“Ms. Matlick, I start to shake when I get on stage. I literally can almost throw up,” one student tells me. We have been knee-deep in a research process for three weeks now asmy students prep for writing their own informative TED talkson topics of their choosing.At the end of the unit, they willeach stand on a red-dotted stage and present their information in front of their peers. Many are excited, but several are naturally apprehensive, or worse. The public speaking element of the project certainly ups the stakes;andgiving the kids many opportunities to test out the stage and their material in front of small groups will do a lot to build confidence. But as we head into the drafting and revision stage of the writing process, I’m reminded of a post by Floop co-founder Christine Witcher. She wrote about howfeedback exchangesthemselvesin any context can be emotionally charged, too. She suggests that by not only preparing kids in the traditional sense for the task at hand, we shouldals…

This article originally appeared in EdSurge.
"Are you going to resubmit your chemical changes model?" Valentina asked Jayda.
"I'm not sure,” Jayda responded, “I'm already at proficient and I understand all the concepts, so mastery work wouldn't really be worth it for me." 
Hearing a student say that work isn’t worth it would send most teachers into a downward spiral, but these words brought me joy. Jayda was confident that she understood the material, and hearing her make a choice not to pursue additional work for the purpose of chasing an extra few points on her grade made me proud.
At Forest Ridge, an independent all-girls school serving students in grades 5-12 in Bellevue, Wash., we've been grappling with how to support students in focusing on growth over grades for years.
In 2016, our school began putting intentional effort into getting our students to value the learning process and to focus on growth rather than grades. At the same time, our m…