A Guatemalan Journey with CHILD AID: Commitment, Passion, and Hope

by Mónica Lara

Have you ever been genuinely moved by an experience?

Several months ago, Pete Noll, Child Aid’s Chief Development Officer, invited me on a week-long trip to visit schools in rural, indigenous communities in Guatemala. Child Aid (child-aid.org) is a non-profit organization dedicated to increasing child literacy through teacher training, classroom resources, and reading programs.

Having previously visited schools in Mexico and Honduras, I anticipated finding passionate teachers, eager students, adherence to school guidelines, and limited resources. While these assumptions were correct—I certainly saw passionate teachers and students who welcomed us with inquisitive attitudes and love—my week in Guatemala proved to be much more profound.

As I reflect on the experience, three powerful words capture the essence of what I witnessed: Commitment, Passion, and Hope.

Commitment

The work of every teacher reflected a deep commitment to their students and their profession. They dedicate long hours to planning and preparing instruction. Beyond that, they are also committed learners themselves. For years, they have diligently trained with Child Aid staff to implement effective literacy practices, aiming to improve instructional delivery and develop avid readers. Visible indicators of this commitment are everywhere: “el rincón de lectura” (the reading corner), “la pared/el muro de vocabulario” (the vocabulary wall), “el mapa del cuento” (the story map), and “el esquema de escritura” (the writing framework), all highlighting the importance of “el proceso de la lectoescritura” (the literacy process). As one sign read: “Si quieres una aventura, lánzate a la lectura.” (If you want an adventure, launch yourself into reading.)

Furthermore, educators actively participate in a coaching cycle. They are trained by coaches who implement pre-conferences, observations, and post-conferences. A unique difference is that feedback is often given immediately after the lesson, with students present. These students understand how to behave and not interrupt the coach-teacher interaction, eliminating the need for a substitute.

Passion

All you need is to look at the faces of the teachers and children. Teachers love teaching, and students love learning. Teachers passionately welcome their students and celebrate the advances in their performance—from non-readers blossoming into avid readers, and from non-writers to students who author their own books. Thanks to Child Aid and its donors, students receive books in their classrooms and are passionate about the stories they are hearing.

Teachers have also learned to read with passion. They practice prosody, modeling for their students how reading with intonation and expression enhances reading comprehension. For this passion to continue, however, classrooms urgently need sets of books so every child can hold a text in their hands, rather than straining to see a small book held by a teacher walking around a classroom of 25+ students.

Hope

Despite the many challenges Guatemalan children have experienced—from war and genocide to poverty and discrimination—educators and students possess profound hope.

They have hope for literacy, recognizing that finishing school is a key answer for success. They have hope that one day their culture will be embraced and their dialects will not become extinct, holding deep love and pride for their communities. They have hope that one day they will obtain a visa to enter the United States and reunite with the father who sends remesas (money) monthly so they can survive. They even have hope for the return of their fathers. When we asked one child what he wanted to be when he grew up, his heartbreaking response was: “Quiero ser un soldado para rescatar a mi papá que está preso en Estados Unidos por ser indocumentado.” (“I want to be a soldier to go and rescue my dad who was incarcerated for being undocumented.”) They also have hope that corruption will one day end in their country, allowing them to secure a good job to make ends meet, since many children subsist on a cup of coffee or hot water for breakfast, and are lucky if they get a tortilla.

A Renewed Perspective

My visit to Guatemala left me re-energized with all three—commitment, passion, and hope. I feel a renewed commitment to spreading the word about Child Aid’s vital work. I have a greater passion to continue supporting our immigrants in U.S. schools, knowing that every one of them has a powerful story. Finally, I hold hope that in the United States, we will continue to open our classroom doors wider to embrace cultural and language diversity.

The Guatemalan community has certainly made a difference in my life as the leader of Seidlitz Education. Thank you, Child Aid, for this opportunity.

Texas’s New ELPS and PLDs: Math Strategies for Emergent Bilinguals in Any Classroom

by Jim Ewing

For many Texas educators, the rollout of the updated English Language Proficiency Standards (ELPS) and Proficiency Level Descriptors (PLDs) scheduled for Fall 2026 may feel like “one more thing” on an already full plate. However, these standards are not an add-on—they are a roadmap for intentional instruction.

The updated ELPS now include content-specific PLD examples for math, science, and social studies content-areas, offering teachers clearer guidance than ever before. Instead of relying solely on broad descriptors, educators now have a structured way to support students across five proficiency levels while maintaining rigorous academic expectations.

While these are required in Texas, educators across the country can also use this framework to better support Emergent Bilinguals (EBs) in math classrooms.

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1% Better, Every Day

by Nancy Motley

March is usually when I start my countdowns… 57 days left of school, 11 more Fridays, 5 more staff meetings, etc. I find myself focused on finishing, likely as a way to lower the stress that I feel during this time of year. In the midst of state testing, end-of-year meetings, and finalizing grades, professional growth gets lost. Unlike at the beginning of the school year, when I am energized to try new strategies and reflective about my practice, I am currently in survival mode.

Here is the good news: Improvement can still happen during the countdown days! In his book, Atomic Habits, James Clear writes that all it takes is focusing on getting 1% better each day (2018). Generally speaking, we might think 1% is insignificant. A 1% increase in a test score, for example, doesn’t seem like much. If we remain focused on small and consistent improvements over time, however, the results can be staggering. Clear explains: “If you can get 1 percent better each day for one year, you’ll end up thirty-seven times better by the time you’re done.” (Clear, 2018, p.15). This sounds very appealing to me! Almost forty percent growth just by focusing on a teeny tiny change. Even in March countdown mode, this feels doable.

So what does 1% look like for us? While the ideas are endless, I’d like to offer a few concrete, small moves that are quick and low-to-no prep. Any one of them could be the 1% adjustment that, when implemented with consistency, can have a significant and positive impact on both you and your students. Most of these ideas come from my book, Small Moves, Big Gains.

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The Vocabulary Hack That Changes Everything: Why Morpheme Instruction Works

by Michelle Yzquierdo

Picture this: Your tenth grade student is reading her biology textbook. She’s navigating dense paragraphs about cellular processes when she hits the word “photosynthesis” and stops cold. “I don’t know this word,” she mutters, and skips ahead. You’ve seen this pattern many times: students shutting down the moment they encounter unfamiliar academic vocabulary.

So what do you do? Spend the necessary instructional time pre-teaching all the academic vocabulary words? Have students dutifully copy definitions? Maybe even make flashcards? Furthermore, you have 150 students across five classes, reading anywhere from third-grade to college level, and the gaps in academic language and vocabulary are as diverse as your students. How do you differentiate vocabulary instruction for that range?

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Our Favorite Seidlitz Blog Posts of 2025

by Sarah Welch and Mark Cotham

The season of reflection and renewal is upon us! This new year, we’re looking back at some of our most-read posts of all time. We’re pleased to see that some of our oldest posts are still valuable to educators.

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All Kids Doing, All the Time

by Sally Barnes

This year, there’s a new rule in classrooms across the United States: Many state legislatures or local districts have banned cellphones and related devices in schools. With this change comes so many benefits, but also a few challenges. What do we do with students who were compliant (quiet, nondisruptive) because of their phones, but now don’t have their device at their disposal? What does this mean for classroom behavior, free time, peer-to-peer socialization, and expectations for bell-to-bell work? The truth is, I don’t want my kids to be compliant. I want them to be engaged in our class. So, how do we move kids from compliant to engaged? What does that mean day-to-day?

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Beyond the 7 Steps: Discovering a Trauma-Informed Approach for Multilingual Learners

by Elise White Diaz

For years, the 7 Steps framework had been my Bible—my gospel for teaching language to some of the most challenging students: timid newcomers and discouraged multilingual learners struggling with disabilities.

But one day, I was sitting beside a newcomer of 2.5 years who refused to participate. She was well past the silent period, so expecting her to verbalize “repeat, please,” didn’t seem unreasonable. We were on Step 1: What to Say Instead of I Don’t Know. I had broken down each phrase and ensured understanding, and now it was her turn to repeat after me. She opened her mouth, paused, and simply said, “No.”

The finality in that single syllable said everything. Her eyes narrowed in defiance. I knew there was nothing I could do to coax her into speaking. My mind jumped back to other students who refused to speak (although they most certainly could), and to students who resisted walking into a classroom.

Something deeper was happening with these students—something I couldn’t reach with strategies alone. The crisis team, the administrators, even the parents were at a loss. The special education department called it culture shock, but decades of experience told me that wasn’t the whole story.

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Bridging Worlds: Supporting Maasai Teachers in Tanzania with the 7 Steps

by Marie Heath

Just outside the Linjani tribal village, about three hours from Arusha, Tanzania, down a long stretch of dusty, rutted roads, sits Promise Village Academy.

Inside its classrooms, the air doesn’t buzz with projectors or the tapping of laptop keys. Instead, it echoes with the sound of chalk on crumbling plaster, voices reciting lessons in unison, and the soft scratching of worn pencils against well-used composition notebooks. Add to that the high-pitched screech of metal chairs dragging across concrete floors from an automatic response each time an adult entered the room as every student stood tall and greeted in chorus, “Welcome, teacher.”

In this remote region, where the Maasai children live and learn, I found a classroom unlike any I’ve seen before, primitive in resources, yet rich in potential.

When I first visited in February 2024, I came to offer something I had spent years delivering in schools across the United States: the formative training based on the 7 Steps to a Language-Rich, Interactive Classroom book. But what I didn’t realize was how much I would learn in return.

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Education Is Still the Answer

by Dr. Carol Salva

Education is the most powerful weapon we can use to change the world.

– Nelson Mandela

Without a doubt, the 2025-2026 school year brings great challenges for some of our most vulnerable students and their families. Current US government policies put some immigrant students and families at a greater risk than they have faced in years past. Many educators, like me, are worried and have significant concerns such as deportation, a fracturing of our students’ home lives, fewer support services, and significant interruptions to our students’ education.

As educators, we can feel overwhelmed by this reality. This post offers support to the teachers who support these immigrant learners.

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Downtime Do-Nows: Easy-to-Implement Language Rich Strategies for Those In-Between Moments

by Dr. Lora Beth Escalante

What do students do right away when they walk into class? Are there a few minutes when they sit idly while you take attendance or get papers and materials organized from the last class? Maybe the lesson ended early, and you find your class with a glorious 5-10 minutes of “free time.” Maybe you read your audience half-way through a lesson and realize you’ve lost them due to too much sitting. How can we utilize these in-between moments to provide students with low-stress opportunities for meaningful language practice?

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