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When tech giant Amazon announced its search for a second headquarters site, cities across the country scrambled to produce persuasive pitches. In Loudoun County, Virginia, fourth-graders from Goshen Post Elementary School took up the challenge personally. To create compelling video arguments, student teams interviewed experts in economic development, researched state history and geography, and even wrote poems to sing the praises of their region. When Northern Virginia was ultimately picked as a new HQ site, students were as proud as any civic leaders from their community. The story offers a good example of how education is shifting as we wrap up two decades of the 21st century. Instead of relying on textbooks and teacher direction, these students had to think critically about unfolding events, collaborate with peers and adults, and make creative use of digital tools to communicate their ideas. In the process, they also learned plenty about social studies and civic engagement. For Loudoun County Superintendent Eric Williams, what makes such authentic learning experiences worthwhile is how they prepare students "to make meaningful contributions to the world."

"Juan Carlos Galindo, a Wheaton High School ninth-grader with attention-deficit disorder, always had difficulty managing academic demands when he was younger. His mother, Virginia Munoz, a single mother of four, regularly found her son asleep with homework in his lap. She knew he was struggling, and she worried he would become a checked-out, rebellious teenager. In seventh grade, however, Juan Carlos was invited to participate in a maker learning partnership between Parkland Middle School in Rockville and the KID Museum in Bethesda. The maker philosophy emphasizes hands-on, self-guided projects to build kids' technical skills and confidence through tinkering, inventing and designing."

"I just returned from a conference where the organizers screened World Peace and Other 4th Grade Achievements, a documentary about John Hunter, the teacher from Charlottesville, Virginia whose elegant design of a classroom activity elicits the deep thinking and creative problem solving educators strive for. Hunter responded to questions with a crafted vision of teaching and touching anecdotes from his long years in the classroom. Over and over, he repeated a central theme: human interaction is at the heart of effective education. There's no app or standardized test for good teaching. (Or replacement for the kinds of things great teachers do differently.)"

"For one language arts class project, a middle school teacher in Shelburne, Virginia, Chad Sansing, asks his sixth graders to read Peter Cherches's 1986 poem "Lift Your Right Arm," and then translate it into computer code. The poem occurs in action sequences-for example, "Lift your right arm, she said./I lifted my right arm." Sansing and his class conceive a list of actions, sketch ideas of how to code them, using icons or letters, and then code the poem. In doing so, the students become producers of both a new language and way of seeing poetry. Sansing's students have also translated the poem's code into Scratch, to create animation, and into LEGO Mindstorms EV3, a robot-programming language. This innovative way of engaging students with poetry is just one example of how educators are increasingly integrating transmedia techniques in their teaching and assessments. What is the point of this activity? "To help kids see connections between grammar and code," says Sansing who shares his lessons on his "Classroots" blog."

"Remake Learning is a resource for the people, organizations, and ideas shaping the future of teaching and learning in the greater Pittsburgh region. Read stories about learning innovation on our blog and in the news, browse upcoming events and opportunities, and connect to resources and network members in Pittsburgh, West Virginia, and beyond."

This site was designed by teachers to assist colleagues in planning and delivering effective 21st century instruction in West Virginia Classrooms. It enables educators to quickly access 21st Century Content Standards, Learning Skills and Technology Tools for WV Schools, as well as other resources that exemplify rigorous and relevant instructional design and delivery.

"In his new book, Raising Kids Who Read, Daniel Willingham wants to be clear: There's a big difference between teaching kids to read and teaching them to love reading. And Willingham, a parent himself, doesn't champion reading for the obvious reasons - not because research suggests that kids who read for pleasure do better in school and in life. "The standard things you'll hear about why kids should read I actually don't think are very strong arguments," he says. "Because if the goal is to become a good citizen or the goal is to make a lot of money, I can think of more direct ways to reach those goals than to read during your leisure time." Willingham wants his kids to love reading because, he says, "for me it's a family value. It's something that I love, something that I find important. I think I gain experiences I wouldn't gain any other way by virtue of being a reader. And so naturally I want my children to experience that." The professor of psychology at the University of Virginia uses his new book to map out strategies for parents and teachers hoping to kindle that same passion for reading."

"A year ago, Nick Anglin was a jaded 6th grader who, as he put it, "hated school and rarely paid attention or did homework." He punctuated the hours of boredom by cracking jokes and making his classmates laugh. Then, something extraordinary happened. Anglin went to a summer Maker Corps camp at the Sutherland Middle School in Charlottesville, Virginia, where his teachers Robert Munsey and Eric Bredder encouraged him to follow his curiosity and passion. As Anglin recently recalled, "They challenged us from day one: 'Create a project related to something you love, incorporate some type of technology and possibly start a business around it.'""

" If student engagement equals deeper learning, then making school fun might just be the key to improved learning.  Imagine the looks on students' faces when you tell them that today, right there at school, their job is to become toymakers. Once they get over the shock, they'll be thrilled to create their own toys and channel their creative energy with an added bonus of fun. It may be the best head-fake technique ever for embedding the problem-solving and creative thinking skills that students will need for digital age jobs. Thanks to 3D printing and other maker tools, students can gain valuable STEM and technology skills while engaging their brains instantly and in new ways. And this will help them as they get older, according to Glen Bull, co-director of the Center for Technology & Teacher Education at the University of Virginia."

As is required of all women in their 30s, I am in a book club. At the first meeting of this group, one poor unsuspecting woman mentioned that she had listened to that month's selection instead of reading it. That, the rest of the group decided together, is definitely cheating. Never mind that no one could exactly articulate how or why it was cheating; it just felt like it was, and others would agree. She never substituted the audiobook for the print version again (or, if she did, she never again admitted it). This question - whether or not listening to an audiobook is "cheating" - is one University of Virginia psychologist Daniel Willingham gets fairly often, especially ever since he published a book, in 2015, on the science of reading. (That one was about teaching children to read; he's got another book out next spring about adults and reading.) He is very tired of this question, and so, recently, he wrote a blog post addressing it. (His opening line: "I've been asked this question a lot and I hate it.") If, he argues, you take the question from the perspective of cognitive psychology - that is, the mental processes involved - there is no real difference between listening to a book and reading it. So, according to that understanding of the question: No, audiobooks are not cheating.

"Please, No More Professional Development! By Peter DeWitt on April 17, 2015 8:10 AM Today's guest blog is written by Kristine Fox (Ed.D), Senior Field Specialist/Research Associate at Quaglia Institute for Student Aspirations (QISA). She is a former teacher and administrator who has passion for teacher learning and student voice. Kris works directly with teachers and leaders across the country to help all learners reach their fullest potential. Peter DeWitt recently outlined why "faculty meetings are a waste of time." Furthering on his idea, most professional development opportunities don't offer optimal learning experiences and the rare teacher is sitting in her classroom thinking "I can't wait until my district's next PD day." When I inform a fellow educator that I am a PD provider, I can read her thoughts - boring, painful, waste of time, useless, irrelevant - one would think my job is equal to going to the dentist (sorry to my dentist friends). According to the Quaglia Institute and Teacher Voice and Aspirations International Center's National Teacher Voice Report only 54% percent of teachers agree "Meaningful staff development exists in my school." I can't imagine any other profession being satisfied with that number when it comes to employee learning and growth. What sense does it make for the science teacher to spend a day learning about upcoming English assessments? Or, for the veteran teacher to learn for the hundredth time how to use conceptual conflict as a hook. Why does education insist everyone attend the same type of training regardless of specialization, experience, or need? As a nod to the upcoming political campaigns and the inevitable introduction of plans with lots of points, here is my 5 Point Plan for revamping professional development. 5 Point Plan Point I - Change the Term: Semantics Matter We cannot reclaim the term Professional Development for teachers. It has a long, baggage-laden history of conformity that does not

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