Books are one of the most powerful ways to learn about others and about ourselves. But for that learning to happen, we need a wide range of stories that represent a whole spectrum of people and lives. In many schools and classrooms, however, the offerings are far too narrow. Curating the kind of library that truly reflects the diversity of human experience takes time, intention, money, and good tools. This episode will help you make that happen. Joining me are three exceptional librarians — Cicely Lewis, Julia Torres, and Julie Stivers — who share their advice for building more inclusive collections. They also recommend a handful of outstanding titles to add to your shelves.

Thanks to Scholastic Magazines+ and Alpaca for sponsoring this episode.

For a full transcript of this episode, visit cultofpedagogy.com/pod and choose episode 237.

Any time we teach our students something, we need to check to see how well they learned it. If we only do this check at the very end, after all the teaching is done, and we find that our students haven't learned the material, it's too late to do anything about it. That's why we really need to do formative assessment — checking along the way — so if there are problems, we can fix them. In this episode, we're talking about five important things we need to do to make sure we get formative assessment right.

Joining me are two people who really understand what works in education: The Marshall Memo's master curator Kim Marshall, and Jenn David-Lang, the mind behind The Main Idea. Together they have published the Best of the Marshall Memo website, a fantastic, free collection of the best ideas in education.

Thanks to Scholastic Magazines+ and Listenwise for sponsoring this episode.

For a full transcript of this episode, visit cultofpedagogy.com/effective-formative-assessment/.

If our students are going to thrive, they all need to feel safe, accepted, and loved while under our care. This week, we're focusing on what that looks like when it comes to gender-expansive students — kids whose gender expression or identity is different from what they were assigned at birth. For these students, creating a school that feels safe and accepting isn't simply a matter of being nice to them; there are some specific do's and don'ts that can make a huge difference in how they experience school. My guest is Dave Edwards, an educator who teaches these principles through his website, Gender Inclusive Schools, and his brand-new book of the same name. As the parent of a transgender daughter who has experienced discrimination, Dave's mission is a personal one. In this episode, he shares specific things schools can do to proactively create safe learning environments for these students.

Thanks to The Wired Classroom and Listenwise for sponsoring this episode.

For links to Dave's book and a full transcript of our conversation, visit cultofpedagogy.com/gender-inclusive-school.