Over the last year I have engaged many educators on the topic of using “Cellphones” as learning tools in the classroom. I would say that in most of these discussions, the leading reason given not to have “Cellphones” in a classroom is that they are a distraction.
For the purpose of this post, I am placing some Webster definitions here:
Telephone: an instrument for reproducing sounds at a distance; specifically: one in which sound is…
"I woke up this morning with a smile on my face, a dance in my step, and a song in my heart. Now this is quite different than most mornings, as I am not a morning person when I have to get up at 5:50am. My children wondered what in the world happened to me, because I had not drunk even one cup of coffee yet, and I was singing and dancing! I even did…the RUNNING MAN! Do you know what I think it is? I think it is SPRING BREAK FEVER! Oh…
One of the great things about word processors is the ability to manipulate documents in any way you see fit. Whichever program you use, you should be aware of the importance of blank space. Emptiness is not the same thing as "nothing". If you're purposeful about the way you use emptiness, it will work to promote learning in…
I watched this video, and cracked up! I was trying to find articles about rigor and bumped into this video. It's a bit long in making its point, but I get it. This poor teacher is being hounded by her principal, to "perform" , so that her students can learn the parts of speech.
Personally, I don't have a problem with rigor in the classroom, I embrace it. I…
The Core standards include financial literacy. I was looking for Web 2.0 financial literacy resources to share with our teachers and this is what I found. This should save you time and give you resources you may not been aware of. Explore and enjoy!
Tablets are taking the academic world by storm. They're light, compact and extremely multifunctional. They also do things differently than a laptop. One of the really interesting areas tablets are being used is as a notebook.…
Over the next few days my blog will be a snapshot album of words describing what it is like to attend a premiere education conference, ASCD12. This is an experience that most educators rarely experience over the course of their careers. It is not an inexpensive proposition to send educators to national conferences. For some reason many districts use that as a reason to send the same administrators year after year to these conferences. I think administrators have the idea that their district…
eBook: "An Educator's iPad" ... published on Amazon and Apple iTunes.
... written for educators and parents who have an interest in mobile learning and especially the use of Apple’s iPad. It is not a “how-to” manual but a resource for enabling more informed decisions regarding the use of…
At my Middle School I am fortunate to have a time every other week that each teacher meets with about 18 students in an advisory role. The time that we meet with students is somewhat planned for those teachers who need a lesson plan and yet open-ended enough for someone like me who likes to work from the "hip." Today, after discussing the events of Spring Break I posed the following to my group of 7th and 8th graders:
I held up a variety of educational journals. “So in each of these…
In order for educators to teach kids, they need something to teach. Exactly what it is that educators should teach has often been discussed and continues to be the focus of ongoing discussions for over many generations. The delivery of that content, in regard to what to teach, has never been of great concern, because the bulk of it came in the form of text, delivered in a book called the textbook. In the 50’s the education pioneers introduced film strips, 16mm films, and recordings to…
Fourth Grade AIG students created this collage using words they associated with AIG class. They practiced using Wordle before creating individual projects with words used to describe the story elements in the novel Dovey Coe by Frances O"Roark Dowell. We will post student work later this week. I look forward to seeing their creations. Fun!…
I finally had the chance to use a classroom set of i-pads as a reinforcement to all of the math concepts my first graders have learned so far (see photo above). Instant feedback to children is of vital importance when it comes to reinforcing a newly-learned skill. When there is only one teacher in the room, instant feedback doesn't happen often enough. Today, I had seventeen…
One of my students came in with a link to an interesting website this morning. This fun trivia site lets students take trivia quizzes and play games to earn badges. Scores are posted by user name so students can compare their scores and progress to that of others. The administrator (you) can create a group for students to join, and your group can compete against other groups around the world. Great for critical and strategical thinking, and loads of interesting tidbits of information for…
Groote Schuur is our new sister school in Cape Town. Enjoyed meeting administrators, faculty and more importantly the students of the Interact Club. We are now working on our first exchange which will take place in November 2012.
Added by Gérard Gatoux on March 12, 2012 at 10:21am —
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I spent my Saturday morning learning how to use a new tool for my language classes and I'm pretty happy with the results! We are currently studying sentence diagramming…
Essay Definition can vary widely depending on the Person DefiningEssay definition can be different depending on the source. The narrowest definition of essay is “a short piece of writing on a particular subject”, as appearing in Oxford Dictionary. Most common form of essay is written in prose. In practice, essays are regarded as short pieces of writing, though there are some exceptions like John Locke’s” An essay concerning human understanding”. In its broadest sense, definition of essay…See More
I hate standardized testing. I hate what standardized testing has done to teaching. SMH :( This is what it has driven me to!
