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Lisa C. Hurst

Inside the School Silicon Valley Thinks Will Save Education | WIRED - 9 views

www.wired.com/altschool

shared by Lisa C. Hurst on 05 May 15 - No Cached
  • Lisa C. Hurst on 05 May 15
     
    "AUTHOR: ISSIE LAPOWSKY. ISSIE LAPOWSKY DATE OF PUBLICATION: 05.04.15. 05.04.15 TIME OF PUBLICATION: 7:00 AM. 7:00 AM INSIDE THE SCHOOL SILICON VALLEY THINKS WILL SAVE EDUCATION Click to Open Overlay Gallery Students in the youngest class at the Fort Mason AltSchool help their teacher, Jennifer Aguilar, compile a list of what they know and what they want to know about butterflies. CHRISTIE HEMM KLOK/WIRED SO YOU'RE A parent, thinking about sending your 7-year-old to this rogue startup of a school you heard about from your friend's neighbor's sister. It's prospective parent information day, and you make the trek to San Francisco's South of Market neighborhood. You walk up to the second floor of the school, file into a glass-walled conference room overlooking a classroom, and take a seat alongside dozens of other parents who, like you, feel that public schools-with their endless bubble-filled tests, 38-kid classrooms, and antiquated approach to learning-just aren't cutting it. At the same time, you're thinking: this school is kind of weird. On one side of the glass is a cheery little scene, with two teachers leading two different middle school lessons on opposite ends of the room. But on the other side is something altogether unusual: an airy and open office with vaulted ceilings, sunlight streaming onto low-slung couches, and rows of hoodie-wearing employees typing away on their computers while munching on free snacks from the kitchen. And while you can't quite be sure, you think that might be a robot on wheels roaming about. Then there's the guy who's standing at the front of the conference room, the school's founder. Dressed in the San Francisco standard issue t-shirt and jeans, he's unlike any school administrator you've ever met. But the more he talks about how this school uses technology to enhance and individualize education, the more you start to like what he has to say. And so, if you are truly fed up with the school stat
Christine Schlitt

Lesson Plans: Name & Word Wall Activities, Building Blocks (Kindergarten, Building Blocks) - 32 views

teachers.net/...2466.html

lesson plans kiundergarten kindergarten lesson lessons alphabet plans name word wall teaching

shared by Christine Schlitt on 05 Sep 11 - No Cached
  • Word Walls and The Name Game Each day we have one person who is our helper and we focus onher name. When everyone has had a turn, we start another round.I find it easiest to go in alphabetical order by first names. I write the students names on sentence strips, using one colorfor boys, and another for girls.First round: We reveal one name each day, beginning with a cheer:?Gimme a B (B), Gimme an i (i), Gimme an l (l), Gimme another l(l), Gimme a y (y). What?s that spell? (Billy). One more time!(Billy). Then I ask if anyone ?notices? anything about Billy?s name andwe look for letters in common with other names, or count lettersand look for other names with the same number of letters. Thenwe take a good look at the student, discussing colors ofclothing, so each child can draw a picture of the helper. Iwrite the helper?s name on the board and encourage everyone totry to write that person?s name and then draw a picture of thehelper. The helper gets to take home the pictures drawn byothers, his is put up on the bulletin board with the name cardI?ve made. 2nd Round: The self-portraits are put into a class book and thename cards are transferred to an alphabet word wall. Each day weread the alphabet and names, then take the helper?s name off tocheer and ?notice? letters about this name and others. We formthe helper?s name in magnetic letters, scramble them up and taketurns putting them in the right order. 3rd Round: When we read the alphabet, we say the sounds inaddition to the letters and names. This time we cheer, writethe letters in the helper?s name on the board and then count howmany of those letters are in the names on the word wall. Thenwe talk about which letter has the most, least, etc. We havealso added another name cheer: ?Bryan, Bryan, that?s his name.It starts with B, it ends with n, hooray, Bryan! We stillscramble the name with magnetic letters. At some point we begin to add sight words to the names on thewall, usually starting with go and we. In December, or after wecome back from Christmas, we take the names off the word walland put them in a pocket chart for the kids to use duringcenters. We continue to add sight words the rest of the year,reading the alphabet, and saying the sounds and words each day. Here are additional name ideas; some I?ve tried, some I haven?t.*Count the syllables.*Write the names like a rainbow.*Name poems from the website Korky?s Kool rhyme machine (http://www.literacyhour.co.uk/learning_activities/rhyme/rhyme.html)*Think of words that begin the same as the name.*Make up tongue twisters.*Fill out an interview sheet.*Mystery person (hangman type game where you draw blanks for theletters and the kids guess letters until they know the name.* Use the letters in the name and look for smaller words. *Cut up name puzzles to keep in a literacy center.*Change the initial consonant and play with the word (Sue, Bue,Lue, etc.).*Another name cheer: No matter what I do or say,My name will always be the same,It starts with_____It ends with ____Now count to 3 and say my name,1,2,3,_______.
    • Christine Schlitt
      Christine Schlitt on 05 Sep 11
       
      Name Game Ideas for Kindergarten
  • Christine Schlitt on 05 Sep 11
     
    "Word Walls and The Name Game Each day we have one person who is our helper and we focus on her name. When everyone has had a turn, we start another round. I find it easiest to go in alphabetical order by first names. I write the students names on sentence strips, using one color for boys, and another for girls. First round: We reveal one name each day, beginning with a cheer: ?Gimme a B (B), Gimme an i (i), Gimme an l (l), Gimme another l (l), Gimme a y (y). What?s that spell? (Billy). One more time! (Billy). Then I ask if anyone ?notices? anything about Billy?s name and we look for letters in common with other names, or count letters and look for other names with the same number of letters. Then we take a good look at the student, discussing colors of clothing, so each child can draw a picture of the helper. I write the helper?s name on the board and encourage everyone to try to write that person?s name and then draw a picture of the helper. The helper gets to take home the pictures drawn by others, his is put up on the bulletin board with the name card I?ve made. 2nd Round: The self-portraits are put into a class book and the name cards are transferred to an alphabet word wall. Each day we read the alphabet and names, then take the helper?s name off to cheer and ?notice? letters about this name and others. We form the helper?s name in magnetic letters, scramble them up and take turns putting them in the right order. 3rd Round: When we read the alphabet, we say the sounds in addition to the letters and names. This time we cheer, write the letters in the helper?s name on the board and then count how many of those letters are in the names on the word wall. Then we talk about which letter has the most, least, etc. We"
Adrienne Michetti

Where Everybody Knows Your (Screen) Name: Online Games as "Third Places" - 52 views

jcmc.indiana.edu/...steinkuehler.html

games gaming social

shared by Adrienne Michetti on 19 Nov 09 - Cached
    • Adrienne Michetti
      Adrienne Michetti on 19 Nov 09
       
      This is, I think, why I'm more keen on today's social networks than I am on games -- games do not provide deep emotional support.
  • "bowling alone" hypothesis (Putnam, 2000), which suggests that media are displacing crucial civic and social institutions
    • Adrienne Michetti
      Adrienne Michetti on 19 Nov 09
       
      Putnam - need to check this article. Interesting; not sure I agree.
  • ...80 more annotations...
  • According to Putnam, time spent with relatively passive and disengaging media has come at the expense of time spent on vital community-building activities.
  • The evidence to date is mixed
  • A core problem on both sides of the debate is an underlying assumption that all Internet use is more or less equivalent
    • Adrienne Michetti
      Adrienne Michetti on 19 Nov 09
       
      SO True
  • It would be more plausible and empirically rigorous, then, to consider how specific forms of Internet activity impact civic and social engagement as a result of their particular underlying social architectures
  • combining conclusions from two different lines of MMO research conducted from two different perspectives—one from a media effects approach, the other from a sociocultural perspective on cognition and learning.
  • By providing spaces for social interaction and relationships beyond the workplace and home, MMOs have the capacity to function as one form of a new "third place" for informal sociability much like the pubs, coffee shops, and other hangouts of old.
  • loosely structured by open-ended narratives
  • They are known for their peculiar combination of designed "escapist fantasy" and emergent "social realism"
  • from two research projects: one an examination of the media effects of MMOs, the other an ethnographic study of cognition and culture in such contexts.
  • the conclusions of both studies were remarkably aligned.
  • the assumption that the most fruitful advances are sometimes made when congruent findings are discovered through disparate means
    • Adrienne Michetti
      Adrienne Michetti on 19 Nov 09
       
      Love this quote.
  • demonstrate the "effects" of game play vs. no game play.
  • first project was a traditional effects study
  • second project, a qualitative study of cognition and learning in MMOs (
  • ethnography
  • sociocultural perspective
  • as a way to tease out what happens in the virtual setting of the game and how the people involved consider their own activities, the activities of others, and the contexts in which those activities takes place
  • a reasonable level of generalizability (random assignment to condition in the first study) and contextualization (ethnographic description of existing in-game social networks and practices in the second)
    • Adrienne Michetti
      Adrienne Michetti on 19 Nov 09
       
      but I wonder why he chose these games -- this is not specified. Only their success in US and abroad?
  • brick-and-mortar "third places" in America where individuals can gather to socialize informally beyond the workplace and home
  • the exaggerated self-consciousness of individuals.
  • In what ways might MMOs function as new third places for informal sociability?
  • virtual environments have the potential to function as new (albeit digitally mediated) third places similar to pubs, coffee shops, and other hangouts.
  • in this section we analyze the structural form of MMOs that warrants this "third place" assertion.
  • eight defining characteristics of third places
  • there is no default obligation
  • To oblige any one person to play requires that explicit agreements be entered into by parties
  • the default assumption is that no one person is compelled to participate legally, financially, or otherwise.
  • Unless one transforms the virtual world of the game into a workplace (e.g., by taking on gainful employment as a virtual currency "farmer" for example, Dibbell, 2006; Steinkuehler, 2006a) or enters into such agreement, no one person is obligated to log in
    • Adrienne Michetti
      Adrienne Michetti on 19 Nov 09
       
      and this is why, in my opinion, you will never see games in school. The game cannot be the Third Place because school is a Second Place.
  • Yee's (2006) interviews also reveal that individuals who game with romantic partners or family find that such joint engagement in the "other world" of MMOs allows them to redefine the nature and boundaries of their offline relationships, often in more equitable terms than what may be possible in day-to-day offline life
  • the relationships that play-partners have with one another offline are often "leveled" within the online world
  • an individual's rank and status in the home, workplace, or society are of no importance
  • appeal to people in part because they represent meritocracies otherwise unavailable in a world often filled with unfairness
  • conversation plays an analogous role
  • "In all such systems, linguistic interactions have been primary: users exchange messages that cement the social bonds between them, messages that reflect shared history and understandings (or misunderstandings) about the always evolving local norms for these interactions" (p. 22).
  • third places must also be easy to access
  • such that "one may go alone at almost any time of the day or evening with assurance that acquaintances will be there"
  • accessible directly from one's home, making them even more accommodating to individual schedules and preferences
  • barriers to initial access.
  • "What attracts a regular visitor to a third place is supplied not by management but by the fellow customer,"
  • "It is the regulars who give the place its character and who assure that on any given visit some of the gang will be there"
  • affective sense
  • As one informant satirically commented in an interview, "You go for the experience [points], you stay for the enlightening conversation.
  • engendering a sense of reliable mentorship and community stability.
  • Oldenburg argues that third places are characteristically homely, their d�cor defying tidiness and pretension whenever possible. MMOs do not fit this criterion in any literal sense
  • In neither of our investigations did the degree of formality exhibited by players within the game bear any relation to the degree of visual ornamentation of the players' immediate vicinity.
  • Thus, while the visual form of MMO environments does not fit Oldenburg's (1999) criterion of "low profile," the social function of those environments does.
  • Oldenburg (1999) argues that seriousness is anathema to a vibrant third place; instead, frivolity, verbal word play, and wit are essential.
  • The playful nature of MMOs is perhaps most apparent in what happens when individuals do bring gravity to the game.
  • the home-like quality of third places in rooting people
  • Participation becomes a regular part of daily life for players and, among regular gamemates such as guild members, exceptional absences (i.e., prolonged or unforeseen ones) are queried within the game or outside i
  • create an atmosphere of mutual caring that, while avoiding entangling obligations per se, creates a sense of rootedness to the extent that regularities exist, irregularities are duly noted, and, when concerning the welfare of any one regular, checked into
  • Are virtual communities really communities, or is physical proximity necessary?
  • Anderson (1991), who suggests that geographic proximity itself is neither a necessary nor sufficient condition for the emergence and preservation of "community."
  • Social capital (Coleman, 1988) works analogously to financial capital; it can be acquired and spent, but for social and personal gains rather than financial
  • operates cyclically within social networks because of their associated norms of reciprocity
  • bridging social capital is inclusive.
  • This form of social capital is marked by tentative relationships, yet what they lack in depth, they make up for in breadth.
  • On the one hand, bridging social capital provides little in the way of emotional support; on the other hand, such relationships can broaden social horizons or worldviews, providing access to information and new resources.
  • bonding social capital is exclusive.
  • social superglue.
  • it can also result in insularity.
  • shows that bridging and bonding social capital are tied to different social contexts, given the network of relationships they enable.
  • Virtual worlds appear to function best as bridging mechanisms rather than as bonding ones, although they do not entirely preclude social ties of the latter type.
  • One could argue that, if the benchmark for bonding social capital is the ability to acquire emotional, practical, or substantive support, then MMOs are not well set up for the task:
  • While deep affective relationships among players are possible, they are less likely to generate the same range of bonding benefits as real-world relationships because of players' geographic dispersion and the nature of third places themselves.
  • Despite differences in theoretical grounding and methodologies, our conclusions were remarkably similar across complementary macro- and micro-levels.
  • It is worth noting, however, that as gamers become more involved in long-term social networks such as guilds and their activities become more "hardcore" (e.g., marked by participation in large-scale collaborative problem-solving endeavors such as "raids" into difficult territories or castle sieges), the function of MMOs as "third places" begins to wane.
  • It may be, then, that the structure and function of MMOs as third places is one part of the "life cycle" for some gamers in a given title.
  • In such cases, MMOs appear to enable a different kind of sociability, one ostensibly recognizable as a "community" nonetheless.
  • However, our research findings indicate that this conclusion is uninformed. To argue that MMO game play is isolated and passive media consumption in place of informal social engagement is to ignore the nature of what participants actually do behind the computer screen
  • Perhaps it is not that contemporary media use has led to a decline in civic and social engagement, but rather that a decline in civic and social engagement has led to retribalization through contemporary media (McLuhan, 1964).
  • Such a view, however, ignores important nuances of what "community" means by pronouncing a given social group/place as either wholly "good" or "bad" without first specifying which functions the online community ought to fulfill.
  • Moreover, despite the semantics of the term, "weak" ties have been shown to be vital in communities, relationships, and opportunities.
  • is to what extent such environments shift the existing balance between bridging and bonding
  • In light of Putnam's evidence of the decline of crucial civic and social institutions, it may well be that the classification "lacking bridging social capital" best characterizes the everyday American citizen. T
  • Without bridging relationships, individuals remain sheltered from alternative viewpoints and cultures and largely ignorant of opportunities and information beyond their own closely bound social network.
  • it seems ironic that, now of all times, we would ignore one possible solution to our increasingly vexed relationship with diversity.
Randolph Hollingsworth

Ariz State Univ - Service Learning syllabus (USL410 Indep Placement) - 7 views

servicelearning.asu.edu/...10

shared by Randolph Hollingsworth on 07 Sep 12 - No Cached
  • Randolph Hollingsworth on 07 Sep 12
     
    COURSE OBJECTIVES: This is a graded internship that allows you to integrate your own coursework with a hands-on service learning experience. The central objective of this course is to provide students with community experiences and reflection opportunities that examine community needs, the importance of civic engagement, and social justice issues affecting ethnic minorities and marginalized populations in contemporary American society. Students dedicate 70 hours at a pre-approved site (including Title I K-12 schools, youth programs, health services, social services, environmental programs, government agencies, etc.) directly serving a population in need or supporting activities that contribute to the greater good of our community. A weekly seminar, course readings, discussions, and reflection assignments facilitate critical thinking and a deeper understanding of cultural diversity, citizenship, and how to contribute to positive social change in our community. The course is also designed to provide "real-world" experiences that exercise academic skills and knowledge applicable to each student‟s program of study and career exploration. STUDENT LEARNING OBJECTIVES: Student will be introduced to essential skills associated with their baccalaureate studies to actively serve the local community. While completing this in-depth study of cultural diversity, citizenship and social justice issues facing our community, students will gain an understanding of the value of Social Embeddedness and the importance of incorporating civic engagement into their collegiate careers, as they strive to become civically engaged students. Students will be introduced to inequalities, discrimination, and other community issues facing ethnic minorities and marginalized populations, as well as the correlation with greater societal issues. INTERNSHIP RESPONSIBILITIES:  Service hours - 70 hours of community outreach (spread throughout the semester in which you are enrolled in the course)
Randolph Hollingsworth

ASU - Service Learning USL210 - 5 views

servicelearning.asu.edu/...11

shared by Randolph Hollingsworth on 07 Sep 12 - No Cached
  • Randolph Hollingsworth on 07 Sep 12
     
    COURSE OBJECTIVES: This is a graded internship that allows you to integrate your own coursework with a hands-on service learning experience. The central objective of this course is to provide students with community experiences and reflection opportunities that examine community needs, the importance of civic engagement, and social justice issues affecting ethnic minorities and marginalized populations in contemporary American society. Students dedicate 70 hours at a pre-approved site (including Title I K-12 schools, youth programs, health services, social services, environmental programs, government agencies, etc.) directly serving a population in need or supporting activities that contribute to the greater good of our community. A weekly seminar, course readings, discussions, and reflection assignments facilitate critical thinking and a deeper understanding of cultural diversity, citizenship, and how to contribute to positive social change in our community. The course is also designed to provide "real-world" experiences that exercise academic skills and knowledge applicable to each student‟s program of study and career exploration. STUDENT LEARNING OBJECTIVES: Student will be introduced to essential skills associated with their baccalaureate studies to actively serve the local community. While completing this in-depth study of cultural diversity, citizenship and social justice issues facing our community, students will gain an understanding of the value of Social Embeddedness and the importance of incorporating civic engagement into their collegiate careers, as they strive to become civically engaged students. Students will be introduced to inequalities, discrimination, and other community issues facing ethnic minorities and marginalized populations, as well as the correlation with greater societal issues. INTERNSHIP RESPONSIBILITIES:  Service hours - 70 hours of community outreach (spread throughout the semester in which you are enrolled in the course)
Jess Hazlewood

"Where's the Writer" TETYC March 2014 - 43 views

DIIGO_FILE_HOME/1dj8a/b5ju

shared by Jess Hazlewood on 03 Sep 14 - No Cached
  • “Responders Are Taught, Not Born”
  • We contend that student writers will see greater value in peer response if they develop tools that allow them to participate more actively in the feedback process. With teaching suggestions like those above, writers can learn how to re-flect on their experiences with peer response. They can also learn to identify their needs as writers and how to ask questions that will solicit the feedback they need.
  • We like to limit each mock session to no more than seven minutes of back and forth between respondent and writer.
  • ...33 more annotations...
  • class suggests that the writer’s question
  • This becomes a teachable moment. When the respondent asks for assistance from the class, this break in the session becomes an opportunity for the class to assist the writer and the respondent. The writer appears stuck, not knowing what to ask. And the respondent appears perplexed, too.
  • we follow Carl Anderson’s suggestion to teach students how to ask questions about their writing through role-playing.
  • dynamic list that students freely update throughout the semester on the class classro
  • organize the questions within categories such as tone, content, evidence-based support, style, and logistics
  • The end result is a robust list of questions for writers to ask of their respondents.
  • in-class discussion about effective and less effective questions for writers
  • raft three to five questions they have about the assignment to ask of their peers as they prepare to write or revise their assignment. When appropriate, we can direct our students to the course text, where there are
  • : pointing, summarizing, and reflecting
  • Students’ comments often point to their struggle to position themselves in peer response.
  • “What would it take for you to be in-vested as writers in peer response?” Students’ typical responses include the following:>“I need to know what to ask.” >“I don’t know what to ask about my writing, except for things like punctua-tion and grammar.”>“Does the person reading my work really know what the assignment is? Bet-ter than I do?”>“I’m not really sure if I’m supposed to talk or ask questions when someone is giving me feedback about my work, so I don’t really do anything. They write stuff on my paper. Sometimes I read it if I can, but I don’t really know what to do with it.”
  • it is important to offer activities to ensure that both respondents and writers are able to articulate a clear purpose of what they are trying to accomplish. These activities, guided by the pedagogies used to prepare writing center consultants
  • devote more attention to the respondent than to the writer, we may unwit-tingly be encouraging writers to be bystanders, rather than active participants, in the response process.
  • , “Feedback: What Works for You and How Do You Get It?”
  • highlight the value of both giving and getting feedback:In 56 pages near the end of this book, we’ve explained all the good methods we know for getting feedback from classmates on your writing. . . . The ability to give responses to your classmates’ writing and to get their responses to your own writing may be the most important thing you learn from this book. (B
  • we question whether textbooks provide emergent writers with enough tools or explicit models to engage actively in peer response conversations.
  • While such questions are helpful to emerging writers, who depend on modeling, they lack explanation about what makes them “helpful” questions. As a result, emerging writers may perceive them as a prescriptive set of questions that must be answered (or worse, a set of questions to be “given over” to a respondent), rather than what they are intended to be: questions that could advance the writer’s thoughts and agenda.
  • this information is limited to the instructor’s manual
  • llustrates the difference be-tween vague and helpful questions, pointing out that helpful questions
  • You will need to train students to ask good questions, which will help reviewers target their attention.Questions like “How can I make this draft better?” “What grade do you think this will get?” and “What did you think?” are not helpful, as they are vague and don’t reflect anything about the writer’s own thoughts. Questions like “Am I getting off topic in the introduction when I talk about walking my sister to the corner on her first day of school?” or “Does my tone on page 3 seem harsh? I’m trying to be fair to the people who disagree with the decision I’m describing” help readers understand the writer’s purpose and will set up good conversations. (Harrington 14, emphasis added
  • uestions” when soliciting feedback (like the advice we found in many textbooks), she also provides explicit examples for doing so
  • he most explicit advice for writers about ask-ing questions and, in effect, setting up good conversations is buried in an instruc-tor’s manual for The Allyn & Bacon Guide to Writing. In thi
  • “Getting Response” chapter later in the book, they will benefit from the textbook authors’ instructions that they should in fact use questions that will help them solicit their feedback
  • dependent on what parts of the textbook they choose to read
  • point writers to a specific set of questions that they should ask of their respondents. Such instructions take a notable step toward shifting the locus of control from the respondent to helping writers engage their peers in conversation.
  • there is no mention that writers might use them for purposes of soliciting feedback.
  • we see an opportunity for modeling that is not fully realized.
  • we argue that Faigley offers respondents specific examples that empower them to actively engage the process and give feedback. We contend that emergent writers need a similar level of instruction if they are to be agents in response.
  • textbook authors offer few examples for how to get specific feedback
  • Peter Elbow and Pat Belanoff ’s first edition of A Community of Writers published in 1995, in which eleven “Sharing and Responding” techniques, d
  • we worked to understand how textbooks highlight the writer’s role in peer response.
  • We wanted to know what books tell writers about asking questions
  • lthough we do not discount the importance of teaching respondents how to give feedback, we argue that writers must also be taught how to request the feedback they desire.
  • Jess Hazlewood on 03 Sep 14
     
    Writer's role in soliciting feedback during peer edit. Suggestions for modeling and training.
Aaron Shaw

Education World ® Lesson Planning: Icebreakers - 107 views

www.educationworld.com/...lesson074.shtml

education TEACHING Icebreakers planning

shared by Aaron Shaw on 29 Aug 10 - Cached
  • Aaron Shaw on 29 Aug 10
     
    Last September, in response to an Education World story, teachers around the world sent in their favorite first-day-of-school activities. So here they are -- 14 great activities to help you get to know your new students -- and to help them get to know you!
Roland Gesthuizen

Why Sing? | Mrs Fintelman Teaches - 6 views

mrsfintelmanteaches.global2.vic.edu.au/...why-sing

singing music arts teaching TeachingStrategy blog

shared by Roland Gesthuizen on 15 Mar 15 - No Cached
  • Roland Gesthuizen on 15 Mar 15
     
    At the start of the year I love to start off with a lot of singing. As in A LOT. We sing on the first day, first thing in the morning. We spend a good part of the morning singing. We sing in between activities, waiting in lines and just before we go home.
Mary Beth Messner

firstday - Tech - 164 views

firstday.wikispaces.com/Tech

First Day Activities Icebreakers

shared by Mary Beth Messner on 19 Aug 11 - No Cached
  • Mary Beth Messner on 19 Aug 11
     
    First day activities organized by subject. While the site is geared toward K-12 students, I'm sure many activities could be adapted for our online students.
Brianna Crowley

Response: Several Ways to Get the New Year Off to a Good Start -- Part One - Classroom ... - 60 views

blogs.edweek.org/..._a_good_start_--_part_one.html

firstday resources teaching

shared by Brianna Crowley on 16 Aug 12 - No Cached
Denise Olsen liked it
  • Every day that first week, even in the first meeting, teach something substantive in the curriculum. Make it something that is brand new, not something reviewed from the previous year. Students are hungry for intellectual engagement after a summer off, and they want to think great thoughts and do great works.
  • Mix academics with administrative and Get-to-Know-You activities. It should be about 50-50: half engagement with interesting academics, half focused on forms, announcements, or activities meant to build classroom community. Keep the ratio: students will grow impatient and disillusioned if too much time is spent on get-to-know-you activities. It sounds weird, but most students are not looking for continued summer camp experiences so much as they are seeking confidence and engagement.
  • choose poems related to growing up or modern culture, or read share the lyrics of powerful songs of any generation.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • Tell students what new opportunities and freedoms they now have instead of just listing rules and the consequences for breaking them.
Carol Ansel

The Daring Librarian: Wikipedia is not wicked! - The Answer Sheet - The Washington Post - 70 views

www.washingtonpost.com/...gIQAYWSF8J_blog.html

wikipedia washintonpost daringlibrarian encyclopedia research

shared by Carol Ansel on 08 Sep 11 - No Cached
  • Teaching Wikipedia in 5 Easy Steps: *Use it as background information *Use it for technology terms *Use it for current pop cultural literacy *Use it for the Keywords *Use it for the REFERENCES at the bottom of the page!
  • 4 ways to use Wikipedia (hint: never cite it) Teachers: Please stop prohibiting the use of Wikipedia 20 Little Known Ways to Use Wikipedia Study: Wikipedia as accurate as Encyclopedia Britannica Schiff, Stacy. “Know it all: Can Wikipedia conquer expertise?” The New Yorker, February 26, 2006 And: Yes students, there’s a world beyond Wikipedia **Several years ago, Nature magazine did a comparison of material available on Wikipedia and Brittanica and concluded that Brittanica was somewhat, but not overwhelmingly, more accurate than Wikipedia. Brittanica lodged a complaint, and here, you can see what it complained about as well as Nature’s response. Nature compared articles from both organizations on various topics and sent them to experts to review. Per article, the averages were: 2.92 mistakes per article for Britannica and 3.86 for Wikipedia. -0- Follow The Answer Sheet every day by bookmarking http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet. And for admissions advice, college news and links to campus papers, please check out our Higher Education page. Bookmark it! var entrycat = ' ' By Valerie Strauss  |  05:00 AM ET, 09/07/2011 .connect_widget .connect_widget_text .connect_widget_connected_text a {display:block;} #center {overflow:visible;} /*.override-width iframe {width:274px !important;}*/ Tumblr Reddit Stumbleupon Digg Delicious LinkedIn http://platform.twitter.com/widgets/tweet_button.html#_=1315504289567&count=horizontal&counturl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Fblogs%2Fanswer-sheet%2Fpost%2F
  • Carol Ansel on 08 Sep 11
     
    Excellent perspective on "The 'W' Word" - use it wisely for what it is - high school and college kids shouldn't be citing any general knowledge encyclopedias for serious research - but that doesn't mean there aren't some excellent uses for it.
Christopher Lee

Creating a Wordsearch using Google Spreadsheets - 1 views

blog.pamelafox.org/...g-wordsearch-using-google.html

gapps googleapps gdocs wordsearch activator vocabulary spreadsheets

shared by Christopher Lee on 25 Jul 12 - No Cached
  • Christopher Lee on 25 Jul 12
     
    SUNDAY, MAY 17, 2009 Creating a Wordsearch using Google Spreadsheets I'm a fan of alternative learning and testing techniques. Back when I was the teaching assistant for the "History of Video Games" class (yes, that's a real class), I gave the final exam as an illustrated crossword puzzle. It was surprisingly hard to find software for creating that crossword, so I hoped to make a Spreadsheets gadget to make it easier. Unfortunately, crossword-solving algorithms that run entirely in JavaScript are hard to find, and I gave up and went for second best: a wordsearch gadget. (A big thanks to Robert Klein for the wordsearch JavaScript library.) Here are steps for using the gadget: Create a new spreadsheet, and put a list of words in the first column. (Or, alternatively, use an existing spreadsheet that has a column of words you're interested in). My sample spreadsheet has a simple animals wordlist: Click on the "Insert" menu and then select "Gadget..." This presents you with various categories of gadgets to choose from (similar to the iGoogle directory). My gadget isn't yet in the gallery, so you'll need to select "Custom" and then type in the URL to the gadget: The gadget will appear embedded in the current worksheet, and it will prompt you to select a range of data to send to the gadget. Select all the cells that contain the desired words, and you should see the Range text field update with the range. If it doesn't work, you can always manually type it in. You can now customize the number of rows and columns. The default is 10 by 10, but if you have more words, you likely want a larger wordsearch. Click "Apply", and see the generated output. You have a few options for how you use the wordsearch. You can play with it immediately, inside that gadget, or you can use the option on the gadget menu to move the gadget to its own sheet and use it there. Note that each time you reload the spreadsheet, the wordsearch will be randomly generated with a new layout - so
Keith Rowley

Brief meditative exercise helps cognition - 5 views

www.sciencedaily.com/...100414184220.htm

meditation cognition exercise brain mindfulness psychology spirituality personal news

shared by Keith Rowley on 20 Jun 11 - Cached
  • "Simply stated, the profound improvements that we found after just 4 days of meditation training- are really surprising," Zeidan noted. "It goes to show that the mind is, in fact, easily changeable and highly influenced, especially by meditation."
  • The meditation training involved in the study was an abbreviated "mindfulness" training regime modeled on basic "Shamatha skills" from a Buddhist meditation tradition
  • "Findings like these suggest that meditation's benefits may not require extensive training to be realized, and that meditation's first benefits may be associated with increasing the ability to sustain attention,"
  • ...5 more annotations...
  • seems to be strong evidence for the idea that we may be able to modify our own minds to improve our cognitive processing -- most importantly in the ability to sustain attention and vigilance -- within a week's time."
  • Both groups also improved following the meditation and reading experiences in measures of mood, but only the group that received the meditation training improved significantly in the cognitive measures. The meditation group scored consistently higher averages than the reading/listening group on all the cognitive tests and as much as ten times better on one challenging test that involved sustaining the ability to focus, while holding other information in mind. "The meditation group did especially better on all the cognitive tests that were timed," Zeidan noted. "In tasks where participants had to process information under time constraints causing stress, the group briefly trained in mindfulness performed significantly better."
  • participants were instructed to relax, with their eyes closed, and to simply focus on the flow of their breath occurring at the tip of their nose. If a random thought arose, they were told to passively notice and acknowledge the thought and to simply let 'it' go, by bringing the attention back to the sensations of the breath."
  • "The simple process of focusing on the breath in a relaxed manner, in a way that teaches you to regulate your emotions by raising one's awareness of mental processes as they're happening is like working out a bicep, but you are doing it to your brain. Mindfulness meditation teaches you to release sensory events that would easily distract, whether it is your own thoughts or an external noise, in an emotion-regulating fashion.
  • "This kind of training seems to prepare the mind for activity, but it's not necessarily permanent," Zeidan cautions. "This doesn't mean that you meditate for four days and you're done -- you need to keep practicing."
anorred79

Mrs. Orman's Classroom: Five Ways to Use Memes to Connect With Students - 68 views

www.traceeorman.com/...use-memes-to-connect-with.html

memes classroom icebreakers

shared by anorred79 on 23 Jul 14 - No Cached
    • anorred79
      anorred79 on 06 Oct 14
       
      Ice Breaker Activity is great to use on the first days of school.
Daryl Bambic

How a Radical New Teaching Method Could Unleash a Generation of Geniuses | Wired Busine... - 54 views

www.wired.com/...2

shared by Daryl Bambic on 24 Oct 13 - No Cached
    • Daryl Bambic
      Daryl Bambic on 24 Oct 13
       
      Natural selection and learning: asking questions and being curious is adaptive behaviour.
  • inland pared the country’s elementary math curriculum from about 25 pages to four, reduced the school day by an hour, and focused on independence and active learning. By 2003, Finnish students had climbed from the lower rungs of international performance rankings to first place among developed nations.
  • emphasizing student-led learning and collaboration.
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  • The teaching method makes little difference,” he says.
Clint Heitz

Flipping the Classroom: A revolutionary approach to learning presents some pros and con... - 73 views

www.slj.com/...ng-presents-some-pros-and-cons

flipping flipped classroom flipped_classroom

shared by Clint Heitz on 09 May 13 - No Cached
    • Clint Heitz
      Clint Heitz on 09 May 13
       
      Why not create multiple types of videos? YouTube allows "choose your own path" videos that can let you alter the video based on the responses during viewing.
    • Clint Heitz
      Clint Heitz on 09 May 13
       
      Great way to provide equitable access opportunities
  • Teachers need to figure out what they want to get out of a flipped classroom, says Marine City High’s Ming. “What’s the purpose of doing it? Is it because you’re looking for more time in your curriculum to do hands-on activities?” An AP government teacher told Ming the best part of teaching his class was holding class discussions. The flipped classroom helped him get through the material with time to spare for conversation.
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    • Clint Heitz
      Clint Heitz on 09 May 13
       
      The purpose is always the key. Don't try to implement this "just because" or excessively. It is a great tool, but not always the right one.
  • Watching videos also means more sitting in front of devices. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends kids limit “screen time” to two hours a day because too much exposure has been linked to obesity, irregular sleep, behavioral problems, violence, and less time for play.
    • Clint Heitz
      Clint Heitz on 09 May 13
       
      Why not flip it with podcasts that students can listen to while walking, driving, etc.
  • Students need to feel as though their teachers are guiding them to the best materials, not merely giving them a list of videos to watch, says Valenza
  • “Teachers should keep posing the ‘why,’” says Bob Schuetz, the technology director at Palatine High School in Illinois. “Why am I doing this? Why is it beneficial to students?”
  • “The teacher walks around and helps everyone. It’s not a get-out-of-jail-free card for teachers not to teach.” It’s also not a way for kids to get out of doing anything at home. “Flipping what the kid does means they do the work ahead of time, come to class, and debrief,” explains Michelle Luhtala (aka the
  • “The end goal is personalized education. The flipped classroom is just a means to that end.” Students can use the videos to learn at their own pace—any time or place, says Roberts. “These students can replay their teacher’s explanation of a new concept as many times as they need to without fear of holding up the rest of the class.”
  • a librarian at Bullis School in Potomac, MD, gives students videos, Web pages, and screenshots about the nuts and bolts of the library, which frees up more time to devote to their research projects.
  • ure, some kids will ignore the video. “The same kids who don’t currently do their homework will not watch the lecture,” says McCammon. “But as you start making your class more engaging, kids who don’t usually do their homework will start doing it because they want to participate in the class.” Kids write questions down while they’re watching the video, and then the first 10 minutes of class is for discussion of what they’ve seen.
Aaron Shaw

First Days of School - 70 views

www.kimskorner4teachertalk.com/...firstday.html

firstday activities teaching school

shared by Aaron Shaw on 29 Aug 10 - Cached
  • Aaron Shaw on 29 Aug 10
     
    This is something that often gets overlooked. Although the students know your name, they do not know you. Let them know some things about you. Let them know where your grew up, where you went to school, your teaching background and how long you have been teaching.
mrssalasyoshii

10 Team-Building Games For The First Day Of Class - 111 views

diigo.com/07y3rx

shared by mrssalasyoshii on 07 Sep 15 - No Cached
  • mrssalasyoshii on 07 Sep 15
     
    by TeachThought Staff Team-building activities are great. Not only can they help establish routines, tone, and expectations, they're also fun, and can help learners feel comfortable. Though many older students in high school and college may groan at their thought, they're usually fun, and great ways to help students feel at ease.
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