Your students aren’t the only ones sitting too much - your lesson materials are, too.

So this week we’re bringing you two things that refuse to stay still: a differentiation tool that reshapes your existing materials without extra work, and a new study showing why classrooms may need more movement breaks than ever.

Buckle up, because you’re about to become an even better teacher in the next 6 minutes:

🚀 Noteworthy News

👉️ Neat: Early peanuts helped 60,000 kids avoid allergies - here’s how.

👉️ Disruptive: Denmark bans social media for children - what that means here.

👉️ Smart: Stop asking “How was school today?”, ask these questions instead.

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And now back to making you an even better teacher 👇️ 

TECH TOOL

Differentiation, But Make It Easy

Differentiation isn’t a new expectation, but it feels heavier than ever. 

With wide learning gaps, mixed abilities, and limited support, teachers end up wearing every hat at once. Diffit steps in as the rare edtech tool that doesn’t ask you to reinvent your lesson plans. Instead, it reshapes what you already have so every student can access the same learning in a way that works for them. 

The Solution: Diffit

Diffit lets you upload any article, text, lesson plan, or resource and instantly creates versions at different reading levels, complete with summaries, questions, and vocabulary lists. 

It’s less “make a worksheet for me” and more “help me teach the same content more effectively.” 

In other words, it supports instructional impact, not shortcuts. It’s a great match for teachers managing IEP goals, ESL needs, or large classes with wide reading ranges.

While it technically saves time, the real value is that it frees you to focus on the parts of teaching that actually matter—guiding students, checking in, and planning next steps. 

You can try Diffit for free, and while school licenses are their preference, individual teacher plans are about $150/year USD if budgets are tight.

Is This For YOUR Classroom?

If you want a tool that helps you support diverse learners without rewriting your entire unit plan, this is it. 

But if you expect AI to differentiate your whole classroom for you, Diffit won’t go that far. It starts the process, but you still steer it - and that’s a good thing.

Strategies That Work:

1. Same Text, New Levels: Upload one reading and use Diffit’s different versions to support mixed-ability groups.

2. ELL Support Made Easy: Turn complex texts into simplified versions with vocabulary supports for multilingual learners.

3. Quick-Prep for Sub Days: Leave one resource that still meets every student where they are.

Diffit won’t fix differentiation, but it makes it doable, and that’s the kind of help teachers actually need.

Brainy Bit

The Kids Aren’t Moving

TLDR: A new national study from Canada shows teen activity levels crashing—only 1 in 5 teens is getting the movement they need. 

The data is Canadian, but the problem isn’t just there. Schools everywhere are watching childhood activity drop and sedentary time climb.

The Study:  Physical activity and sedentary time in Canada

Statistics Canada analyzed movement using accelerometers, not self-reports—meaning this is hard, objective data. Over 7,000 people, including hundreds of teens, wore sensors for a full week as part of the Canadian Health Measures Survey (2022–2024).

Researchers tracked 24-hour behavior: light movement, vigorous exercise, sleep, and total sedentary time. Teens aged 12–17 emerged as the least active group of all. Only 21% met the recommended 60 minutes of daily movement—down from 36% just a few years ago. In girls, that number dropped to 8%.

The Results:

Teens averaged 10.6 hours of sitting per day—nearly an entire waking day parked.

Only 28% stayed under the two-hour recreational screen-time guideline.
Both boys and girls lost ground, but girls’ activity levels fell even faster.

The trend may be measured in Canada, but it mirrors rising global concerns: more screens, less movement, and school days built around extended sitting.

In YOUR Classroom:

If kids are sedentary all day at school, then the classroom becomes a key place to reverse the trend, not reinforce it.

Here’s how this study could improve your classroom this week:

Strategies That Work:

• Reclaim transition time: Add 30-second movement resets between tasks.

• Use vertical spaces: Standing work, stations, and gallery walks count as activity.

• Let students lead: Rotate “movement captains” who choose quick energizers.

Kids everywhere might be moving less, but every minute of active learning you build in helps undo a global trend one class at a time.

WHAT DO YOU THINK?

We would LOVE to hear from you!

Reply to this email, or send us a message on Instagram! We’re here to walk with you in these crazy times!

Part of what makes The PEN Weekly community so special is the fact that our readers are teachers from around the world! We’re not going to lie, we think that’s pretty darn cool!

We’ll see you again on Monday 🍎

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