I was inspired to write this piece after seeing an Instagram post from my friend Jacob Carr (Mr. Carr On The Web)... Most of the conversation around AI and cheating is focused on the wrong thing. We keep asking how to catch it, prevent it, or design around it. But there is a more honest question underneath all of that. If a student can open a chatbot, type a prompt, and have a finished product in under a minute, what does that tell us about what we were actually measuring?

This week was about staying grounded in what actually matters. We are heading into spring break, and it would have been easy to rush through content and give a test just to say we did. I am not doing that. I am not going to move on just to check a box. I would rather students actually understand what we are doing and have something to build on when we get back.

I want to start off and say I have always been fond of country music. The sound. Te history, The stories. Yesterday, I was watching Ken Burns' Country Music documentary on PBS, and Episode 7 kept sticking with me because of how much was happening at the same time in the Country genre. You had Nashville continuing to push a polished, commercial sound built around strings, production, and crossover appeal.

Monday: Making Thinking Visible We finished our unit on the early republic with hexagonal thinking, and it turned into one of those moments where you can really see student thinking come to life. Students connected hexagons across topics like the Whiskey Rebellion, the National Bank, political parties, and foreign policy, each one representing a different test of the Constitution and the new government.

This week was all about putting learning into action. Instead of just moving through content, we focused on activities that helped students think, discuss, and make sense of ideas. From analyzing perspectives on the War of 1812, to building an understanding of sectionalism, to predicting the Monroe Doctrine through images, and finally connecting everything through hexagonal thinking, each activity pushed students to do something with what they were learning.

This week in Room 103 felt like a good reminder that not every lesson needs to chase coverage. Sometimes the better move is slowing down and letting one big idea carry the work. We stayed in the Early Republic all week, but each day asked students to look at the young nation from a different angle. One day it was freedom of speech and constitutional limits under John Adams.

I’m getting tired of teacher hot takes. You see them everywhere. Someone declares that a certain strategy is the only way to teach. Another says something should never be done in a classroom again. A thread blows up online about how one practice is terrible and another is the future of education. The problem is that most of these takes ignore something really simple.

Monday: Hamilton, Jefferson, and the Constitution in Real Time We started the week by continuing our work with Hamilton’s financial plan, which really began last Friday. On Friday, students watched an EdPuzzle on Alexander Hamilton and paired it with the Archetype Four Square EduProtocol. The video added something important to the lesson because it highlighted Hamilton’s early life, his rise, and the beliefs that shaped how he viewed the future of the United States.

This week was built around a simple idea: use clear EduProtocols to help students think deeply about how power works. We used Frayers to activate prior knowledge. CyberSandwich to frame historical tension. My Short Answer to sharpen explanations. Sketch and Tell to make ideas visible. Archetype Four Square to push evidence-based thinking. Building Thinking Classrooms to rank, justify, and disagree. EdPuzzle to anchor content before diving deeper.

Last Friday I presented EduProtocols at Springer School and Center in Cincinnati. Springer is known for its work with students who have ADHD and executive functioning challenges. I went to share ideas. I left rethinking some of my own. Early in her keynote, Sarah Ward had us build a word cloud around executive functioning. The room filled it fast. Words like....

This week in Room 103 was about helping students see how government systems actually work. Instead of rushing from topic to topic, we focused on sequencing ideas, revisiting concepts, and using familiar routines to build understanding over time. From checks and balances to federalism, each lesson was designed to move ideas from abstract definitions to real situations students experience every day.

This week marked the start of our new unit on the Principles of the Constitution. The focus was not on racing through content, but on building understanding step by step. Each lesson was intentionally designed to move from identifying ideas, to comparing them, and eventually to applying them. By the end of the week, it was clear that slowing down, naming the big ideas, and letting students wrestle with them made a real difference.

This post is going to look a little different because, well… the week looked a little different. About 12 inches of snow different. Monday and Tuesday disappeared thanks to winter weather, and Wednesday through Friday were all late starts. So instead of our usual rhythm, we had a shortened, stop-and-start week right as we were beginning our Constitution unit. Not ideal timing, but sometimes you just roll with what you get and adjust on the fly.

Lately I have been posting quotes from the Founders and early American history. Not to sound smart and not to start a fight. I do it because there is a clear line between what they wrote then and what we are living through now. The irony is obvious once you actually read the words. The warnings are sitting right there in plain English.

Tuesday After a long weekend, we jumped back into our Text Quest and focused on the Three-fifths Compromise and the compromise over the Atlantic slave trade. To check what stuck from last week, we opened with a Quizizz. Class averages came in at 75%, 80%, 85%, 90%, and 94%. I will take that. We are trending up and holding onto content.

"Hey, send me a picture of the homework that you finished when you get home." That was a text I overheard this week and it hit me. Sometimes I feel the pressure in my new school to give homework. I was told it is an expectation. But I do not always give homework because I try to use our class time wisely.

This was our first week back from winter break, and I’m going to be honest. There are days where I feel exhausted and stuck in a rut. Some days it feels like I’m doing stuff just to do it, and other days it feels purposeful. Some days I feel like I’m lacking creativity. I’m just tired. As my friend Dr. Scott Petri used to say, “Moler, your worst days of teaching and lessons are someone’s best day.” Some days I remind myself of that, just to get perspective.

This week was a weird one heading into winter break. Monday started as a two-hour delay, but the cold did not play nicely with the salt. Roads iced over, conditions got worse, and the day was eventually called off. Over the weekend, I had a freak accident and hit my head, which led to concussion symptoms. Headache and dizziness lingered into Monday and Tuesday, so I missed school on Tuesday.

Monday Setting the Stage for the Declaration Monday was all about setting the stage for the Declaration of Independence. This was not the deep dive yet. It was about building background knowledge and telling the story behind the document. We started with an image of the Declaration itself. I told the story of Thomas Jefferson writing it. Jefferson was a quiet, soft spoken individual, not someone who demanded attention, but someone who could write like no one else.

Monday We kicked off the week by jumping straight into one of the most confusing and debated moments in early American history, the Battle of Lexington. The goal wasn’t just to learn what happened, but to help students build their own interpretations using evidence, perspective, and context. And honestly? Monday delivered. A Documentary Hook We opened with a three minute clip from the brand-new Ken Burns…

I was scrolling through my own blog the other day, looking back at what I did at this time last year, and it hit me. I am four full weeks behind where I was. Last year I had 65 minute classes. I had 180 school days. I had far fewer interruptions and almost zero strange schedules. This year I’m teaching 40 to 45 minute classes.

Monday Monday was one of those keep the storyline going days. We are still building the Road to the Revolution, but instead of dumping vocab or giving kids a list of causes, I am trying to tell it like an actual unfolding story through the people who lived it. I pulled a short video from the American Battlefield Trust that covered the Boston Tea Party and the punishments that followed.

I never really thought about this until I had a brief conversation with two parents this afternoon. They were touring the school, thinking about sending their child here next year, and they stopped by my room. My students were working on their summative assessment for our Road to the Revolution unit. It is an argumentative one pager answering the question, “Why did loyal colonists begin fighting against their own government?”

I’ve been watching Ken Burns’ new documentary, The American Revolution, and it hit me just how much is packed into this era. Abstract ideas. Complicated politics. Dozens of events. And honestly, the way I used to teach it wasn’t doing anyone any favors. My old approach was pretty typical: start with some vocab, squeeze in the French and Indian War, sprint through every tax over 2–3 days, toss in salutary neglect somewhere, then protests, then the Boston Massacre as a one-off, then the Tea Party and Intolerable Acts, and finally the Declaration and natural rights.

This week in 103 was all about building a bigger story. We moved from Samuel Adams to the Stamp Act protests, into the Townshend Acts, and finally circled back to the Boston Massacre with fresh eyes. Even though we had shortened classes on a few days, the structure of the protocols kept things tight and focused. Students were constantly reading, creating, discussing, and explaining.

Monday and Tuesday Monday and Tuesday were all about performance-based assessments. I’ve been wrestling with a question that probably crosses a lot of teachers’ minds at some point: Am I doing enough to prepare my students for what comes next? Most social studies classes lean on multiple-choice tests, short answers, and essays. I rarely do. My students spend more time creating, connecting, and explaining.

This week in 103 was packed with movement, discussion, and meaningful writing. The lessons built on each other, using EduProtocols that pushed students to analyze, connect, and create rather than memorize. We used CyberSandwich for deep reading and partner discussion, Snorkl for instant writing feedback, SWBST Sketch and Tell to help students visualize and summarize key events, Map and Tell to analyze spatial change, and Twelve-Topic Stitch-Up to review and connect ideas across multiple units.

Sometimes I feel like I’ve lived a few different lives.My parents are divorced, so I grew up splitting time between two worlds, a suburban neighborhood and stretches of country backroads. I’ve been on tractors, in tobacco fields, in college classrooms, and on tennis courts. There’s some country in me. I love country music, I work hard, and I’m not afraid to roll up my sleeves and get after it.

Monday - Mercantilism Rack and Stack Tuesday and Wednesday - Stations, Questions Friday - Colonial Government Vocab, Finish the Drawing Monday The Question That Drove the Lesson This week’s focus was one word with a big question behind it: How did mercantilism shape opportunity and inequality in the 13 colonies? Starting with Context We began with an Annotate and Tell that served two purposes.

This week we wrapped up our last unit and began a new one. The transition brought a nice mix of reflection and fresh energy as students finished their Netflix series projects and shifted into our study of the 13 Colonies. We moved from storytelling and creative thinking to deeper analysis and discussion, setting the stage for our new compelling question: Was colonial America a land of opportunity or inequality?

The 13 Colonies Inquiry Unit Link The Common Mistake A lot of people open ChatGPT, type “make me a lesson plan,” and press go. It spits out something that looks ready to teach, but it doesn’t know your room. It doesn’t know your pacing, your standards, your textbook, or your teaching style. If you really want ChatGPT to plan with you, you have to treat it like a coplanner, not a shortcut.

AI can be a real time saver when it comes to making quizzes. I’ve used ChatGPT plenty of times to build question banks I can plug right into Gimkit or Quizizz. It’s fast, it’s flexible, and it gets you about 80% of the way there. But if you don’t know a few key things, that other 20% can turn into a mess real quick.

This unit started with a question that actually mattered:If you lived in England in the 1600s, would you have left and risked it all? That single question framed the entire unit. Every activity, reading, and discussion tied back to it. When students know the “why,” it changes how they engage, instead of memorizing colony facts, they were weighing survival, opportunity, and risk.

This has been on my mind lately. Teachers (myself included) often say we’re doing certain practices like retrieval, inquiry, student choice, feedback cycles, or collaboration. We believe we are. We even tell others we are. But when you really stop and look at the day-to-day flow of your classroom, sometimes the truth is we’re not. Not in the way we imagine.

I’m going to frame this week’s post around the beginning, middle, and end of the week. Once again, our rhythm was shaped by shortened schedules and shadow days, which meant adjusting plans and finding ways to keep learning moving forward. To work around the interruptions, I started the week with a take-home test, then rolled out a new unit built around a compelling question: …

I’m learning quickly that my school has a rhythm all its own—one filled with odd schedules, unexpected interruptions, and lots of moving parts. Some days it feels like just when I find my teaching groove, the bell schedule changes or half the class disappears for a shadow day. Other days, Mass, assemblies, or leadership experiences shift the tempo in ways that make planning a clean, flowing lesson nearly impossible.

I feel like I am starting to hit a rhythm. There are still days when I wonder if I am just doing random things, trying to find consistency and purpose. But slowly, I can feel the stride taking shape. The protocols are giving me structure, and the students are responding with genuine engagement. This week showed how much can happen when we stack the right activities.

I’ve been coaching tennis for a long time, and I can still hear the echoes from courts all over: “Bend your knees.” “Finish your swing.” “Low to high.” Those lines are so common they almost fade into the background. But I never really bought into that approach. To me, coaching was never just about repeating mechanical reminders. What shaped me as a coach is the belief that tennis is a game of awareness.

I’m discovering as the year moves along that life at the Villa comes with a steady stream of interruptions to the normal school rhythm. Practice high school placement tests, walk-a-thons, shadow visits, pep rallies, and more. Honestly, it feels like way more than I ever experienced in public schools. But here’s the thing, it’s all good. These moments create a climate and culture that is unlike any place I’ve been, and I’m learning to embrace them as part of what makes this community special.

Being at a new school means I’m living inside a learning curve. One is the learning curve of new procedures, figuring out how things run in a building that isn’t second nature to me yet. The other is learning about my students, how they learn, what they know, and what still feels brand new. Technology has been the most eye-opening part.

Week two felt like a reset button. Last week I tried to do too much too fast with Chromebooks, logins, and codes. It was overwhelming. This week, I went back to the basics. Paper, pencils, and simpler routines gave students (and me) the space to breathe. We still pulled out the tech: Quizizz for Fast and Curious, Google Slides for Thin and Thick slide, but we balanced it with Frayers, CyberSandwich, and Sketch & Tell-o on paper.

This week was my first full stretch as the new 6th, 7th, and 8th grade social studies teacher at St. Ursula Villa. With only three days on the books, I do not have the time or space to reflect on every class and every moment. Instead, I am going to highlight some lessons that stood out. Not because it was the best, but because it captured what I want this year to feel like.

Teaching social studies in 2025 is not the same as it was even five years ago. My middle schoolers live in a world where AI can spit out an answer in less time than it takes them to find the question mark on the keyboard. That changes things. But here is the key: it does not change why we teach social studies.

This year brings something new. After a long run in public education, I have made the switch to a small private school, St. Ursula Villa. I will be teaching 6th, 7th, and 8th grade social studies. The change already feels right. The school is close to everything I do, where I live, where I coach tennis, where life actually happens. If I need to run up to school, it will not feel like an all-day event.

Every so often, I go back and reread a blog post called Is Your Lesson a Grecian Urn? (It's a great post from th Cult of Pedagogy). I’ve shared it in PD sessions, sent it to colleagues, and maybe most importantly, used it to check myself when I start planning something that’s more “fun” than it is valuable. The first time I read it, it hit me like a well-placed serve in the ribs.

There are some people you can learn something from every time you talk to them. That was Scott Petri or me. Whether it was during a presentation, a text thread, or a chat about lesson design, he had a way of dropping a sentence or two that would make me rethink what I was doing in my classroom. He helped me see Social Studies through a different lens.

It wasn’t some big dramatic moment. Just a soggy afternoon, a rained out practice, and a quiet conversation in the parking lot. I turned to my coach and said, “I just want to be better.” Not the best.Not great.Just better. At the time, I was 7th or 8th on the team at NKU. No scholarship. No spotlight. I wasn’t bad, I was just…

I couldn’t feed a ball to save my life. That’s where it started. I was a teenager working at Ivy Hills Country Club, learning how to roll clay courts, line baselines, and scrape off the dried teneco when it got too thick. I knew how to hustle. I knew how to show up. But I didn’t know I had something to give.

My parents divorced when I was young. I spent most of my time with my mom and stepdad; and his mom, Irene. For years, I wondered what to call her. Was she my grandma? Step-grandma? Something in-between? I spent too long trying to figure out a title, but looking back now, it didn’t matter. She didn’t need a label. She was just Irene.