Attendees will understand the definition and theory of cultural proficiency and learn practical classroom applications for identifying and addressing microaggressions. This is a high-energy, interactive keynote where participants will be able to raise questions, discuss challenges in real-time, and discuss the next steps for their school.
Students can't be what they can't see. This session discusses the reasons students do not pursue STEM careers and provides strategies to foster career exploration. Using Learning Blade's classroom enrichment tools (funded for MA schools), students learn about CTE & STEM pathways while applying Math, Science, Social Studies, and ELA skills.
Environmental themes can build content knowledge and skills across the curriculum. In this hands-on session, engage in 3D modeling, simulations relevant to life sciences, geography, and real-world math. Help students explore timely topics including climate, biodiversity, land and water use, population trends, and paths to a sustainable future.
How do you make concepts relatable and relevant for students? Participants in this session will develop a living tool to use with students that breaks down units into interconnected ideas, reinforces their learning daily, and bridges the gap between classroom instruction and real-world applications.
Explore strategies to help all students experience motivation in your class. These strategies include speaking motivationally about academic work; incorporating reflection and goal-setting; supporting students to connect the academic work to their own experiences, interests and goals; and engaging in effective teacher-student coaching conversations.
James Simons loves school. Prior to co-founding cor creative partners, James Simons served as a high school principal and dean of students, an instructional coach, a middle and high school English teacher, a visual storyteller, and a writer. In his current role, James coaches school... Read More →
Student Study Teams (SST) are collaborative groups within the MTSS framework that address students' academic, behavioral, and social-emotional needs. This session will explain how the SSTs work within West Springfield Middle School, from early development to full implementation, with tangible takeaways for those ready to create a SST at their building.
Vice Principal (Grade 7), West Springfield Middle School
I have been a Vice Principal for 6 years at the Middle School, and prior to that was a middle level history teacher for 12 years. In my current position, I am responsible for Curriculum & Instruction at the building level.
Join The Browne Center as we explore our groundbreaking ESSA/ESY social-emotional learning initiative. Lead Facilitator Hannah and Program Designer Andrew will present what we've done, how we did it, and experientially explore how you can do this, too! Come with questions, and leave with tools and ideas!
A small group of staff from Walpole Elementary School, a grades 5-8 school in Walpole, NH, started their journey towards building their advisory program at NELMS a few years back. This is the story of what we have done to create an SEL based program for the entire school.
Flip your planning script! Skills-based knowledge is essential to empower our learners today to take action in their worlds. Come to this session to learn how to prioritize skills through inquiry over content.
As educators, we must understand the impact racial microaggressions have on teaching and learning while developing an intellectual identity. Teachers must do the arduous personal work of addressing their own implicit bias while creating psychologically safe classrooms. This session is designed to allow participants to gain a clear understanding of how to interrupt microaggressions while preserving relationships.
You’ve taught for years and know students well, but what’s the latest research on their physical, socioemotional, cognitive, and identity development? How might you treat students differently, change classroom instruction, or adjust school policies if you knew the latest about their growth? Take this quiz to learn about new strategies.
Embracing the value of leadership in education and empowering students and teachers to champion their own leadership promotes both student and school success. Through the implementation of BARR, involving both systemic and relationship-based approaches, one rural Maine school shares their experience enhancing outcomes and fostering new leaders in their community.
Low teacher retention rates impact students everywhere. This session will highlight research regarding teacher job satisfaction, as well as leadership practices that contribute and detract from it. Participants will interact with the research and leave with leadership strategies that may effectively enhance teacher job satisfaction and increase teacher retention rates.
During our school’s “team week”, in physical education, students learn to put "we before me" in a series of tasks that demand teamwork and flawless communication. These cooperative games set the tone for the year as students learn to communicate, lead, and follow. Come and experience team week for yourself.
Join this interactive session and fill your toolbox with brain-based techniques to cultivate engagement, belonging, and empower student voice and ownership of learning. Build a connected and supportive community. Integrate academics with SEL. Take away creative inspiration and practical methods to enhance involvement and retention in academics, advisory, and groupwork.
Would you like to explore engaging and educational approaches to creating excursions outside of your classroom that will create lifelong memories for students? We can show you how! Walk away with exciting and interactive activities to bring more content and curricular connections to your field trips! Come join us!
Increasingly, educators share concerns regarding deficits in their students’ communication skills. In this session, we’ll explore a series of instructional practices designed to help students become critical consumers of media, quality producers of media, and savvy communicators.
Taunya has built unique itineraries for students throughout New England, the nation and Globe for more than 22 years. Students and teachers alike walk away with unforgettable experiences that last a lifetime. Wolfe Tours' full service approach allows teachers and chaperones to focus on students and not logistics.
Explore the intersection of ELA and Computer Science in middle school classrooms! This session showcases a project where students analyzed literary conflict and programed robots to depict key scenes. Attendees will have the chance to experiment with programming, discovering how coding can transform stories into dynamic, interactive experiences.
Explore how innovative enrichment programming helps connect students to staff, increase attendance and boost morale. Follow the journey of one Maine middle school's mission to increase student attendance that lead to positive community through enrichment. This session allows educators to face scheduling roadblocks, create an action plan and share possibilities.
This workshop focuses on the benefits of Animal Assisted Learning and the many benefits of having certified dogs and handlers available to students and staff. The focus is for staff partnered teams and addresses volunteer teams. Discussions include choosing the right partner, training, the certification process and insurance.
Ripple Effects explores activities and opportunities to foster self-reflection, strengthen connections with trusted adults, and build peer collaboration. Participants will gain practical strategies, hands-on activities, and take-home ideas to promote teamwork, emotional well-being, and inclusivity in their schools.
What should middle level educators and students know about non-binary identities? How can we make our schools safe for non-binary students and employees? This presentation/discussion will offer some answers and also create space for participants to share their knowledge and experiences as well.
In this engaging session, we embark on a journey to navigate the shifting discussion on DEI. Change is a constant, and as the tides shift, so do opportunities. This session is designed to equip participants to navigate the ocean of change, harnessing ideas to sail smoothly and chart clear pathways for our schools.
Teachers are exiting the world of education at alarming rates. When they leave, they’re exhausted, frustrated, and angry. How do we stem this tide? How do we save our teachers in order to save our schools? This presentation will examine specific skills and mindsets that new teachers must develop in order to love their jobs, as well as ways that colleagues and leaders can help them in this development.
"The Successful Middle School” states Effective Leadership is critical to a school's success. The question that needs to be addressed is, so what is effective “middle level” leadership? Interested in becoming an administrator? Join veteran administrators Bob Griffin, Scott Clayton, and Jeff Rodman for an in-depth discussion on middle level leadership.
Executive Director, New England League of Middle Schools
Founded in 1974, the New England League of Middle Schools (NELMS) is a non-profit organization founded with the purpose of fostering general improvement of education for middle level students and educators. NELMS is committed to a concept of quality education for the pre and early... Read More →
Our students have changed. Educators at every level are exhausted, spread too thin and in the burnout cycle of battling every day for cooperation, engagement and calm. This keynote will help educators feel reenergized and rediscover their enthusiasm and joy! They’ll smile, laugh (a lot) and walk out saying, “That’s exactly what I needed to hear today.” As a veteran educator, with 26 years working with students, Molly speaks to teachers’ hearts, so they feel seen, valued and celebrated. The ripple effect means even greater student success.
Molly Kennedy has dedicated the past 26 years to empowering people to have more resilience, confidence and learning to leverage their adversity into results.Challenges and trauma followed Molly throughout her life. She grew up in a dysfunctional family with addiction, divorce, neglect... Read More →
A pixel art project that meets FACS, Math, and other curriculum standards. Participants will create a sample during this session. Fun and interactive project, with phenomenal student “buy-in”/ positive response. Hint: math facts, FACS, graph paper, fuze beads, irons… piqued your interest?
Join this interactive workshop and take advantage of teachable moments with engaging student-centered reflection techniques. Enliven the traditional sharing circle with active, brain-based methods including movement, metaphor, art, and “warm-welcome” and “optimistic-closing” activities to increase emotional connection, relevancy, and depth-of-understanding. Create lasting lessons and help students become lifelong reflective learners.
All adolescents deserve the chance to learn to read and spell proficiently. Some struggle with foundational skills, but adolescence offers opportunities for growth. This session introduces a structured literacy approach, focusing on word study to improve decoding and spelling. The goal is to build independence and master grade-level standards.
In this session, teachers will participate in a series of hands-on activities to engage learners in the four areas of reading: phonics, fluency, vocabulary and comprehension. Come ready to move and play as you practice ways to incorporate reading games in your classroom.
In the age of selfies, we constantly construct and reconstruct our images - how can educators tap into that so students think more deeply about our shared past and their place in the present? We created a cross-curricular unit on portraiture in colonial America and modern self-portraiture to explore this question.
Educators play a pivotal role supporting children through a trauma-informed lens. This presentation will provide an overview of trauma, focusing on the latest research. Strengths-based practices are highlighted as a school-based intervention to foster resiliency and post-traumatic growth. Participants will leave with a strong understanding of the components of trauma-informed care within school systems.
Hive Time is an alternative approach to teaching social emotional lessons (SEL). This group provides our seventh grade students with skills that go beyond academic knowledge, on topics such as emotional regulation, relationship building, and coping skills. We lead SEL curriculum through a variety of activities, games and interactive lectures.
Participants in this workshop will learn about the process MCCPS uses to develop student portfolios beginning in grade 4, and using through grade 8. Using Google Sites, students are supported as they develop their portfolios and provided with many opportunities for personalization, reflection and growth. Each portfolio shows their growth over time and incorporates goal setting, then with support of a member of the faculty, students present their learning to important people in their life.
We will share our collaborative approach to professional learning, building capacity, organizational strategies & structures, and leadership. We will help all educators in all roles show how Ditching Divide & Conquer will help tackle challenges & yield better outcomes for kids, less teacher burnout, and create more fun!
Middle level students are tremendous leaders and their talents can help shift and shape school culture; in this session, participants will learn how to create a ready-to-launch restorative mentoring program that focuses on building social and academic culture in school.
Discover how Austin Prep developed a robust parent education series for middle school families. Learn about their approach to planning, promoting, delivering, and assessing "Parent University," which offered sessions on relevant adolescent development topics. Gain insights into strengthening school-home connections and empowering families with valuable information to support their children's growth.
Michael McLaughlin is the Head of Middle School at Austin Preparatory School, a 6-12 Catholic independent school in the tradition of Saint Augustine located in Reading, Massachusetts. McLaughlin serves on the Board of Directors of the New England League of Middle Schools (NELMS... Read More →
Reading, writing, lectures…teaching History can feel redundant. “More than a Lecture…Bringing History to Life” focuses on providing practical ideas and resources for your classroom! The session includes an interactive presentation to provide audience members an opportunity to collaborate and put new ideas into practice for their own classroom. (This is a two-part session.)
In this interactive workshop we will create shared understanding of school/organizational culture. Attendees will ideate and share their experiences with workplace rituals and culture (healthy as well as not) and begin to develop a tool kit to enhance and increase positive culture in their schools/districts.
Youth Programs Coordinator, University of New Hampshire - Browne Center for Innovative Learning
Jeff Frigon is the Youth & Student Programs Coordinator for The Browne Center for Innovative Learning and an Adjunct Instructor at UNH in the Departments of Kinesiology & Rec Management & Policy and delivers adventure-based experiential programming & training to youth and adults... Read More →
A Special Thank You to our Ice Cream Social Sponsor SubZero for making and serving their amazing ice cream made with the help of nitrogen! And please take time to visit with our exhibitors who have joined us!
What is the connection between fun and learning? It's brain science! This session will review the way our brains learn and how fun enhances that process. Participants will share, borrow, and steal brain-based strategies for having fun while learning that can be applied to classrooms and schools.
This interactive session will be a deeper dive from Molly's keynote to help you manage all of the things on your plate. You will have time to plan how you will apply those skills and strategies and feel empowered when you return to your students. It will be a relaxed, fun and meaningful work and social session.
Molly Kennedy has dedicated the past 26 years to empowering people to have more resilience, confidence and learning to leverage their adversity into results.Challenges and trauma followed Molly throughout her life. She grew up in a dysfunctional family with addiction, divorce, neglect... Read More →
This fast-paced presentation covers 30 instructional strategies designed to boost student engagement, support differentiation, encourage collaboration and communication, and foster an inclusive learning environment, ensuring all students are motivated, challenged, and actively involved in their educational journey.
Participants engage in collaborative group work with the goal of preparing to support students to do the same. Participants adopt group roles, co-construct a group contract, share about their experiences facilitating student collaboration, and then work together to strategize and make plans for successful student collaboration in their classrooms.
I love school. At cor creative partners, we provide joyful professional development to support integrating SEL + Academics, developing leadership, curriculum and pedagogy, and the Investigating History curriculum.
James Simons loves school. Prior to co-founding cor creative partners, James Simons served as a high school principal and dean of students, an instructional coach, a middle and high school English teacher, a visual storyteller, and a writer. In his current role, James coaches school... Read More →
We will learn about the most popular tools and applications for AI in the classroom environment, including tools for both teachers and students to use to enhance the learning experience and prepare for the Brave New World of artificial intelligence and large language models.
As Visions of the Graduate have taken root across CT, there’s been a greater emphasis on learning transferable skills over content standards, however assessing student progress with these skills remains challenging. Portland Middle is using a Middle School Capstone and Student Success Plans as student benchmarks along the VoG continuum.
One of the best changes we have made at Gilford Middle School was transitioning from homerooms to advisories. The benefits of advisories at the middle school have been a highlight for all of us and we would love to share our best practices so they can be utilized in your school.
Students benefit from spending time with dogs, who love unconditionally and help break down social barriers, provide comfort for emotional dis-regulation, and offer breaks from the stressors of a typical school day. Meet Therapy Dog Betty and learn how one district has implemented a Therapy Dog Program and how to start one at your school.
Join us for an insightful conversation on the new Middle School Advisory model, designed to foster student growth and engagement. Explore its structure, implementation strategies, and sample lessons. We’ll also share data demonstrating its positive impact on student outcomes. Discover how this model can transform middle school education!
Many schools are focused on equity, yet they struggle to form relationships with their students of color. They know the buzzwords, they’ve increased representation in curriculum, and they’ve had professional development, yet minute-to-minute they struggle to connect with diverse students. This presentation will help schools and educators move past this point. A framework for supporting students of color at all age levels will be discussed, including a progression of support which helps students becoming independent learners.
Discover how high school National Honor Society students mentor middle school students to enhance academic success, build connections, and inspire motivation. This program fosters collaboration, emotional support, and leadership development. Learn how mentorship boosts student confidence, strengthens school community ties, and creates meaningful opportunities for personal growth and academic achievement.
