TCEA TechNotes Blog

Instructional coaches are often pulled in a dozen directions, but your calendar can be your greatest ally in protecting the time that makes the most impact. In this post, I’ll…

Struggling with end-of-year behavior? Discover practical classroom management strategies to keep students engaged and finish the school year strong.

A teacher at a high school opens the semester with a policy: Your work may contain up to 20% Gen AI content. Cite it, or you get a zero. Is…

Remember the days of drowning in essays and other written assignments, each page a crimson battlefield of red pen corrections? Those days are over, my friends. Don’t get me wrong,…

Sitting in a safety committee meeting while someone argues about door labels is exactly how you want to spend a Wednesday morning. You have three spreadsheets open, a half-eaten taco,…

End-of-year review doesn’t have to be a struggle. This choice board strategy gives students ownership, boosts engagement, and helps you reinforce key concepts without rebuilding your entire curriculum.

Back in December 2017, I wrote about a tabletop exercise game built after hearing Round Rock ISD’s CTO (Chief Technology Officer) Mark Gabehart (now retired) talk about disaster preparedness. “It’s…

Cut through the noise of education trends. Discover research-based teaching strategies that actually work—and how instructional coaches can turn small shifts into meaningful classroom impact.

“What recommendations, if any, do you have for an online algebra tutor?” This question pushed me to search online for free, perhaps AI-powered, algebra tutors. Having struggled with Algebra I…

You are staring at your Texas history unit plan, specifically the part where students identify contributions of Texas artists and musicians. Willie Nelson is on the list. On the Road…

Another Sunday evening deadline pops up. You have seventeen browser tabs open as you try to put a newsletter together that goes out the next morning. Each one holds a…

Texas has 5.5 million K-12 students. During the 2024-25 school year, 85% of teachers and 86% of students nationally used Gen AI, and 52% of Texas teachers used AI tools…

Across Texas, something interesting is happening. School boards are debating device use, lawmakers are asking tougher questions about technology in classrooms, and parents are increasingly concerned about how much time…

As AI tools become more conversational, some students are forming emotional connections with them. Here’s what educators need to know about AI attachment and how to guide healthy AI use.

Every year when May 4th rolls around, I think, “This is the year I want to contribute.” Well… 2026 is finally that year. So I’m jumping in with some fun…

In Part 1 of this series, you explored the “Secret Sauce” of the ARC Protocol. In it, you learned about the neuroscience of psychological safety, the power of the Crucial Conversations‘…

Picture this: You’ve assigned a Socratic seminar on the Gettysburg Address. It’s a powerful primary source, packed with meaning, and you can already envision the rich conversation your students are…

Do you suddenly have a plethora of business-oriented calls landing on your personal device that you didn’t ask for? If you’ve noticed your phone ringing more often with calls from…