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garth nichols

Mindful Teachers: Mindfulness Activities and Teaching Resources - 1 views

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    As we head into the business of the year, here is a thoughtful reminder for mindfulness and its benefits...
su11armstrong

Mappio - Mind Map Library - 0 views

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    1000s of Mind Maps for your perusal.
garth nichols

http://archive.constantcontact.com/fs184/1102752268498/archive/1122580804441.html - 1 views

  • In my mind, a solid 4 rating means that your adult professional embraces feedback, both formal and informal and has strong systems and processes in place that encourage feedback - things like annual faculty,  parent, and board surveys, intentionally designed evaluation processes for students, faculty, staff and leadership that happen at minimum annually, but even better quarterly, regular audits of programs, curriculum, pedagogy, time and space.  Other good signs that your culture supports feedback might be meetings that end with questions like, "How are we working together as a team/department?" and "What can we do to get better at this work?"  and school leaders who ask their reports with genuine curiosity,  "What can I do to better support your work?"  "What do you think about this idea?" or "How did this meeting go for you?"
  • What if you spent a week "playing anthropologist" with the following question in mind: "What evidence do I see that our adult community has a strong culture of feedback?" 
    • garth nichols
       
      Love these questions of educators!
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  • pend some time with colleagues. Ask them questions about their classes.  See how many times you hear someone ask questions like: "What do you think about this?"  "Will you come by my class and let me know what you think about this lesson I am teaching?"  "How can I/we do this better?"  Attend meetings with this question in mind.  How receptive are team members to feedback they get in meetings?
  • talk Feedback Without Frustration.  This 15 minute video offers some key habits and practices that designers (and educational leaders in their roles as experience designers) can adopt in order to make feedback more meaningful, especially when presenting a new idea or product and much of which can be applied to feedback - both formal and informal.  A few tips include:taking responsibility for the feedback you are gettinggoing after the kind of feedback you wanthaving a designated facilitator for more significant processeshaving goals for the project that you can use to make the feedback more helpfulnot confusing what you like/don't like with what is good/bad(most importantly) just getting better at talking to each other.
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    For those of us who lead teachers; for those of us who seek feedback from others; and for those of us who want to buid a culture of sharing and feedback, this is a great read!
celeste Kirsh

Scale-Free Schools / A Day In The Life - 2 views

shared by celeste Kirsh on 23 Nov 13 - No Cached
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    This is a fantastic example of how technology can transform the way that we learn. This will blow your mind. Who else wants to teach in this school.
garth nichols

Sugata Mitra and the new educational Romanticism - a parody - 0 views

  • ll children are born to drive their education. The problem is that prior to the digital age there were no child-friendly pedagogic vehicles. Now that the military-industrial complex has created them, parents and teachers should give the keys to the kids as soon as possible and let them head off on their own down the beautifully linear highway of knowledge.
  • One of the empires is the empire of fear. Surely we are not free if our lives are dominated by fear. Although Mitra’s minimal model blithely assumes that children greet everything new with a calm curiosity, Rousseau recognises that children can just as easily respond to the new with fear. To avoid this requires early training. A snippet of his advice on this subject:
  • At another junction on the same road is the empire of habit. We are not free if we are too firmly set in our ways. Hence Rousseau’s advice: “the only habit that a child should be allowed to contract is none. Do not carry him on one arm more than the other; do not accustom him to give one hand rather than the other, to use one more than the other, to want to eat, sleep, or be active at the same hours…Prepare from afar the reign of his freedom…” (63) (Sir Ken Robinson’s critique of the school bell is but a footnote to this.)
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  • If tools are needed, he suggested, it is better that we make them ourselves, and for the sake of the children’s freedom it is better that they acquire the belief that the imperfect tools they make themselves are better than perfect tools made by others.
  • he great Romantic pedagogy of liberation becomes a parody of itself when it loses sight of how vulnerable the child is to a myriad imperial forces, reducing itself to the myopic claim that the only thing children need to be liberated from is teachers.
  • Of course, the child must feel at every step of the way that she is making the discoveries, or, as Rousseau says of his Emile in his now outdated language: “let him always believe he is the master” but, he reminds the tutor, “let it always be you who are.” (120)
  • Rousseau suggests beginning the scientific part of a child’s education with some geographical discovery learning. He has a nice criticism of his EdTech contemporaries: “You want to teach geography to this child, and you go and get globes, cosmic spheres, and maps for him. So many devices! Why all these representations? Why do you not begin by showing him the object itself so that he will at least know what you are talking about?” (168)
  • If curiosity and attention need cultivation and direction, they also need protection. Rousseau sees a particular risk with the sciences – and this is one which online learning surely magnifies, not diminishes. He puts it beautifully, describing the entry into science as something that can be like entering “into a bottomless sea…When I see a man, enamoured of the various kinds of knowledge, let himself be seduced by their charm and run from one to the other without knowing how to stop himself, I believe I am seeing a child on the shore gathering shells and beginning by loading himself up with them; then, tempted by those he sees next, he throws some away and picks up others, until, overwhelmed by their multitude and not knowing anymore which to choose, he ends by throwing them all away and returning empty-handed.” (172)
  • In a parallel way, learning emerges at the edge of chaos where children meet Google, and it emerges with the same spontaneity seen when the first amoeba dragged itself out of the primordial soup.
  • “The man who did not know pain would know neither the tenderness of humanity nor the sweetness of commiseration. His heart would be moved by nothing. He would not be sociable; he would be a monster among his kind.” (87)
  • Rousseau makes a point more specifically about the psychology of the child, arguing that it is damaging for children to be encouraged to learn things that are beyond the developing sphere of their experience.
  • Children become accustomed to parroting the truth instead of perceiving for themselves that something is true.
  • No child ever came face to face with his mortality when his avatar was struck by a pixelated bullet. No, the child learns infinitely more about the human condition from a single bout of toothache than from 1,000 hours of online gaming.
  • Mitra’s minimalism is not just the minimalism of a hands-off approach to teaching; it is also the minimalism of a theory that – in that questionable analytic tradition – wants to limit itself to technique. All we are given is a methodology – the theoretical equivalent of the automotive machinery that children can drive.
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    This is a real eye-opener for the counter-digital-revolution perspective. It's good to keep these perspectives in mind as we chart our way forward because these ideas can help temper our enthusiasm for tech as a panacea
garth nichols

Do You have the Personality To Be an Inquiry-Based Teacher? | MindShift - 3 views

  • Are you optimistic? Viewing the world as damaged or the future as bleak shuts down the brain by transmitting fear. Maintaining an optimistic attitude is an expression of love, inspiring curiosity and hope, and fostering emotional and physical health. Optimism is essential to teaching: Without hope, the reason to learn disappears. Are you open? The world is being refreshed and powered by divergent thinking. Outcomes are unclear, even dangerous. But faith in the flexible thinking of the human mind can support young people as they sort out their new world and have the freedom to discover solutions not yet visible. An open attitude activates the frontal lobes, the place of flow and creativity. Are you appreciative? Deep appreciation gives permission for failure, rather than penalizing for the “wrong” answer. It honors the stops and starts of human development. It conveys the ultimate message of a communal world: We are in this together. Are you flexible? In inquiry, the journey matters as much as the destination. Constant reflection is a necessity to improving thinking and doing. Metacognition encourages wisdom, the ultimate goal of any worthy education system. Flexibility tells the brain and heart to keep working, keep going—you’re getting there. Are you purposeful? Purpose binds teacher and student into the high-minded pursuit of solutions that matter. It is the reason that “authentic” education works and inauthentic education struggles. It tightens the connection between the learner and the teacher in ways that spur the natural creative impulse to change and improve the world.
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    This is an important list of attributes for 21st Century Teaching. As schools and teachers are looking to PBL, we often don't think about what is required in the social-emotional realm of teaching that will allow PBL to fly...here's some good info' on this...
Justin Medved

Pushing, Pulling, Nudging, Lifting | Aaron Vigar - 0 views

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    Love this honest post from Aaron "This has certainly been true of my journey with Cohort 21. A true meeting of the minds, at the end of each session I feel like anything is possible, but when I get back to the very busy and  imperfect world in which I actually teach (this isn't a suggestion about my school, but true of everywhere) I feel it incredibly challenging to see how the big ideas I love to talk about look in the particular setting of my classroom. It's easy to get tied up trying out new technologies or aiming for a certain look to the classroom, and forget that what I really want is the simplest and most complicated goal: to help my students be happy and learn."
garth nichols

WordSift - Visualize Text - 0 views

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    Use this to help data mind responses from Google Forms
Justin Medved

Twitter Chats - The ins, outs and my top 8 chats - 2 views

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    Twitter Chats - The ins, outs and my top 8 chats Educational Twitter Chats are happening all the time on Twitter and as a globally connected educator - I LOVE IT! Every opportunity I can get I involve myself in the 1 hour twitter chats that surface themselves in my twitter feed. It gives me the opportunity to connect and collaborate with like minded educators, network with the best in the business and pick up new and interesting things to use to make me a better educator. PD in the palm of my hands (literally). For those that don't know what I am talking about - let me give you the low-down. Twitter chats take place on twitter at a certain time every week (click here for a complete list of education related twitter chats and their times). All chats use a certain hashtag to discuss a variety of topics with a education related theme. They provide a unique and eye opening opportunity for educators to connect, share and collaborate with others from all over the world. The best part about this virtual staffroom ….. it is FREE!
Derek Doucet

12 Effective Ways To Use Google Drive In Education | Edudemic - 3 views

  • I’d recommend using it as a useful tool for project-based learning where students can collaborate in real-time, hold chats, and even finalize a project from different locations.
    • a_harding
       
      Fantastic applications of Google Drive in the classroom!
  • The other big way I’d recommend trying out Google Drive would be for mind maps. You can create mind maps using a presentation in Google Drive and work on it with others at the same time.
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  • Are you a Google Drive / Google Docs fan? Do you take notes, compose papers, construct spreadsheets, and build presentations in real-time on the web while collaborating with others? I’m not necessarily promoting Google Drive; just merely pointing out a few of the powerful ways the free tool can help you save time and keep you better organized.
    • Derek Doucet
       
      Hey check this out, this could some excellent in class application of drive.
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    This is a way that eductors can utilize Google Drive full capabilities in the classroom
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    I've begun a journey this week where my students and I are collaborating on PE "sportfolios". So, I guess what I am saying, is you can add e-portfolios to the list!
Justin Medved

Skills in Flux - New skills of for the 21st century - 2 views

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    "As the economy changes, the skills required to thrive in it change, too," says David Brooks in this New York Times column, "and it takes a while before these new skills are defined and acknowledged." He gives several examples: * Herding cats - Doug Lemov has catalogued the "micro-gestures" of especially effective teachers in his book, Teach Like a Champion 2.0 (Jossey-Bass, 2015). "The master of cat herding," says Brooks, "senses when attention is about to wander, knows how fast to move a diverse group, senses the rhythm between lecturing and class participation, varies the emotional tone. This is a performance skill that surely is relevant beyond education." * Social courage - In today's loosely networked world, this has particular value - the ability to go to a conference, meet a variety of people, invite six of them to lunch afterward, and form long-term friendships with four of them. "People with social courage are extroverted in issuing invitations but introverted in conversation - willing to listen 70 percent of the time," says Brooks. "They build not just contacts but actual friendships by engaging people on multiple levels." * Capturing amorphous trends with a clarifying label - People with this skill can "look at a complex situation, grasp the gist and clarify it by naming what is going on," says Brooks. He quotes Oswald Chambers: "The author who benefits you most is not the one who tells you something you did not know before, but the one who gives expression to the truth that has been dumbly struggling in you for utterance." * Making nonhuman things intuitive to humans - This is what Steve Jobs did so well. * Purpose provision - "Many people go through life overwhelmed by options, afraid of closing off opportunities," says Brooks. But a few have fully cultivated moral passions that can help others choose the one thing they sho
Ryan Archer

The Distracted Classroom - The Chronicle of Higher Education - 1 views

  • Distraction occurs, the authors argue, when we are pursuing a goal that really matters and something blocks our efforts to achieve it.
  • They argue that distraction actually arises from a conflict between two fundamental features of our brain: our ability to create and plan high-level goals versus our ability to control our minds and our environment as we take steps to complete those goals.
  • cognitive control abilities
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  • Our cognitive control is really quite limited: We have a restricted ability to distribute, divide, and sustain attention; actively hold detailed information in mind; and concurrently manage or even rapidly switch between competing goals."
  • while older adults can fully retain their ability to focus their attention, their capacity to block out irrelevant distractions diminishes with age.
  • That’s one reason why older adults may have more trouble concentrating on a conversation in a crowded restaurant than younger people.
  • What goal had I established for Kate’s learning that day? How had I created an environment that supported her ability to achieve that goal? And perhaps most important — assuming that the class had a learning goal that mattered for her — did she know about it?
  • The more powerful the goals we establish for ourselves, and the more we feel ownership over those goals, the more we are able to pursue them in the face of both internal and external distractions.
  • Most of us can shut out distractions when we are pursuing something that really matters to us.
  • Who creates them? How much do they matter? And how well do students understand them?
celeste Kirsh

Class Badges - 0 views

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    Use these to help honour and recognize student work (NB I didn't say "reward"!)
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    One way to track student achievements (possibly learning skills) over the course of the year and acknowledge milestones in student development.
garth nichols

Advent of Google means we must rethink our approach to education - 0 views

  • If we did that to exams, the curriculum would have to be different. We would not need to emphasise facts or figures or dates. The curriculum would have to become questions that have strange and interesting answers. "Where did language come from?", "Why were the pyramids built?", "Is life on Earth sustainable?", "What is the purpose of theatre?" Questions that engage learners in a world of unknowns. Questions that will occupy their minds through their waking hours and sometimes their dreams.
  • We don't need to improve schools. We need to reinvent them for our times, our requirements and our future. We don't need efficient clerks to fuel an administrative machine that is no longer needed. Machines will do that for us. We need people who can think divergently, across outdated "disciplines", connecting ideas across the entire mass of humanity. We need people who can think like children.
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    Google's impact on thinking and teaching
Walco Solutions

Academic Projects | Walco Solutions - 0 views

The final year projects and mini projects are considered to be the important parts of the engineering education system. The projects done by students in their curriculum play an important role fo...

started by Walco Solutions on 28 May 15 no follow-up yet
sallymastro

About Daniel Pink | Daniel Pink - 0 views

shared by sallymastro on 20 Oct 12 - Cached
  • A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future charts the rise of right-brain thinking i
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    A provocative read on how brain function has impacted global-economic development.
sallymastro

Mobile Tech in Classrooms Boost English Learners - New America Media - 0 views

  • when a student asked Nieto if he could bring his iPod to class, Nieto agreed, and neither teacher nor student has looked back since.
    • sallymastro
       
      Whether iphone or ereaders...allowing students to use technology to enhance the learning process is something I am starting to approach with a more open mind.
  • said mobile devices are particularly useful because of the many learning applications and basic language tools, such as spell check and grammar check, which increase the speed of learning. Rather than view the mobile applications as learning shortcuts tantamount to cheating, Nieto sees them as motivational tools that increase his students’ interest in reading and writing by giving them instant feedback. It’s a perspective most of his students seem to share.
    • sallymastro
       
      Instant feedback is what I am looking for in the English classroom. I want to be able to provide constructive criticism more immediately, so the students can edit at the moment as opposed to waiting a day or two days to receive my comments on a writing piece.
  • as motivational tools that increase his students’ interest in reading and writing by giving them instant feedback.
    • sallymastro
       
      When I indicated to my students that they could use kindles, kobos or ireaders/iphones for the ISU novel study unit, they were quite excited and quickly retained copies of ISU via this means. I am still using paper copies of the books as well, but I want to be able to have choice in their methods of acquiring texts and engaging in the reading process.
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  • Project Tomorrow survey of roughly 300,000 K-12 students, 42,000 parents, 38,000 teachers and librarians, and 3,500 administrators from over 6,500 public and private schools, on how they are using—and would like to be using —new technologies in the classroom.
  • The results show that while the majority of students—and, perhaps surprisingly, parents—are in favor of using mobile devices for learning as long as the school allows it, most school administrators remain opposed
  • “I know the main reasons mobile technology is not welcome in the classroom are fear and misunderstanding about the structure that it gives the learning,” said Reina Cabezas, a teacher at Cox Elementary in Oakland, Calif., who is also doing masters thesis research on the topic of mobile devices in the classroom.
    • sallymastro
       
      Currently my students are participating in their ISU novel study. They are currently reading and annotating their novels. I have indicated to my students that ireaders or ereaders are the quickest means to accessing a text as opposed to waiting one to two weeks for a book if it has had to be ordered. With the ireaders and ereaders they can now annotate and highlight important or interesting passages as they read. I would like to be able to have the students bring these technology tools to class. I have indicated that this is the direction in which I am going with ISU study, and so far, my Director has indicated he will back in allowing the kids to bring ereaders/ireaders to class. Fingers crossed it will bring positive and engaging results.
  • “But I don't think we stop living because of fear, right? No, we educate ourselves and learn about the security measures, expectations of all stakeholders, and apply principles of successful models of mobile devices in the classroom. Most importantly, we realize that technology is a tool of efficacy for the teacher, not the teacher's replacement. Lastly, technology only engages and motivates students when teachers know how to use them strategically to keep the hook. Overuse of anything is never good.”
    • sallymastro
       
      I am hoping that I will be able to show my Director and Head of School the successful incorporation of ereaders/ireaders into the English classroom.
    • sallymastro
       
      Ongoing concern within my school is the use of personal mobile devices in the classroom. Policy at our school is mobile phones are in the lockers and not used on school premises.
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    You should read this article because, like me, if you have been skeptical about the use of iphones in the classroom, you will be enlightened about how to proceed in a way that will make technologies in the classroom understandable to and meaningful for all stakeholders:administrators, teachers, parents and students. Stay tuned for my blog on incorporating ireaders/ereaders in the English classroom. 
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