special education teacher, as well as any other adults in the building who work with the student/s. I found that when I was a general education teacher, the special ed teacher always had great ideas and resources for supporting the student. They can even help you with students who may not have an IEP yet but are demonstrating negative behaviors or may be going through the evaluation process. When I taught kindergarten, I had a student who fit the criteria I just mentioned. Even though the student was not on this teacher’s caseload at that time, she provided me with a behavior chart to use with that student which was such a great resource. Special education teachers are experts on behavior and classroom management, so don’t hesitate to reach out to them for ideas!

Set Up Peer Mentors

Another way to support special education students in your class is to find general education students who are great role models to help the special education student. They can help them with their academic work, model positive behavior, sit with them at lunch, etc. My personal opinion is that the general education student should be asked privately if he/she would be okay with being a buddy to the special education student. It should be something the general education student should want to do, not be forced to do. If they are okay with it, you can pair them up to be partners or work together in small groups whenever possible. I was a peer mentor for a student with Down Syndrome in elementary school, and I really enjoyed it. We became friends outside of school and I would go to her house to swim and play together. It was a mutually beneficial relationship and it made her experience at school a more positive one.

Having a classroom with both general education and special education students can be a very rewarding and positive experience if the right supports are in place. Explicit expectations provided with visuals can be an invaluable tool for special ed students. Knowing the IEP and collaborating with the special ed teacher can help you feel more comfortable as the gen ed teacher. Setting up peer mentors (with the mentor’s consent) can also provide great support for the special ed student to feel more comfortable in school. We as teachers are always learning, so don’t be afraid to ask for help!

Lindsay is in her ninth year of teaching. She currently teaches a 3rd/4th grade 6:1:1 classroom at a school for students with emotional needs. She has also taught general education in 2nd grade and Kindergarten. She loves to write and help other teachers and also does some part-time blogging on the side.

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