Format: PDF

Explore how educator teams use cloud-based spreadsheets to fluidly and transparently group students by interest and skill.

Leverage special educators’ knowledge and skills to increase the effectiveness of educator teams.

Learn to implement self-organized learning environments, an instructional approach in which students explore complex questions in self-organized peer groups.

Kyrene de las Manitas Innovation Academy in Tempe, Arizona serves about 400 students in Grades K–7. In this resource, explore the schedule and the school’s implementation of a Next Education Workforce model.

Kyrene de las Manitas Innovation Academy is committed to engaging students in a dynamic learning environment that promotes academic excellence and prepares them to be innovators and leaders of tomorrow. In this resource, you’ll learn how they’re implementing a Next Education Workforce model.

At Kyrene de las Manitas Innovation Academy, about 400 students in Grades K–7 in multi-aged grade bands work with core teams of up to six educators: one teacher executive designer, two team teachers and one to three teacher candidates. Read on to learn about key elements of their learning space.

Smith Junior High is located in Mesa, Arizona and serves about 900 students in grades 7-8. Each core educator team serves about 150 students and includes certified teachers with expertise in a specific content area one of whom serves as the lead teacher for the team. In this resource, you’ll view an example schedule at a glance, as well as three sample student schedules.

Smith Junior High is located in Mesa, Arizona, and serves about 900 students in grades 7-8. Each core educator team serves about 150 students and includes certified teachers with expertise in a specific content area, one of whom serves as the lead teacher for the team. In this resource, you’ll find out how they’re implementing a Next Education Workforce model.

Community educators can be found simply by asking around your own social networks and community. However, there are also resources made specifically to locate and connect with industry experts who are ready to support your learning environment.

Activating a lawyer for unit planning support is a great example of a community educator contributing to the distributed expertise of a team. Learn how.

The Living Library brought more than 35 community educators — from stay-at-home parents to investment bankers — to connect with high school students struggling to see the importance of learning math.

Lead Teachers are educators who guide the educator team in sharing responsibility for all elements of student support, instructional planning, and delivery; lead the team in maintaining high expectations for student learning; and ensure the team functions at a high level to serve all learners by strength and need. This description of the Lead Teacher role is intended to be customized based on the unique needs of each school district.

This protocol helps educators make strategic decisions around how to best leverage the distributed expertise of team members. Additionally, it can help to identify other educators who may need to join the team and in what capacities.

Interest-based student groupings are groupings driven by student voice and choice. This planning protocol is an opportunity for team members to explore ways to leverage your team of educators to provide student voice and choice within a lesson or across a unit. In it, you’ll identify a lesson or unit appropriate for interest-based student groupings, draft student choices and work together to plan team deployment.

Skills-based student groupings are groupings based on formative student learning data. This planning protocol is an opportunity for team members to explore how you might leverage your team of educators to differentiate instruction for learners. In it, you’ll identify the objective(s) of your choice, draft a check for understanding and work together to plan team deployment for skills-based student groupings.

In this activity, you will reflect on the connections you make between race, class and education; share those connections with your team; and listen as team members share. This activity is an opportunity to gain an understanding of each other’s lived experiences and build empathy and trust.

Through this activity, educator team members reflect on their preferences for managing conflict and work together to agree on norms for healthy conflict as a team.

This activity offers team members an opportunity to reflect on and share what it takes for them to feel balanced, how they prefer to process information, what they need most from their team members and more. After reflecting and sharing, team members will work together to create norms for communication and working styles.

This activity invites team members to gain a deeper understanding of one another, including backgrounds and context for teamwork. In it, you will create a map that captures key life experiences and then share your map with your educator team.

This activity invites team members to gain a deeper understanding of one another, including backgrounds and context for teamwork. In it, you will respond to questions about your background, education, hobbies and more, and then share responses with your team.

In this activity, you will create and share with your educator team a visual representing your social identity. Social identity is the story others tell about you and where you fit into society or the groups to which you belong (e.g., your race, ethnicity, gender identity).