Ask students to write about what they value or what is meaningful to them in their life as a whole.

Action:

  • Before giving students an assignment or as a first day exercise, ask students to write about what they value or what is meaningful to them in their life as a whole (e.g. spending time with their family and friends).

Reason:

  • David Kirp summarized in a New York Times article that after doing this exercise, “white students did no better, but their black and Latino classmates improved so much that the achievement gap shrank by 40 percent.”