Group items tagged

"I was listening to Chris Molanphy's excellent Hit Parade podcast this week, which is based on his equally great Hit Parade column for Slate Magazine. In this episode, he details the circumstances that lead the Beatles to hold the still-unbeaten record of having the top 5 spots on the Billboard charts all at once. More remarkably, it's not that this feat was achieved through their own talent - it was almost entirely a snafu caused by the lack of interest in the Beatles by major labels. Indeed, much of the feedback they had received from labels and the American music industry was tepid at best and negative at worst. Dick Rowe at Decca Records cemented his place in history by declining to sign the Beatles, saying "Guitar groups are on the way out." He wasn't wrong - the data he had showed that there wasn't likely to be much of a return in signing the Beatles. Instead, Decca signed Brian Poole and the Tremeloes, who would cost them less money. And so, you're probably wondering how in the world this connects to education. When I look at this moment in history, I see a lot of talented people making choices which are informed by data. As teachers, we too need to look at data. It's how we understand our students better, and when used properly, can be influential in shaping our practice to make our teaching more effective. Certainly data is used as a summative tool, but it is most useful as a formative tool for students and teachers alike. How does the use of data in regards to the Beatles relate to teachers?"

"If you'd asked farmers a few hundred years ago what skills their kids would need to thrive, it wouldn't have taken long to answer. They'd need to know how to milk a cow or plant a field. General skills for a single profession that only changed slowly-and this is how it was for most humans through history. But in the last few centuries? Not so much. Each generation, and even within generations, we see some jobs largely disappear, while other ones pop up. Machines have automated much of manufacturing, for example, and they'll automate even more soon. But as manufacturing jobs decline, they've been replaced by other once unimaginable professions like bloggers, coders, dog walkers, or pro gamers. In a world where these labor cycles are accelerating, the question is: What skills do we teach the next generation so they can keep pace?"

"While many Canadian educators struggle to find the solution to students' declining math scores, there's one expert who says we may be looking at the problem the wrong way. Sir Ken Robinson - education guru, author and adviser - says relentless testing and the push for standardized scores are destroying students' imagination and talent. He argues that schools are stifling instead of nurturing kids' creativity. Sir Ken's 2006 TED talk, How Schools Kill Creativity, has had 47 million views and become one of the most popular talks in history. He was in Montreal this week for the Einstein Youth Forum, and sat down for an interview with The Globe and Mail."

"Trust is like the air we breathe; it is essential to our wellbeing and survival, but we barely notice or think about it until it's in short supply. In many different parts of the world, trust in public and public-serving institutions - especially the news media - has declined alarmingly over at least the last decade. Its absence is creating enormous disruption around the world, threatening politics, public health, social relations and many of the other foundations of well-functioning societies. One of the contributors to this state of affairs is the internet. It promised access to a vast ocean of data, news and information, to liberate us from the media's traditional gatekeepers and to make us smarter, more engaged citizens. The internet revolution delivered on some of that promise. But it also unleashed a flood of disinformation and, well, junk. And with weakened gatekeepers, it eventually made it harder than ever to know what and whom to trust."

"You may have heard of play. It's that thing children do - the diverse range of unstructured, spontaneous activities and behaviours. Children play in many ways, including by exploring movements, constructing with equipment, creating games, using imagination and chasing others around a playground. The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child recognises play as every child's basic right. But play is becoming extinct. Global studies, across generations, have confirmed outdoor children's play has been declining, across all age groups, for decades. Play is every child's basic right. from shutterstock.com Unstructured play improves learning and social and physical development. Providing a variety of play options, improved play access and fewer restrictions can encourage children to engage in physical activity with peers in line with their imaginations."

In times when we taught face-to-face, some of these challenges would be overcome through the use of concrete materials, at least with younger students. Unfortunately, it is common for the use of concrete materials to decline as students grow older. Fortunately, this pattern, and the prejudiced beliefs on which it is founded, are today being questioned.

Use technology to its best advantage: Online professional learning communities should be established to help rural educators share best practices and reduce isolation, and online general subject or enrichment courses should be made available to isolated rural learners.