Teachers at ASU Prep Digital create weekly playlists for their students that include a calendar of what they are working on each week, indicating when they are attending live classes and when they are working independently (referred to as “Sun Devil Learning Time”).
An educator, also referred to as a guide, from The Forest School discusses what happens daily in the school’s middle school studio.
Village High School in Colorado allows students to select their mentor teacher through a voting process. Each student fills out a Google Form and ranks their first, second, and third choices, and then school leaders match each student with their preferred mentor teacher as best as they can.
Village High School allows students to set the speed of their own education, with freedom over their learning and schedules. Their model combines online learning, on-campus learning in Colorado Springs, and workplace experiences.
This podcast episode, named “When Student-Teacher Relationships are Prioritized, Learners Thrive,” dives into the story of a student at Map Academy, and how his relationship with a mentor teacher helped him re-engage with school and avoid dropping out.
Listen to more interesting podcast episodes from Map Academy at Education Disruption.
At Map Academy, the Anchor program provides each student a 1:1 relationship with an adult adviser, an opportunity to build community with peers, and a designated block of time each day to set academic goals and monitor student progress.
Map Academy is a free, charter public high school open to all Massachusetts students up to age 24.
Students at The Forest School Online work with a peer partner each morning to set their daily goals on a tracker and create action plans for their “core skills” block. They hold each other accountable and support each other through daily goal progress checks and action-plan reviews.
Laurel Springs School built their own in-house private social network where students could connect with each other, have discussions, and post questions/comments asynchronously to continue conversations outside of class and build an online community.
Students at Taos Academy generate a list of check-in questions and activities, such as “What book character are you feeling like and why?” or “Share a dance move that shows how you are feeling,” to gauge students’ current states. Students then sign up to run the daily check-ins each week.
