Category: Articles
Ending “Transactional” Teacher Observations
September 21, 2021
Teacher observations: As a school leader, you might see them as an opportunity to help teachers reflect on their pedagogy. We know observations can lead to important changes, but we cannot stop at focusing only on the lesson being taught. Observations should not be mere transactions, short visits that result in us sharing our judgments and handing out recommendations to teachers. Rather, they should be part of a transformational exchange […]
Decluttering the Teacher-Centric Classroom
August 1, 2021
Classroom spaces should tell us about our students, who they are, and what they value. The building was bursting with energy: Empty boxes and welcome banners filled the halls. Teachers were creating and mounting bulletin boards, unpacking boxes and assembling learning materials, and decorating their classroom doors. I still remember how each year our faculty worked late into the night preparing for opening day. And sure enough, when students arrived […]
The Two Pillars of a Productive School Team
June 28, 2021
In determining the productivity of a team, we need to consider both its degree of success and whether its members are improving. How do you define “team”? When you picture a team, do you envision a group of athletes in uniform competing against others? Or maybe a group of students from the same school collaborating to solve a problem? Or perhaps you imagine a group of medical professionals working together […]
St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Thomas R. Hoerr – The Importance of Reaching All Communities
February 17, 2020
The most important educational factor in a child’s learning is the quality of the teacher. (Parents matter most, but classroom educators come in a close second.) Good teachers go beyond knowing content and pedagogy — they respect, understand and appreciate their students. Those are the teachers we remember; they knew us, cared for us and pushed us. Consequently, an important part of teacher preparation stems from the context in which […]
UMSL Daily: New Education Course Promotes Servant Leadership Model
February 11, 2020
Mindy Bier and Tom Hoerr are teaching a new graduate-level education course called “Leaders Cultivating Virtues,” which utilizes a servant leadership model. It’s designed to give education leaders the tools to fight against empathy fatigue in teachers and to promote social-emotional learning in students. (photo by August Jennewein) Empathy fatigue is an issue for many people. The phenomenon was first widely observed in the medical field, particularly in ICU nurses […]
K12 Insight: How To Take Social Emotional Learning Schoolwide
December 11, 2019
This article by Tom was originally posted on the K12 Insight blog TrustED on December 11, 2019. Why do we do what we do? What’s the purpose of education? Is it to prepare students to perform well in school and become effective workers or is it to develop good people who will make a positive difference in the world? Of course, the answer is both–and yet, schools and curricula have […]
What Should Be in a Library? An MI Expert Explains
January 17, 2019
In August 2018, MI Expert Dr. Thomas R. Hoerr, Emeritus Head of School at New City School and Scholar In Residence, UMSL College of Education in St. Louis, MO, wrote an article about the questions that informed the design of the Learning Library at the New City School. Below, the article is printed in full and prefaced by a brief comment from Dr. Howard Gardner. If you are over fifty, […]
Looking for ‘Solutions’ in the Face of Staff Conflict
July 9, 2018
Tom was featured as a response in this EdWeek Blog post called “Response: Looking for ‘Solutions’ in the Face of Conflict” by Larry Ferlazzo. Read Tom’s response below. What are your suggestions on how to resolve teacher-to-teacher and/or principal-to-teacher conflicts? I led schools for 37 years and taught for years before that, so let me begin by sharing my bias: conflicts are inevitable when people come together. That’s true at […]
Huffington Post: Grit Isn’t Enough!
December 11, 2017
“Who you are is more important than what you know.” The notion of grit has been getting lots of attention lately. Propelled by the work of McArthur Genius Grant winner Angela Duckworth, there’s a growing realization that parents and educators need to teach children to persevere, to hang in, and to not give up. Thomas Edison’s statement, “Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they […]