Group items tagged

"I am reading Visible Learners by Mara Krechevsky, Ben Mardell, Melissa Rivards and Daniel Wilson. In an effort to document my reading, I am choosing to tweet quotes that resonate with me through the lens of my work around documentation as/for learning. You can follow the curation of these tweets, as I am reading, in the storify slidedeck below."

"Your school has spent a lot of money on those iPads, and their skilful deployment in music lessons can be a real game-changer for both specialist and non-specialist classroom teachers. Unsure where to start? Transformance Music's Ben Sellers shares five simple ideas to incorporate GarageBand for iPad into your music lessons at KS1, 2 and 3."

"Filmmakers are using virtual reality to make the problems of the developing world seem more ... real. But how can you see their work? You could buy a headset, but you might end up in virtual debt. Prices range from $200 to $500 for devices from big players like Oculus Rift, Sony and Samsung. And forking over that much cash is a problem since there's not a lot of content yet. MindMaze Software Engineer Nicolas Bourdaud demonstrates a virtual reality system at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco on Tuesday. All Tech Considered Developers Continue Push To Make Virtual Reality Mainstream An attendee at the Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles plays Sony's Project Morpheus London Heist video game with a virtual reality headset and Move controllers. All Tech Considered Gaming Industry Pushes Virtual Reality, But Content Lags "You're in a store ... and here's all the head-mounted displays and then it costs $200 or $300. Why would you ever buy it when you don't know why you're buying it? You wouldn't," Tony Christopher, CEO of Landmark Entertainment Group, told NPR last month. But there are inexpensive options that require only your smartphone and some cardboard. Google Cardboard, a project of the tech giant, offers instructions and templates to build your own cardboard virtual reality headset. Grab a pair of scissors, X-Acto knife and some glue. Then find some cardboard at home, print out the templates, trace and cut out the different pieces and assemble your goggles. The instructions can get confusing, so our multimedia editor Ben de la Cruz suggests following a how-to video like this one from the tech site, CNET."

ASCD session by Ben Grey and Angela Maiers.

"I spend a significant amount of time watching Twitter; in particular teachers and educators on Twitter. I call this research although I know I am deluding myself as at best it is usually procrastination. I am beginning to notice with interest that Twitter is causing the power balance in education to be shifted slightly away from the centre with a number of grassroots initiatives that look as if they are influencing policy for example a few high profile Tweachers meeting with Ofsed and the Headteachers Roundtable . Among the many topics currently being debated in this Twibe is evidence informed teaching practice and Random Controlled Trials (RCT). This interest has been particularly apparent over the last 18 months or so. I see the trigger being a presentation given by Ben Goldacre a doctor, academic and author of the Guardian column Bad Science and the book Bad Pharma. "

"For a while now I have ben exploring the use of technology to bring interactive information to our students. This has involved QR codes, uBleams, Augmented Reality and eBooks. There have been some successes but it was a long process that meant the initial trigger usually looked fairly boring so made a very poor 2D presentation of work. I have since been looking at using Layar to create augmented reality magazines and posters."

"Often the idea of creativity is put in a special box that is limited to only certain kinds of people. This is one of our great myths. I am sure that Albert Einstein, Gandhi, David Bohn, Martha Graham, Wendell Berry, Aristotle, Pablo Picasso, Billie Holiday, Steve Jobs, Vincent Van Gogh, Mozart, Socrates, Leonardo Da Vinci, Martin Luther King, Beethoven, Charles Dickens, Carl Jung, Tesla, Galileo, Thomas Edison, Ben Franklin and Michelangelo all came from different backgrounds, cultures and ways of life. What they did have in common was the ability to see or feel the dynamic interconnectedness of the flow of life."

"IF YOU CAN think back to what you were doing when you were eleven-years-old, the chances are that demoing your own tech product in front of thousands wasn't one of them, but that was the case for these five students. The product in question was BullyBug, a wristband that aims to reduce bullying. When a child presses a button on the wristband, it sends an alert to the teacher's phone via its app. The teacher can later sit down with the child and help solve the problem. The idea was conceived by five 5th class students from St. Audoen's National School in Dublin city centre: Katelyn O'Connell, Chloe Long, Ben Hughes, Nadine Costello, and Daniel McCann."

"In Texas, there are 180 days of instruction, taking away 30 days for state testing so that leave 150 days for instruction. Let's say that a teacher gives a curriculum-based test once every two weeks and the district benchmark test three times a year. That is 21 less days of instruction or 129 days. Now, schools typically have three days of teacher in-service. Five special assemblies, two holiday parties, two half days, four emergency drills and three sick days takes away 15 more days bringing it to 111 days."

"The micro-computer revolution of the 80's radically improved how teachers and schools carry on the business of learning. We now have iPads in classrooms that will not only improve it, but it has the potential to change the business of learning in schools. The question is, "Are teachers ready to adjust their teaching for this new learning revolution?""

"ter-loving capybara. Understanding their differences is the first step, but even if we create individual education plans that differentiate instruction for each student, teachers are forced to make choices that affect student learning when it comes to instructing them all at once. "

"Educational author and former teacher, Dr. Michael Schmoker shares in his book, Results Now, a study that found of 1,500 classrooms visited, 85 percent of them had engaged less than 50 percent of the students. In other words, only 15 percent of the classrooms had more than half of the class at least paying attention to the lesson. So, how do they know if a student is engaged? What do "engaged" students look like? In my many observations, here's some evidence to look for:"