The Cult of Pedagogy Podcast

How do we know whether students can actually use what they've learned? Traditional tests can tell us a lot, but they don't always show us whether students can apply their knowledge and skills in meaningful ways. In this episode, I'm talking with author and educator Jay McTighe about performance tasks, which not only give us a richer picture of student learning but can also be powerful learning experiences in their own right. Jay shares three great examples, explains what makes these tasks effective, and offers practical advice for designing your own, including common mistakes to avoid.

Thanks to Highfive for sponsoring the episode. To read a summary or a transcript and find links to the book, visit https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/performance-assessments/.

To learn more about Mastering the Lesson Plan, visit https://cultofpedagogy.com/teaching101.

When teachers push back against coaching, professional development, or a new initiative, they often get labeled as "resistant." But that label can keep us from seeing what's really going on. In this episode, author Elena Aguilar shares insights from her new book, How to Coach Resistance. We talk about how coaches and leaders may unintentionally contribute to the pushback, practical ways to respond to emotions and identify barriers to change, and what to do when a teacher's objections have merit.

Thanks to Highfive for sponsoring the episode. To read a summary or a transcript and find links to the book, visit https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/teacher-pushback/.

To learn more about Mastering the Lesson Plan, visit https://cultofpedagogy.com/teaching101.

Schools are constantly trying to improve, but too often, big improvement efforts don't lead to the changes people hoped for. In this episode, I talk with Jal Mehta and Max Yurkofsky, authors of A Chance to Solve Their Own Problems, about what gets in the way of meaningful school improvement, what needs to be in place for it to work, and how leaders can create the conditions that allow educators to solve problems together.

Thanks to Brilliant and Listenwise for sponsoring the episode. To read a summary or a transcript and find links to the book, visit https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/continuous-improvement/.

To learn more about Mastering the Lesson Plan, visit https://cultofpedagogy.com/teaching101.

In Part 4 of our Back to Basics series on unit planning, we're taking our sample unit and building in more differentiation. I'm putting out this series as an introduction to my new online course, Mastering the Lesson Plan. These four episodes will give you the big picture, but the course takes a much deeper dive into each step of the process and gives you practical tools you can use to plan stronger instruction. To learn more about the course, visit https://cultofpedagogy.com/teaching101.

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Thanks to Brilliant and Notability for sponsoring the episode. To read a written version of this podcast, visit https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/realistic-differentiation/.

We've reached part 3 of our Back to Basics series on unit planning! Last episode, we built the assessment plan for our sample unit that included diagnostic, formative, and summative assessments. Now it's time to choose the learning activities that will move students toward success on those assessments: the daily lesson plans. I'm putting out this series as an introduction to my new online course, Mastering the Lesson Plan. These four episodes will give you the big picture, but the course takes a much deeper dive into each step of the process and gives you practical tools you can use to plan stronger instruction. To learn more about the course, visit https://cultofpedagogy.com/teaching101.

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Thanks to Brilliant and Notability for sponsoring the episode. To read a written version of this podcast, visit https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/how-to-write-a-lesson-plan/.

It's part 2 of our Back to Basics series on unit planning! Last episode, we looked at the overall process and started by setting measurable objectives for a sample unit. Now we're going to design a unit assessment plan that includes diagnostic, formative, and summative assessments. I'm putting out this series as an introduction to my new online course, Mastering the Lesson Plan. These four episodes will give you the big picture, but the course takes a much deeper dive into each step of the process and gives you practical tools you can use to plan stronger instruction. To learn more about the course, visit https://cultofpedagogy.com/teaching101.

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Thanks to Brilliant and Notability for sponsoring the episode. To read a written version of this podcast, visit https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/how-to-create-an-assessment-plan/.

I'm kicking off a four-episode Back to Basics series that will offer a practical overview of how to effectivley plan a unit of instruction. This week we'll start with the big picture, an overview of the process I use for planning a unit, starting with setting measurable objectives and getting a sense for how you will assess them at the end of the unit. In the next episode, we'll zoom in on that process of designing the assessment plan. I'm putting out this series as an introduction to my new online course, Mastering the Lesson Plan. These four episodes will give you the big picture, but the course takes a much deeper dive into each step of the process and gives you practical tools you can use to plan stronger instruction. To learn more about the course, visit https://cultofpedagogy.com/teaching101.

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Thanks to Alpaca and iCivics for sponsoring the episode. To read a written version of this podcast, visit https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/how-to-plan-a-unit-of-instruction/.

Character education often gets lip service in schools — we say it matters, but rarely build a real system to make it happen. What if students could regularly practice noticing and naming character strengths like self-efficacy, depth, and generosity in each other through anonymous nominations? On the podcast this week, high school English teacher Marcus Luther returns to share a system he created that does exactly that.

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Thanks to Alpaca and Notability for sponsoring the episode. To read a written version of this podcast, visit https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/peer-affirmations/.

To learn more about my upcoming course, Mastering the Lesson Plan, visit https://cultofpedagogy.com/teaching101.

What often sets the best PD experiences apart are a few intentional choices in how that learning is designed. In this episode, I talk with Jenn White and Josh Kurzweil of Berkeley LTC about three simple but powerful practices they use when designing professional learning for adults: Pre-During-Post, Curated Q&A, and Poster Sessions. All of these strategies create more opportunities for participants to discuss, reflect on, and apply what they're learning, and they can make your next PD a lot better.

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Thanks to Alpaca and Notability for sponsoring the episode. To read a written version of this podcast, visit https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/3-fresh-pd-structures/.

To learn more about my upcoming course, Mastering the Lesson Plan, visit https://cultofpedagogy.com/teaching101.

When Pernille Ripp moved from the U.S., where she had taught for over a decade, to her native country of Denmark, she was immediately struck by how different school was. In this episode, we'll explore why Danish schools are so good for teachers and students, and which practices we might be able to adopt in the U.S.

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Thanks to Alpaca and iCivics for sponsoring the episode. To read a written version of this podcast, visit https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/danish-school/.

It can ruin even the most carefully designed lessons: An activity you had planned takes way longer than you thought it would. Or worse, it takes way less time. And sometimes it can be both, with some students finishing a task in five minutes while others need half an hour. Getting classroom pacing just right is an art that takes practice and technique. In this episode, I'll share 10 habits you can build into your classroom routine that can prevent many of these problems from happening, or help you deal with them much more effectively when they do.

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Thanks to Renaissance and Erikson Institute for sponsoring the episode. To read a written version of this podcast, visit https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/classroom-timing/.

To learn more about my upcoming course, Mastering the Lesson Plan, visit https://cultofpedagogy.com/teaching101.

When a student behaves in a way that disrupts their own learning or someone else's, our response is often limited to a reprimand or a punishment. While this usually stops the undesirable behavior for a while, it doesn't often solve the problem long-term. What has longer-lasting impact is viewing the misbehavior as a sign that a student is missing an important skill, and if they are taught that skill, the behavior should naturally improve. In this episode, we learn more about what this approach looks like in practice from Nathan Maynard, educator and author of the new book, The Science of Discipline.

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Thanks to Listenwise and Erikson Institute for sponsoring the episode. To read Maynard's article about replacement skills, visit https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/replacement-skills/.

To find Nathan Maynard online, visit https://www.highfive.school/.

To learn more about The Teacher's Guide to Tech, visit https://teachersguidetotech.com/.

Students are coming to school with more needs than ever, and a lot of those needs aren't strictly academic: anxiety, withdrawal, behavior issues, and learning differences that don't always have quick or obvious solutions. These are problems that often send us to the internet in search of answers, but the nuances of each individual situation can make it hard to find exactly what we need. Ideally, we'd have a colleague with a lot of knowledge and experience who would listen carefully to our problem, ask us questions to make sure they understood it, and offer solutions. Now there's a new platform called Ellis that may be the next best thing. This free, chat-based tool created by the Children's Health Council is designed to give educators practical guidance in those moments when something isn't working and you're not sure what to try next. In this episode, I talk to Cindy Lopez from the CHC about how Ellis works. All educators are invited to give Ellis a try now at https://www.askellis.org/ and see how it works for you!

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This episode was sponsored by Ellis. To read a full transcript of this interview or watch a video of how Ellis works, visit https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/ellis/.

There's been no shortage of conversation about the science of reading over the past several years. But writing barely comes up, even though the two are deeply connected. That's what drew Melanie Meehan and Maggie Roberts to write their new book, Foundational Skills for Writing. The book breaks the larger task of writing into smaller skill categories, including transcription skills, oral language, and executive functioning. In this episode, they share eight of the strategies from the book. Each is from a collection they call "minute moves," quick lessons and exercises that can be done in just a few minutes to build different kinds of writing muscles. They're fun and engaging and if you're someone who teaches writing, I think you're going to love them.

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Thanks to Renaissance and Erikson Institute for sponsoring the episode. To read a full transcript or find links to Meehan and Roberts' book, visit https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/quick-writing-lessons/.

To learn more about Grammar Gap Fillers, visit https://cultofpedagogy.com/grammar.

Have you ever watched students sit completely silent in math class, only to come alive the moment they're asked to share an opinion? That's what inspired my guest Chris Luzniak to start bringing debate into his math teaching — and the results have been remarkable. In this episode, Chris walks us through how he turns ordinary math questions into debatable ones, how he gets students making and defending arguments, and why he thinks this approach matters now more than ever. It's a conversation that will make you rethink what math class can look like.

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Thanks to Listenwise and Erikson Institute for sponsoring the episode. To read Luzniak's article about math debates, visit https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/debate-math/.

To find Chris online, visit https://debatemath.com.

To learn more about The Teacher's Guide to Tech, visit https://teachersguidetotech.com/.

When our students face challenges in the classroom, some teachers double down on control and rigor: tighter rules, firmer consequences, higher demands. Others lean toward grace and flexibility: easing up, giving extensions, and softening expectations because they know our students are carrying a lot. But what if the answer isn't either/or? Warm Demander pedagogy is an approach that pairs genuine care and deep relationship-building with unwavering high expectations. It's the belief that students need to feel seen, respected, and valued — and that we honor them most by refusing to lower the bar. In today's episode, I'm joined by educators Marcee Harris and Dr. Wendy Amato. They explain what Warm Demander pedagogy looks like in action, how it supports student agency and productive struggle, and why it's especially relevant for teachers right now.

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Thanks to Renaissance and SchoolAI for sponsoring the episode. To read Amato and Harris' article about Warm Demander pedagogy, visit https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/warm-demanders/.

To learn more about The Teacher's Guide to Tech, visit https://teachersguidetotech.com.

Teaching students to write well has always been challenging, and newer developments have made it even more difficult: The internet offers unlimited text to plagiarize, standardized testing has pushed us to teach more formulaic writing, and AI constantly offers to do our writing for us. Frustrated with her students' lack of confidence and the robotic style of their writing, language arts teacher Nashwa Elkoshairi tried adding freewriting before and after her inquiry-based units. The results, she says, were dramatic: Students became more confident as writers and their writing developed far more depth and complexity than she'd ever seen before. In this episode, she joins me to talk about how she weaves freewriting into her classroom practice.

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Thanks to Renaissance and SchoolAI for sponsoring the episode. To read Dr. Elkoshairi's article about how she uses inquiry-based freewriting, visit https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/inquiry-based-freewriting/.

To learn more about Grammar Gap Fillers, visit https://cultofpedagogy.com/grammar.

We're kicking off the year like we always do, with a round-up of six educational tech tools we think are worth a look. On the list this year: a site that offers fantastic STEM interactives, an AI-powered collaborative writing platform, a free, web-based sound editor, a tool that can turn any text into an infographic, a library of beautifully produced documentaries on current events, and an incredible project that connects makers with people who need assistive devices. My lead technology specialist, Marnie Diem, joins me to talk about them.

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Thanks to foundry10 and SchoolAI for sponsoring the episode. For links to all six tools and videos showing each one in action, visit https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/6-ed-tech-tools-2026/.

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To learn more about The Teacher's Guide to Tech, visit https://teachersguidetotech.com/.

We're living in a time when having a difference of opinion is a potential minefield of hurt feelings, emotional outbursts, and severed relationships. If this has caused you to avoid certain topics in your classroom, the growth discourse framework used by the School of Ethics and Global Leadership (SEGL) may offer a way to re-engage in these conversations. In this episode, I talk with SEGL founder Noah Bopp about how the growth discourse model works and how teachers can get started using it.

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Thanks to foundry10 and SchoolAI for sponsoring the episode. To read a full transcript of this conversation and find links to the growth discourse guidelines and the sample lesson plan we talked about in the episode, visit https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/growth-discourse/.

To learn more about Grammar Gap Fillers, visit https://cultofpedagogy.com/grammar.

Neurodivergent educators, like those with ADHD, autism, dyslexia, and other forms of cognitive diversity, are essential voices in our schools. They bring innovation, empathy, and authenticity. Yet they often work within systems that weren't built with them in mind, and this can make the job of teaching especially challenging. In this episode, we'll learn about the strengths neurodivergent teachers bring to the classroom and strategies that help them thrive from Emily Kircher-Morris, who is a mental health professional, neurodiversity advocate, and host of The Neurodiversity Podcast.

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Thanks to foundry10 and SchoolAI for sponsoring the episode. To read Kircher-Morris's article and a full transcript of our conversation, visit https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/neurodivergent-teachers/.

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To learn more about The Teacher's Guide to Tech, visit https://teachersguidetotech.com/.