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Today I'm going to share with you my top three rules for student engagement. Number one,
meet them where they're at. Let students tell you what they're interested in learning even
if it's about superheroes and zombies. Make ties to connect your curriculum to student
interest and to open new avenues of study for them that they didn't consider or that
they didn't know about. Students will work harder and dig deeper if they're curious and
interested. I had a class where I had students that were just obsessed with zombies. Well
we were studying biology and genetic mutation, and so I called in a pathologist from Salt
Lake City who came in and talked to my kids and we talked about whether or not zombies
were actually physiologically possible and it was interesting. It was a really great
learning experience for the kids. So meeting kids where they're at is just the top rule
of engagement. Number two, be a learner too. If students want to study something that you
don't know anything about, go on the journey with them. What I knew about zombies before
we did the zombie pathology project, absolutely nothing. What I know about it now? I'm a zombie
expert. I could tell you anything you want to know about zombies. Expect work and learning
in your classroom. Everything else is negotiable. Number three, solve and share. In technology,
students love to figure out a solution that you didn't. Explain the problem and then let
them go to it. Let them try to problem solve for you. You get great IT help because most
of the time they succeed. They figure it out, and then once they figured it out, let them
teach the class the solution and be the go-to person for that issue. Those are my top three
rules of engagement.