What Schools Get Wrong About Therapeutic Support. Here's How to Get It Right.
The post argues that the traditional pull‑out model of school‑based therapeutic support is fundamentally misaligned with today’s heightened anxiety and sensory challenges. By treating behavior as a problem, equating compliance with progress, and isolating therapy in separate rooms, schools prevent skill transfer and mask student distress. Post‑pandemic shifts in nervous‑system baselines demand an ecosystem design that embeds therapists, applies universal design for learning, and teaches basic nervous‑system literacy to all staff. The author urges educators to redesign environments and routines rather than simply adding more pull‑out minutes.
He Was the Kid Who Couldn't See the Point. Now He Teaches Kids to Find One.
Darrell Trujillo, a former construction worker turned gifted‑and‑talented itinerant teacher in Denver Public Schools, launched a capstone project that turns students in the Montbello neighborhood into community investigators. Using problem‑based learning, students identify local issues such as food insecurity and...
She Saw Something the Classroom Couldn't.
Megan Pulis, a part‑time gifted‑talent educator in Aurora, launched an after‑school science club to reach students who struggle with traditional classroom schedules. The low‑cost, inquiry‑driven program helped participants present at the district science fair and even uncovered two gifted learners...
She Was That Kid. Now She Builds the Room for Them.
Becky Middleton, a gifted‑and‑talented teacher at Bill Roberts K‑8 in Denver, has launched a student‑driven capstone program that lets learners choose real‑world topics and manage projects from research to presentation. The initiative, supported by the Thinkering Collective, provides a structured...
She Said She Was Just a Language Teacher. Then She Built This.
Laura, a dual‑immersion Spanish teacher in Loudoun County, transformed a ten‑week Thinkering fellowship into an interdisciplinary spice‑garden curriculum for second graders. The project blends science, math, geography, art and cultural history by having students grow herbs, track growth data, and...
You Tell Us the Problem, We Build the World.
Salty Sharks' Aquatic Metaverse created the Time‑Lost Cavern, a fully immersive virtual world that teaches UK primary students geology through interactive rock and soil golems. The project originated from a request by Mrs. Parkinson, headteacher at Ingol Community Primary School,...