by Trevor Barton | Feb 15, 2021 | Opinion
Alex Kotlowitz is one of my favorite non-fiction writers. He wrote a remarkable book in 1992 titled There Are No Children Here: The Story of Two Boys Growing Up in the Other America. It’s the story of Lafeyette and Pharoah Rivers, 11- and 9-year-old brothers...
by Trevor Barton | Mar 31, 2020 | Opinion
I woke at my normal time – 6:15 a.m. – on March 18. I drove to school on my normal route. I walked through the front doors of the school with my normal smile on my face and hope in my heart. That’s where my normal turned into “lamron” – backwards normal – where up...
by Trevor Barton | Feb 27, 2020 | Opinion
Experiencing homelessness was a topic of conversation in my elementary school classroom several years ago. This has been on my mind lately; it means as much now as it did then. My students had questions about the central character in the story, “Fly Away Home,”...
by Trevor Barton | Dec 23, 2019 | Opinion
A meaningful moment happened at lunch recently. They often do in elementary school cafeterias. We elementary school teachers eat lunch with our students. As we sit and eat our meat and three vegetables with them, we become listeners instead of talkers, we become...
by Trevor Barton | Nov 20, 2019 | Opinion
I noticed one of my students was sitting at her table with her head in her arms, as still as the petals of a daisy on a midsummer afternoon. This was a few weeks ago as we were moving from our morning work to our writing workshop, and as the students were milling...