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Sandy Wenzel

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In the area of pre-training I could only locate one source that I felt worthy of using. It is called Guided Discovery DVD and can be seen at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uz6V483pg3A. It provided...

8847_ pre-training

started by Sandy Wenzel on 16 Jan 11 no follow-up yet
D. S. Koelling

Wikipedia Comes of Age - The Chronicle of Higher Education - 38 views

  • Not all information is created equal. The bottom layers (the most ubiquitous, whose sources are the most ephemeral, and with the least amount of validation) lead to layers with greater dependability, all the way to the highest layers, made up mostly of academic resources maintained and validated by academic publishers that use multiple peer reviews, trained editors, and scholarly reviewers. When the system is effective, the layers serve to reinforce one another through clear pathways that allow queries to move from one layer to another with little resistance.
  • Most of the nearly 2,500 students who responded said they consult Wikipedia, but when questioned more deeply, it became clear that they use it for, as one student put it, "pre-research." In other words, to gain context on a topic, to orient themselves, students start with Wikipedia. That makes perfect sense. Through user-generated efforts, Wikipedia is comprehensive, current, and far and away the most trustworthy Web resource of its kind. It is not the bottom layer of authority, nor the top, but in fact the highest layer without formal vetting. In this unique role, it therefore serves as an ideal bridge between the validated and unvalidated Web.
  • Most of the nearly 2,500 students who responded said they consult Wikipedia, but when questioned more deeply, it became clear that they use it for, as one student put it, "pre-research." In other words, to gain context on a topic, to orient themselves, students start with Wikipedia.
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  • My opinion of Wikipedia, like the tool itself, has radically evolved over time. Not only am I now supportive of Wikipedia, but I feel that it can play a vital role in formal educational settings
  • The key challenge for the scholarly community, in which I include academic publishers such as Oxford University Press, is to work actively with Wikipedia to strengthen its role in "pre-research." We need to build stronger links from its entries to more advanced resources that have been created and maintained by the academy.
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    C. Grathwohl argues that Wikipedia plays a vital middle layer of authority for students conducting pre-research; scholars, he says, should work to assure that links in Wikipeida lead students to more advanced research that's been validated by the academic community.
Steven Szalaj

Raise the bar with national exam for teachers - chicagotribune.com - 53 views

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    Editorial about a recommendation by the AFT Pres to develop a professional certification for teachers.  It's about time...
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    About time for what? For standardized tests to ruin the teaching profession like it has ruined our kids? For the government to control, from the top down, what education departments teach their students? Looks like a HUGE power grab and a very bad way for a Union, who professes to stand against standardized tests to act! Shame on them! Go to Fairtest.org to find out more about the scam of standardized testing. If you think a standardized test can improve education, you must also think you can fatten a calf by weighing it!
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    Michelle is right. More standardized testing is not the answer for anything, least of all teacher certification. Come on, Steven .. use your critical thinking skills. Don't encourage the bean counters and bureaucrats who are so enamored of things that can be measured and filed into neat categories. The most valuable things cannot be measured in any "objective" way. To focus on what's measurable is to focus on what's shallow.
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    Mark & Michelle, thank you for your comments. When I posted this I knew the words "standardized test" would be a flashpoint. It is for me too. With nearly 40 years in the classroom, teaching a creative art (music) to all different levels (kindergarten through college and well beyond), I have often railed against reducing any education, any student, to a number. Very little in what I have taught can be measured with a pencil-and-paper test. What I see here is different than this. It is the union that she is saying should be the "gate-keeper" to our profession, rather than some generic government standard test. Yes, tests would be a part of the certification, but from what I read, so would much more, including actual classroom work. The certification would be similar to the AMA for physicians or the Bar for attorneys. These are certifications designed and administered by the profession - not the government - and validate a candidate's readiness to practice. Yes, I too am strongly against the government, or any organization outside of our profession, to certify, to validate, a teacher's ability to do the job. But we have to admit there is a problem with teacher certification and validation. There are people who simply should not be in the classroom (haven't we all seen them?). It is very difficult to remove folks who are dragging the respect for our profession down. Yes, there is remediation. Yes, it should be a difficult process to remove someone in order to protect against administrative abuses. But what is talked about here is the profession policing itself - something that the teacher's unions, in general, have steadfastly refused to do. What the AFT Pres is suggesting is that the best thing we can do to raise the status of teaching as a profession is to take action ourselves to make it happen. Really, if we in the profession do not do this, then it will be imposed from those outside who do not know what we do, how we do it and why we do it.
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    You are still talking about a standardized test. Let's face it--doctors have to have specific knowledge to do their job. Whether or not they are creative or engaging is not as important as their knowledge base. The same with lawyers--knowledge of the law is essential, and everything else is secondary. However, in teaching, although educational theory and knowledge of their subject area is important (and already tested, by the way) the most essential aspect of teaching is how you can creatively engage students, interact with parents and peers, and stay organized and motivated. These things CAN'T BE TESTED. Right now, teachers already go through extensive training, evaluation, and continuing education. Do you REALLY think that a standardized test will really improve teaching? I know a lot of university professors who can easily pass a test, but few of them can teach worth beans.
Marc Patton

Create and Publish Amazing Multi-touch Books for iPad using iBooks Author - mLearnCon 2... - 74 views

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    Participants in this session will learn the basics of iBooks Author - from Apple's pre-built templates, to creating chapters, pages, and glossaries. You will learn to turn textbooks into interactive training materials through Apple's interactive widgets like Photo Galleries, Videos, Review Interactions, Keynote Presentations, Interactive Images, 3-D material, and even custom HTML5 interactions and animations.
Steve Ransom

Attention versus distraction? What that big NY Times story leaves out » Niema... - 51 views

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    The web is a space whose very abundance of information - and whose very informational infrastructure - trains our attention to follow our interests. And vice versa. In that, it's empowering information as a function of interest. It's telling Vishal that it's better to spend time with video than with Vonnegut - simply because he's more interested in editing than in reading. Vishal needs needs no other justification for his choice; interest itself is its own acquittal. And we're seeing the same thing in news. While formal learning has been, in the pre-digital world, a matter of rote obligation in the service of intellectual catholicism - and news consumption has been a matter of the bundle rather than the atom - the web-powered world is creating a knowledge economy that spins on the axis of interest. Individual interest. The web inculcates a follow your bliss approach to learning that seeps, slowly, into the broader realm of information; under its influence, our notion of knowledge is slowly shedding its normative layers.
Jon Tanner

What's the point of media specialists...? on School Library Journal - 49 views

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    "Joyce Valenza Ph.D On the librarian: What's the point . . ? The Twitter conversation April 30, 2009 @karlfisch: What's the point of having a media specialist if they aren't specialists in the media forms of the day? I was nearly finished copying and pasting, figuring out how best to post Tuesday's Twitter conversation, when I discovered that Karl Fisch (@karlfisch), who kinda started it all, already took care of that. (You likely know of Karl's very popular and provocative videos.) I am still not sure how best to frame this conversation on the place of the information/media specialist in today's school. What is clear is that a lot of smart people--people who are out there teaching, speaking, moving, and shaking--are disappointed in what they see when they see school librarians. Either we have a perception problem or we need to do some serious retooling. I'd say we have to deal with both. In a hurry. Being an information (or media) specialist today means being an expert in how information and media flow TODAY! It is about knowing how information and media are created and communicated. How to evalute, synthesize, and ethically use information and media in all their varied forms. It is about being able to communicate knowlege in new ways for new audiences using powerful new information and communication tools. Forgive me if it hurts. In my mind, if you are not an expert in new information and communication tools, you are NOT a media specialist for today. Tuesday's conversation happened in the open, on Twitter. We need to be aware that these conversations are happening where we cannot hear them--at conferences, at Board and cabinet meetings. We also need to make sure that our voices are heard and that we hear the voices of others in places like Twitter, where so many educational leaders and thinkers are chatting about us and many other things. I've selected the remarks that resonated loudest for me. (I've shuffled a bit, but you can visit Karl'
Has Slone

Always Write: Cobett's "7 Elements of a Differentiated Writing Lesson" Resources - 10 views

    • Has Slone
       
      This is a neat way to start a writing class with the creating plot ideas....
  • One of the goals I ask teachers to set after my training is to find new ways to push students to analyze and evaluate as they learn to write.
  • As part of my teacher workshop on the writing process, we investigate multiple uses of student samples. One of my favorite techniques involves having student compare and contrast finished pieces of writing. During both pre-writing and and revision, this push for deeper student thinking both educates and inspires your students.
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  • The handout has student writers analyze two fifth graders' published writing with a compare and contrast Venn diagram.
  • Revision is hard, and most teachers recognize it as an area of deficiency; the truth is, a lot of really great writing teachers I know still freely admit that revision is where they struggle the most.
  • revision shouldn't be the first of the seven elements to work on
  • When students like what they've written in rough draft form, they're ready to move to revision. My other six elements aim at helping students increase their pre-writing time so they both like and see more potential in their rough drafts
  • I believe in the power of collaboration and study teams,
  • Professional development research clearly cites the study team model as the most effective way to have learners not only understand new ideas but also implement them enough times so they become regular tools in a teacher's classroom.
  • Below, find three examples created by study teams during past workshops. I use them as models/exemplars when I set the study teams off to work.
  • My students learn to appreciate the act of writing, and they see it as a valuable life-skill.
  • In a perfect world, following my workshop,
  • follow-up tools.
  • I also use variations of these Post-its during my Critical Thinking Using the Writing Traits Workshop.
  • By far, the best success I've ever had while teaching revision was the one I experienced with the revision Post-its I created for my students
  • During my teacher workshop on the writing process, we practice with tools like the Revision Sprint (at right), which I designed to push students to use analysis and evaluation skills as they looked at their own drafts
  • I used to throw my kids into writing response groups way too fast. They weren't ready to provide critical thought for one another
  • The most important trick learned was this: be a writer too. During my first five years of teaching, I had assigned a lot of writing but never once had I written something I intended to show my students.
  • I have the following interactive plot element generator (which can be replicated with three coffee cans and index cards) to help my students feel in control of their options:
  • If you want to hear my take on graphic organizers in detail, you're going to have to hire me to come to present to you. If you can't do that, then I'll throw you a challenge that was thrown once at me, and completing the challenge helped me become a smarter designer of graphic organizers. The challenge came in two parts: 1) learn how to use tables and text boxes in Microsoft Word; 2) for practice, design a graphic organizer that would help students be successfully with the following trait-based skills:
  • "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, etc," which is an interesting structure that students can borrow from to write about other topics, be they fiction or non-fiction.
  • Asking students to create daily journals from the perspective of other animals or even inanimate objects is a great way to borrow this book's idea.
  • it challenges students to analyze the author's word choice & voice skills: specifically his use of verbs, subtle alliteration, and dialogue.
  • Mentor Text Resource Page here at my website, because this topic has become such a big piece of learning to me. It deserved its own webpage.
  • Here are seven skills I can easily list for the organization trait. Organization is: 1) using a strong lead or hook, 2) using a variety of transition words correctly, 3) paragraphing correctly, 4) pacing the writing, 5) sequencing events/ideas logically, 6) concluding the writing in a satisfying way, 7) titling the writing interestingly and so that the title stands for the whole idea. Over the years, I have developed or found and adapted mini-lessons that have students practice these skills during my "Organization Month."
  • Now, let's talk differentiation:
  • The problem with focusing students on a product--instead of the writing process--is that the majority of the instructional time is spent teaching students to adhere to a formula.
  • the goal of writing instruction absolutely should be the helping students practice the three Bloom's levels above apply: analyze, evaluate, and create.
  • Click here to access the PowerPoint I use during the goal-setting portion of my workshop.
  • Improving one's ability to teach writing to all students is a long-term professional development goal; sticking with it requires diligence, and it requires having a more specific goal than "I want to improve writing
  • "Trying to get better at all seven elements at once doesn't work;
  • strive to make my workshops more about "make and take,
  • Robert Marzano's research convinced me years ago of the importance of having learners set personal goals as they learn to take responsibility for their own learning.
meghankelly492

Music performance skills: A two-pronged approach - facilitating optimal music performan... - 1 views

  • music performance anxiety (MPA)
  • The concept of “flow”, describing the subjective psychological state in which a person is completely immersed and fully concentrated in an activity which is enjoyable and rewarding, is often associated with optimal functioning
  • Anxiety is generally regarded as having an antithetical relationship with flow
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  • The clinical implications of this negative association between MPA and flow suggest that a two-pronged approach focusing on facilitating flow and positive functioning as well as reducing pathological MPA may bring about improvements in the performer’s subjective performing experienc
  • Seligman’s (2011) most recent model of well-being, from the field of positive psychology, understands well-being as comprising five elements: Positive emotion, Engagement, Relationships, Meaning and Achievemen
  • There is a substantial body of Music Performance Anxiety (MPA) research providing evidence that MPA is a debilitating phenomenon (Kenny, 2011) which can affect musicians at any stage of their careers, from highly experienced professional performers (Fishbein, Middlestadt, Ottati, Straus, & Ellis, 1988; Kenny, Driscoll, & Ackerman, 2014) through to child beginners
  • Anxiety is often described as having an antithetical relationship to the experience of flow (Csikszentmihalyi, 1975), and it has been suggested that fostering techniques for facilitating flow may provide a powerful tool for reducing MPA and encouraging optimal performance
  • “when performance anxiety was highest, flow was lowest and vice versa … the presence of one minimises the magnitude of the other” (Fullager et al., 2013, p. 251), and a recent study found evidence of a strong, significant negative association between flow and MPA amongst 200 professional orchestral musicians (Cohen & Bodner, 2018), supporting Kirchner et al.’s (2008) earlier findings with music students
  • Investigations of the efficacy of existing methods for treating MPA indicate that Cognitive Behavioural Therapy based interventions are most effective (for an overview, see Burin & Osorio, 2016).
  • However, evidence suggests that pharmacological methods, particularly beta-blockers, are most commonly used, often in the absence of medical supervision (Cohen & Bodner, 2018; Kenny et al., 2014) and that the subject of MPA is still stigmatised, with many musicians and teachers unwilling to talk openly about it
  • Csikszentmihalyi’s nine dimensions of flow as follows
  • Although there was an increase in flow over time, this was not significant, F(1, 20) = 4.27, p > .05, η2 =.18, and there was no evidence of a significant interaction between group and time, F(1, 20) = 0.56, p > .05, η2 = .03, indicating that the hypothesis that there would be an increase in self-reported levels of flow in the intervention group, was not supported.
  • Figure 4. Judge-rated musical performance quality and signs of performance anxiety in the intervention group.
  • These results support the fourth hypothesis that there would be an increase in judge-rated PQ and a decrease in judge-rated SPA.
  • Results showed evidence of a significant negative association between MPA and flow, and three out of the four study hypotheses were supported: the music performance skills intervention was found to be effective in reducing pre-/post-test MPA in the intervention group compared to the wait-list control group; there were significant improvements in positive and negative affect and state anxiety associated with the performance situation in the intervention group; and there were significant improvements in judge-rated PQ and behavioural signs of performance anxiety. However, there was no significant change in pre-/post-test measures of flow. These findings will now be discussed in more detail.
  • This supports the understanding of MPA as a specific type of anxiety, where the performer suffers from MPA without necessarily being generally anxious or impaired in any other areas of his/her life (Clark & Williamon, 2011; Hoffman & Hanrahan, 2011) and corresponds to Kenny’s (2011) description of the first and most mild of three types of MPA (for full coverage of this issue, see Kenny, 2011).
  • Thus, the absence in improvement in levels of flow in the current study could also be due to the low average hours of daily practice reported
  • The increases in participants’ positive affect and decreases in negative affect after the second simulated performance compared to the first indicate that the intervention was effective in facilitating positive emotion, the first component of Seligman’s (2011) PERMA model of well-being
  • Evidence of improvements in judge-rated performance quality indicate that the intervention was also effective in facilitating the fifth (Achievement) component of the PERMA model.
  • “Ironically, it may be that the last people to receive some benefit from the therapeutic value of music may be the musicians themselves” (Brodsky, 1996, p. 95).
  • Hopefully, such an approach will enable developing musicians to acquire the skills necessary to enjoy satisfying, successful and healthy lives as performing musicians, in which the threat of debilitating MPA and the need to recourse to beta-blockers are a thing of the past.
  • Cohen, S., & Bodner, E. (2019). Music performance skills: A two-pronged approach – facilitating optimal music performance and reducing music performance anxiety. Psychology of Music, 47(4), 521–538. https://doi.org/10.1177/0305735618765349
Suzanne Nelson

How to Adjust to your Interactive Whiteboard: Use Old Lessons on your New IWB... - 99 views

  • If you’re new to Interactive Whiteboards, chances are you’ve had a couple of training sessions that focused on creating pages from scratch. While I am definitely a big advocate of being innovative, I also strongly believe that time is precious and teachers have too little of it.  In this post, I’ll give you some tips on how to seamlessly incorporate your pre-existing lesson activities for use on your new IWB.
meghankelly492

Mental skills for musicians: Managing music performance anxiety and enhancing performance. - 1 views

  • In asurvey of 2,212 classical musicians, 40% re-ported that anxiety interfered with their perfor-mances (Kirchner, Bloom, & Skutnick–Henley,
  • , see Kenny (2005) andMcGinnis and Milling (2005
  • Few studies have investigated whether a cog-nitive intervention can reduce anxiety and en-hance performance in musicians (Lehrer, 1987;Steptoe & Fidler, 1987)
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  • did notreturn any recent studies investigating the effec-tiveness of a purely cognitive intervention in thetreatment of MPA; consequently, research inthis particular area is needed
  • Past re-search has focused on combined interventions;however, often these programs run for over 6weeks and it is unknown which aspects of theintervention are most effective (e.g., Nagel,Himle, & Papsdorf, 1989)
  • State–Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI).The STAI is widely used in anxiety researchand is considered to be a valid and reliable scale(Kenny, 2006).
  • The PAI (Nagel, Himle, & Papsdorf, 1981) isbased on the STAI and is a music inventoryassessing the three-systems model of anxiety
  • heart rate at 10 min, 5
  • Signs of anxiety included trem-bling knees, lifting shoulders, stiff back and/orneck, trembling hands, stiff arms, face deadpan,shaking head, moistening and/or biting lips, dis-tressed facial expressions, and sweating.
  • Nagel et al.reported that the average preintervention scorewas 55 and the average postintervention scorewas 38, with a score of 39 or less indicating a
  • person has few problems with performance anx-iety
  • Researchers have found that MPA af-fects instrumentalists and vocalists of all agesand abilities, including students, professionals,amateurs, and children (Brotons, 1994; Kenny,2006; Liston, Frost, & Mohr, 2003)
  • Few studies have investigated whether a cog-nitive intervention can reduce anxiety and en-hance performance in musicians (Lehrer, 1987;Steptoe & Fidler, 1987)
  • Few studies have investigated whether a cog-nitive intervention can reduce anxiety and en-hance performance in musicians (Lehrer, 1987;Steptoe & Fidler, 1987
  • The cognitive intervention had no significanteffect on anxiety levels. Sweeney and Horan’s(1982) study indicated that a cognitive restruc-turing program may be helpful in the treatmentof MPA; their program, featuring cognitive re-structuring, significantly reduced anxiety.
  • d it is unknown which aspects of theintervention are most effective (e.g., Nagel,Himle, & Papsdorf, 1989)
  • The STAI is widely used in anxiety researchand is considered to be a valid and reliable scale
  • Performance Anxiety Inventory (PAI)
  • cognitive, behavioral, and physiological fac
  • and has beenwidely used in treatment outcome research
  • Behavioral Anxiety Index (BAI)
  • igns of anxiety included trem-bling knees, lifting shoulders, stiff back and/orneck, trembling hands, stiff arms, face deadpan,shaking head, moistening and/or biting lips, dis-tressed facial expressions, and sweating
  • Participants were then taught howthoughts, behaviors, and feelings interact andinfluence performance
  • practical exercise, how people waste their en-ergy trying to control uncontrollable factors,thereby impairing performance
  • This exercise wasdesigned to demonstrate how thoughts cansometimes be irrational and can be changed inlight of new evidence
  • how to use self-talk effectively and how touse cues
  • Participants practiced how to identify negativethoughts, stop the thoughts, and use cues to helpthem overcome the negative thoughts.
  • Imagery is a mentalexercise that can help athletes maintain concen-tration, decrease anxiety, and improve confi-dence; thus, it may also be helpful for somemusicians (Gregg & Clark, 2007).
  • Participants in the wait-list controlgroup waited 3 weeks until their second perfor-mance, which was on the same night as theirfirst worksho
  • MPA is a pervasive problem affecting musi-cians of all ages and abilities. As compared withthe research on mental skills training in athletes,relatively little is known about the assessment,treatment, and theoretical underpinnings ofMPA
  • Kenny (2006) suggested that improving perfor-mance quality will have a positive, self-reinforcing effect on the musician and enhanceconfidence in future performances.
  • We predicted that anxiety levels would de-crease in the treatment group from pre- to post-test. This hypothesis was partially supported.Specifically, there was a significant reductionon the PAI in the treatment group. Although theparticipants improved after the intervention,they were still not within the optimal rangeaccording to Nagel et al. (1981
  • Although the decrease in anxiety was notas large in our study, our participants droppedfrom the high performance anxiety category tothe moderate performance anxiety category
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