Group items tagged

"John F. Kennedy is often reported to have said "The only reason to give a speech is to change the world." Over the years this has been paraphrased by many speaking and training professionals. Not surprisingly, people occasionally mock this kind of statement as being just so much hubris or pomposity. "Surely," they proclaim, "not every presentation or speech is important enough to even make the slightest difference." However, when we say "change the world," we do not mean necessarily to change the world in a monumental, earth-altering, life-changing way. The operative word in that phrase is change. Affecting a change is a necessary condition of an effective speech. "A presentation that doesn't seek to make change is a waste of time and energy," says business guru Seth Godin. "

"A mind is a valuable thing to waste. You've heard the saying many times, but it truly does ring true. Your mind is your most valuable asset. You need to take care of it. So here's a list of 10 things you can do every day to benefit your brain:"

"The paperless classroom is a compelling concept for what it symbolizes as much as anything else. While it sounds sleek and futuristic and easy to organize and environmentally friendly, the reality is that paperless classrooms aren't that simple. The "environmentally-friendly" part, for example, is wildly subjective: the costs of manufacturing-and eventually recycling and disposing of-tablets versus the loss of "renewable" trees and the subsequent waste that is environmentally-friendly."

"Man, it's a great time to be a note-taker. For a couple of decades-first as a student, then as a professional journalist-I filled notebook after notebook with notes, covering classes, press conferences, interviews, and more. When I was done, I'd have to find someplace to store them until (most likely) I'd throw them out. The notes I did keep? Useless. My on-the-fly handwriting is a horrible thing. The result: A lot of personal and professional history gone to waste."

"Rather than waste your life on Facebook and Instagram, put your daily interneting to good use. Here's a list of websites that will actually make you smarter:"

Many mobile users in India have been receiving missed calls from premium international numbers, or calls related to winning lotteries, prompting them to call back and waste a much of their prepaid balance. TRAI (telecom industry regulator in India) has asked all operators to stop ISD calling on prepaid numbers until especially asked for by customers. TRAI says that it has been receiving complaints that people are getting missed calls (wangiri calls) and calls relating to winning prizes or lotteries from international numbers. These are often premium numbers charging high tariff, prompting consumers to call back such numbers. By responding to such calls/SMSs consumers have to pay unintended charges.

device, I'm concerned that most one-to-one implementation strategies are based on the new tool as the focus of the program. Unless we break out of this limited vision that one-to-one computing is about the device, we are doomed to waste our resources.

"Until recently, the prevailing thought in education was that differentiation according the theory of multiple intelligences was a good thing. Then data started coming out, and the theories Howard Gardner set forth back in 1983 came under fire. Mention multiple intelligence (MI) thinking today, and you're guaranteed to rise the ire of someone on twitter telling you that it's 2014, and the 1980s are gone and there is no data that exists that proves MI does anything but waste time."

"US researchers are investigating ways to extract the gold and precious metals from human faeces. The group identified gold in waste from American sewage treatment plants at levels which if found in rock could be worth mining. Details were outlined at the 249th national meeting of the American Chemical Society (ACS) in Denver."

"There is something deeply satisfying about a simple and elegant (and cheap!) solution to an annoying storage problem. There is also something especially gratifying about utilizing normally wasted space, as a number of these racks and holders do. "Working the cube," a mentor of mine in my youth used to call it; always considering how to optimize every square inch of a workspace, not just the walls and the floors. Here are five great ways to work your cube with some clever shop storage."

Have you been spending too much of your time on social media recently? Is that making much of your internet usage wasteful? Social media can be so addictive, so much that we spend hours on it without really noticing. While social media does contribute in healthy discussions and is also our primary source of news and ideas at times, it's equally likely to encourage us to refrain from learning something useful in our lives. It's very important to keep our social media usage in check if we want to enrich ourselves with great learning experiences and upgrade our lives. Here are 25 great websites which you should check if you want to escape from the vicious trap of social media and live a life full of knowledge, joy, and inspiration.

Our efforts to enculturate a Growth Mindset or Mindset Awareness are not wasted but the process needs to be understood as complex and demands a multifaceted action plan if it is to produce results.

"Most administrators and teachers believe in the importance and value of professional development.  Sadly, though, too many teachers believe that those mandatory, one-size-fits-all professional development sessions offered by their schools are a waste of time and money. "

"What are the kind of things a 21st century teacher needs to know and be able to do? What about 21st century students? What education technology works, and what is a waste of time? What would a checklist for 21st century teaching look like? Does "21st century teaching" even make sense to use as a phrase anymore? If not, do we just say "teaching"? Does that fit our needs to innovate our collective profession to meet a modern circumstance? These are among the questions today's teachers have to face daily-in the classroom, mass media, professional development, and more. These conversations can get complex, opinionated, stuffed with rhetoric, and downright overwhelming at times. In response, Sylvia Duckworth has made consistent contributions to this conversation by creating colorful illustrations that communicate many of these ideas in easy-to-skim, easy-on-the-eyes, tempting to pin and share graphics."

"From packing peanuts to disposable coffee cups, each year the US alone produces some two billion pounds of Styrofoam - none of which can be recycled. Frustrated by this waste of resources and landfill space, Ashton Cofer and his science fair teammates developed a heating treatment to break down used Styrofoam into something useful. Check out their original design, which won both the FIRST LEGO League Global Innovation Award and the Scientific American Innovator Award from Google Science Fair."

"At Hackster we know that learning new technologies and tools for use in the classroom can be time consuming and daunting for many teachers. To help with this, we have partnered with the Micro:bit Foundation to create three short, informative video lessons that will give you the confidence to use the micro:bit in your classroom, without wasting time with extraneous details."

"Are today's students spending too much time in front of computer screens? The more important question is: are students engaged in powerful learning experiences and, whenever possible, given voice and choice in what, how, and when they learn? Digital technology can powerfully facilitate this process, if thoughtful adults deploy it wisely. Otherwise, it can be mind-numbing, or worse."