There is an epidemic of
under-the-desk text messages during class, a virtual economy of exam pictures
posted to Facebook, a trade in school fight videos on YouTube, they say. To
combat it, the county school board voted Thursday to ban cellphones and other
electronics during the school day, even as many school systems across the
country are loosening their rules.
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Top 5 Tips For SEND Teachers by @backpocketteach - 6 views
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Tom Wolfe, Author and Satirist of America, Dies at 88 | Time - 4 views
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Wolfe scorned the reluctance of American writers to confront social issues and warned that self-absorption and master’s programs would kill the novel. “So the doors close and the walls go up!” he wrote in his 1989 literary manifesto, “Stalking the Billion-Footed Beast.” He was astonished that no author of his generation had written a sweeping, 19th century style novel about contemporary New York City, and ended up writing one himself, “The Bonfire of the Vanities.”
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“My contention is that status is on everybody’s mind all of the time, whether they’re conscious of it or not,”
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“new journalism” combined the emotional impact of a novel, the analysis of the best essays, and the factual foundation of hard reporting. He mingled it all in an over-the-top style that made life itself seem like one spectacular headline.
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pointed look at fund-raising for the Black Panther Party by Leonard Bernstein and other wealthy whites.
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And no one more memorably captured the beauty-and-the-beast divide between the Beatles and the Rolling Stones: “The Beatles want to hold your hand,” he wrote, “but the Rolling Stones want to burn down your town!”
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The Washington Post, where he won Washington Newspaper Guild awards in 1960 for his coverage of U.S.-Cuban affairs and a satiric account of that year’s Senate civil rights filibuster.
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The next year, Wolfe was assigned to cover a “Hot Rod & Custom Car” show. He completed a story, the kind “any of the somnambulistic totem newspapers in America would have come up with.” But he knew there was a much richer, and longer story to tell, one about a thriving subculture that captured the post-World War II economic boom and the new freedom to “build monuments” to one’s own style. No newspaper could contain what Wolfe had in mind, so he turned to Esquire magazine, wrote up 49 pages and helped give birth to a new kind of reporter. “For the who-what-where-when-why of traditional journalism, he has substituted what he calls ‘the wowie!'” according to a 1965 Newsweek story.
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“A Man in Full” turned Wolfe’s smirk to Atlanta society. His 2004 novel, “I Am Charlotte Simmons,” looked at life on a fictional elite college campus rife with drinking, status obsession and sex.
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The Creativity Crisis - Newsweek - 48 views
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there is one crucial difference between IQ and CQ scores. With intelligence, there is a phenomenon called the Flynn effect—each generation, scores go up about 10 points. Enriched environments are making kids smarter. With creativity, a reverse trend has just been identified and is being reported for the first time here: American creativity scores are falling.
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it’s left to the luck of the draw who becomes creative: there’s no concerted effort to nurture the creativity of all children
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Students are labeled as "creative" if they display a knack for art or music, and sometimes in writing, however, they are rarely recognized as creative in math or science where a lot of creativity is not only needed, but excellent for learning within those very two disciplines.
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This is precisely why creativity education is important. It is needed everywhere, not just in the arts. Those teaching outside of arts education need to start recognizing the importance of creative thinking as well.
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When faculty of a major Chinese university asked Plucker to identify trends in American education, he described our focus on standardized curriculum, rote memorization, and nationalized testing. “After my answer was translated, they just started laughing out loud,” Plucker says. “They said, ‘You’re racing toward our old model. But we’re racing toward your model, as fast as we can.’ ”
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The argument that we can’t teach creativity because kids already have too much to learn is a false trade-off. Creativity isn’t about freedom from concrete facts. Rather, fact-finding and deep research are vital stages in the creative process.
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When you try to solve a problem, you begin by concentrating on obvious facts and familiar solutions, to see if the answer lies there. This is a mostly left-brain stage of attack. If the answer doesn’t come, the right and left hemispheres of the brain activate together. Neural networks on the right side scan remote memories that could be vaguely relevant. A wide range of distant information that is normally tuned out becomes available to the left hemisphere, which searches for unseen patterns, alternative meanings, and high-level abstractions. Having glimpsed such a connection, the left brain must quickly lock in on it before it escapes. The attention system must radically reverse gears, going from defocused attention to extremely focused attention. In a flash, the brain pulls together these disparate shreds of thought and binds them into a new single idea that enters consciousness. This is the “aha!” moment of insight, often followed by a spark of pleasure as the brain recognizes the novelty of what it’s come up with. Now the brain must evaluate the idea it just generated. Is it worth pursuing? Creativity requires constant shifting, blender pulses of both divergent thinking and convergent thinking, to combine new information with old and forgotten ideas. Highly creative people are very good at marshaling their brains into bilateral mode, and the more creative they are, the more they dual-activate.
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those who diligently practice creative activities learn to recruit their brains’ creative networks quicker and better
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Creativity has always been prized in American society, but it’s never really been understood. While our creativity scores decline unchecked, the current national strategy for creativity consists of little more than praying for a Greek muse to drop by our houses. The problems we face now, and in the future, simply demand that we do more than just hope for inspiration to strike. Fortunately, the science can help: we know the steps to lead that elusive muse right to our doors.
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What’s common about successful programs is they alternate maximum divergent thinking with bouts of intense convergent thinking, through several stages. Real improvement doesn’t happen in a weekend workshop. But when applied to the everyday process of work or school, brain function improves.
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kids demonstrated the very definition of creativity: alternating between divergent and convergent thinking, they arrived at original and useful ideas. And they’d unwittingly mastered Ohio’s required fifth-grade curriculum—from understanding sound waves to per-unit cost calculations to the art of persuasive writing. “You never see our kids saying, ‘I’ll never use this so I don’t need to learn it,’ ” says school administrator Maryann Wolowiec. “Instead, kids ask, ‘Do we have to leave school now?’ ” Two weeks ago, when the school received its results on the state’s achievement test, principal Traci Buckner was moved to tears. The raw scores indicate that, in its first year, the school has already become one of the top three schools in Akron, despite having open enrollment by lottery and 42 percent of its students living in poverty.
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highly creative adults frequently grew up with hardship. Hardship by itself doesn’t lead to creativity, but it does force kids to become more flexible—and flexibility helps with creativity.
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When creative children have a supportive teacher—someone tolerant of unconventional answers, occasional disruptions, or detours of curiosity—they tend to excel. When they don’t, they tend to underperform and drop out of high school or don’t finish college at high rates. They’re quitting because they’re discouraged and bored, not because they’re dark, depressed, anxious, or neurotic. It’s a myth that creative people have these traits. (Those traits actually shut down creativity; they make people less open to experience and less interested in novelty.) Rather, creative people, for the most part, exhibit active moods and positive affect. They’re not particularly happy—contentment is a kind of complacency creative people rarely have. But they’re engaged, motivated, and open to the world.
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solutions emerge from a healthy marketplace of ideas, sustained by a populace constantly contributing original ideas and receptive to the ideas of others
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When scholars gave creativity tasks to both engineering majors and music majors, their scores laid down on an identical spectrum, with the same high averages and standard deviations. Inside their brains, the same thing was happening—ideas were being generated and evaluated on the fly.
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The lore of pop psychology is that creativity occurs on the right side of the brain. But we now know that if you tried to be creative using only the right side of your brain, it’d be like living with ideas perpetually at the tip of your tongue, just beyond reach
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those who diligently practice creative activities learn to recruit their brains’ creative networks quicker and better. A lifetime of consistent habits gradually changes the neurological pattern.
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The home-game version of this means no longer encouraging kids to spring straight ahead to the right answer
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“As a child, I never had an identity as a ‘creative person,’ ” Schwarzrock recalls. “But now that I know, it helps explain a lot of what I felt and went through.”
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In China there has been widespread education reform to extinguish the drill-and-kill teaching style. Instead, Chinese schools are also adopting a problem-based learning approach.
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there is one crucial difference between IQ and CQ scores. With intelligence, there is a phenomenon called the Flynn effect—each generation, scores go up about 10 points. Enriched environments are making kids smarter. With creativity, a reverse trend has just been identified and is being reported for the first time here: American creativity scores are falling.
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In Gatsby's Tracks: Locating the Valley of Ashes in a 1924 Photo | Literary Kicks - 54 views
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Desolate enough? The sight of workers toiling among these giant piles may have even reminded Fitzgerald of Dante, and Fitzgerald's real-life encounter with this spot must have played a part in the genesis of the entire novel.
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If Gatsby's caravan took this southern route, the railroad and highway would have merged exactly as described in the novel. Here, then, is the bridge they would have crossed. I can't tell for sure that it's a drawbridge, but I'm willing to believe it must be one. The tiny settlement to the right, then, is exactly the spot where Dr. Eckleburg's billboard would have stood, and where George Wilson would have kept his auto garage.
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1939 Worlds Fair and then the 1964-65 Worlds Fair. Shea Stadium was built to host the New York Mets on the northern side, and was then replaced by CitiField on the same spot. Every year the US Open Tennis Tournament is held at the Billie Jean King Tennis Center south of the baseball fields. Here's what the same spot looks like in an aerial photograph from 2009. Shea Stadium is on the top left, the US Open tennis courts on the bottom left.
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60second Recap® Video Notes. Everything you need to wow your English teacher! - 111 views
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Be sure to diigo this site! You'll love it!! It recaps all your "favorite" novels!
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60second Recap™ wants to make the great works of literature accessible, relevant, and, frankly, irresistible to today's teens. Through 60second Recap™ video albums, we seek to help teens engage with the best books out there ... not just to help them get better grades, but to help them build better lives.
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Video generated study guide for some of the top literature reads.The 60second Recap™ makes literature accessible, relevant, and, frankly, irresistible to today's teens.
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Jenny goes beyond the books to help you excel in class. Tips on reading, writing, and more.
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While it certainly satisfies a new low in apathy and lethargy, eclipsing the likes of Sparks and Cliff Notes, it does present an outstanding project idea for a literature class.
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Want to improve literacy in your school? Here's how | eSchool News - 23 views
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the district adopted the McGraw Hill curriculum for ELA.
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we teach students how to build an argument and develop critical-thinking skills using five steps: Claims, Evidence, Reasoning, Counterarguments, and Audience.
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To evaluate the effectiveness of our school-wide initiative, we now administer quarterly writing assessments for each content area. We analyze student writing samples at the end of each quarter and include norming as a department, using the district writing rubric to determine strengths and areas requiring improvement.
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Much of what our students learn is told to them, so it is critical that they develop listening comprehension.
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We started with a baseline assessment in September and will compare those results to a final writing sample at the end of the year.
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Top 10 Perks of Teaching, according to the #UKEdChat community - 11 views
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"Despite many challenges and pressures facing the teaching profession, taking a moment to step back an appreciate some of the positives can make you appreciate the joys to behold within the classroom. As part of a #UKEdChat discussion, teachers from around the UK shared the best perks of the job, which we have summarised here to help other colleagues reflect upon. We're not really in it for the perks, are we?"
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Tony Vincent's Learning in Hand - Blog - Wireless Mirroring from iPad to PC N... - 16 views
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Top Blog Podcasting iPod touch iPad iPod Netbooks PDAs Search Contact About Archives Accessories (1) android (3) annoucements (1) announcements (2) app (2) apps (2) appstore (12) blogging (8) caption (1) digital video (4) ebooks (3) economics (1) edapp (1) events (24) games (1) grants (1) handhelds (6) hhl07 (2) ios (9) ipad (37) iphone (59) iphone ipodtouch (1) ipod (48) ipod touch (1) ipodtouch (82) itunes (5) laptops (1) learning (1) learning in hand: ipods (25) math (1) mobile internet (6) mobile phone (12) mobile web (4) mobilelearning (1) netbooks (5) ourcity (3) palm (53) pbl (2) pocket pc (37) podcast (17) podcasting (48) ppcket pc (2) presentations (6) professional development (3) research (6) rss (2) sketchy (4) soft reset (8) tablets (1) tonyvincent (4) twitter (1) ustream (1) video (9) web2.0 (2) webapps (1) windows mobile (9) May 2012 (1) April 2012 (2) March 2012 (3)
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AirServer offer a 7 day trial period, though you will have to allow the developer to post on your Facebook wall. Standard and student licensing costs are very reasonable and can be installed on up to 5 machines.
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Education Week Teacher: How to Make the Most of Your Professional Learning Community - 33 views
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During our first meeting of the school year, we jotted down on sticky notes what each of us wanted to accomplish in our weekly meetings. Three main ideas rose to the top and have driven our work together ever since: support for each other, help with pacing an overwhelming curriculum, and detailed plans to implement with our students. Everything we do as a group addresses one or more of these three objectives.
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Talking about the issues and pressures of teaching—always in a solutions-focused way, of course—is cathartic itself.
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Effective PLCs must focus on student learning. It's no use becoming bogged down in issues or procedures that are out of our control as classroom teachers.
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To keep ourselves on track, we examine our students' strengths and weaknesses, creating plans that maximize student success.
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Purposeful Professional Learning (Professional Learning That Shifts Practice- Part 1) -... - 10 views
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allow learners to solve relevant issues that matter to them
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the team determined a specific goal that they wanted to accomplish by the end of the day
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To guide the work time, we observed some classrooms and discussed what we noticed. Based on our goals, we set clear targets and some time boundaries to check in on progress.
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each teacher shared what they had learned, what they had created, and their actionable next steps.
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The more you empower learners, the more they will be invested in the work.
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society evolves and schools work to meet the needs of learners
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I think one of the keys here is to acknowledge that society is evolving and we need to evolve to meet the needs of society - for example, just because research shows that, for some things, handwriting helps people remember something better or reading a hard copy is easier for comprehension than a digital copy - just because research at this point confirms these concepts, that doesn't mean we don't need to provide opportunities for practice and teach learners to recall digitally written info or comprehend digital text. If that is the trend the world is moving toward, we have to move in that direction as well - or be left behind.
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purposeful
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Media and Technology Resources for Educators | Common Sense Media - 15 views
www.commonsensemedia.org/educators
InternetSafety digitalcitizenship cyberbullying Internet_safety cipa
shared by mgranger on 01 Apr 11
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with complete confidence. Our online trainings show you how. More about parent professional development Research Credentials Check out our DNA. Our programs are built on respected digital ethics research. More about parent research credentials Turn wired students into great digital citizens Get all the tools you need with our FREE Digital Literacy and Citizenship Curriculum and Parent Media Education Program. The relevant, ready-to-use instruction helps you guide students to make safe, smart, and ethical decisions in the digital world where they live, study and play. Every day, your students are tested with each post, search, chat, text message, file download, and profile update. Will they connect with like minds or spill ... read more Get started Browse our classroom lessons and parent education resources by grade level or topical area. select gradeK123456789101112 select topicCell phones & digital communicationCyberbullying & online relationshipsDigital creation, plagiarism & piracyFamily media managementGaming & online worldsInternet safetyMedia's influence on kidsOnline privacy and securityOnline research & learningSocial networking & communityViolence in media Get Started Educator Updates Common Sense announces di gital driver's license Common Sense Media announced plans to create a digital driver’s license, an interactive online game that will teach kids the basics of how to be safe and responsible in a digital world. Read more about our plans for interactive curriculum modules