Maslow never drew the pyramid you've seen on every PD slide. In this episode, I share where it came from (a 1960 business article about getting more out of workers for less money), what Maslow said about human needs, and why taking "Maslow before Bloom" too literally can lead us to lower expectations for the kids who are struggling the most.

I also get into the level of the hierarchy most of us never learned in teacher prep. Late in his life, Maslow added self-transcendence above self-actualization, and I trace how that idea connects to the six weeks he spent with the Blackfoot in 1938, and what it means for how we support students today. You'll walk away with a research-backed way to build that missing level into your classroom this week, even when everything else in kids' lives feels shaky.

Mentioned in this episode:

Finding Flow Solutions curriculum for K-12: findingflowsolutions.com
My video essay on why self-actualization is for everyone, on my YouTube channel, So What Are We Doing Here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hq-hUY63Y8o&t=3s
Full transcript and blog post: https://truthforteachers.com/truth-for-teachers-podcast/the-missing-level-of-maslows-hierarchy-what-we-get-wrong-about-the-needs-of-struggling-students/

Every lesson plan can feel like an endless series of decisions: What should students do? How should I teach this? How will they practice it? How will I know whether they learned it? What needs to be differentiated? What should happen next?

In this episode, I'm talking with Jennifer Gonzalez of Cult of Pedagogy about how having a clearer decision-making framework can reduce some of the mental load of lesson planning. Rather than starting with activities and building a lesson from scratch every time, you can make a few key decisions in a more deliberate order, then choose strategies that serve those decisions.

Jenn walks me through four shifts from the framework she developed while creating her new course, Mastering the Lesson Plan:

• Stop starting with activities, and start with the destination
• Ask what students need to do with the content (acquire it, process it, or apply it)
• Build assessment into the plan instead of adding it afterward
• Create a planning process you can reuse

We also talk about why planning doesn't automatically get faster with experience, and in fact can take LONGER for veteran teachers. Jenn explains what to actually do with exit slips once you've collected them, and how to get from the four-page lesson plans you wrote in college to the bullet points in your planner.

A framework won't fix your workload, and neither of us pretends it will. But it can make your planning more intentional and repeatable.

Check out Jenn's NEW course, Mastering the Lesson Plan, and use the code ANGELA for $10 off: https://cultofpedagogy.teachable.com/p/mastering-the-lesson-plan?affcode=102837_hq3ox7wk

(That's an affiliate link, so I earn a small commission if you enroll, at no extra cost to you.)

Listen on or read: https://truthforteachers.com/truth-for-teachers-podcast/why-lesson-planning-takes-so-long-and-how-to-reduce-decision-making/

I had an experience when I was a new teacher that shaped much of what I believe about how educators should use their time and the most effective way to reach students.

It was my very first exposure to understanding and questioning school norms, and made me realize that so much of what we assume about the ways school "should be done" is based on a very specific construct in our local area or even in our individual buildings.

Part of this story is in my book "Fewer Things, Better: The Courage to Focus on What Matters Most" but I felt like it was too lengthy to include the best details, and I really wanted to share the entire story with you. So, I hope you'll join me for this episode as I recall the very first time I went against school norms, and why the experience shaped my thinking from that day forward.

Listen on or read: https://truthforteachers.com/truth-for-teachers-podcast/the-first-time-i-questioned-tradition-vs-whats-best-for-kids/