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We can't fundamentally change our report cards in a truly meaningful way until we change what we consider important first. However, assessment itself is the greatest impediment to meaningful change in education. Standardized tests are about 'counting marks' NOT 'marking what counts'.

So often when we talk about schools, students, parents and teachers, we discuss things in arm-lengths type of way. We discuss how they need to have richer and more meaningful learning experiences, how we need to provide them with the opportunities to use the technological tools in authentic learning experiences. What we don't discuss is how schools need to be places of living not just of learning. They need to be places of community where children can experience life-lessons not just academic lessons. The story that follows is about one such event that took place at our school this past year.

Excellent article from ASCD about meaningful work and students. I particularly appreciate the section on having a driving question. "A project without a driving question is like an essay without a thesis." Absolutely. Does your project or activity have a driving question? Great article worth a read.

Forget whining about access, never mind the slow speed of change, get over the obstacles! Go after meaningful results. Engage and empower students. Be a leader and a role model.

This amazing matrix is wonderful to share.

WOW!

Considers: Levels of Technology Integration into the Curriculum -compared to- Characteristics of the Learning Environment.

From the site: 1. Teachers now have an unprecedented resource of meaningful science projects to engage their students. 2. Students can work with professional scientists anywhere in the world on real research projects that benefit us all. 3. Students can create their own projects and find collaborators all over the planet. 4. Citizen scientists can find like-minded people to share ideas. 5. Home-schoolers now have a network of science lovers to use as a resource for their children. 6. Professional scientists now have a turn-key solution to promote their research projects, archive their data, find collaborators and reach out to thousands of people they could not reach before.

From the site: 1. Teachers now have an unprecedented resource of meaningful science projects to engage their students. 2. Students can work with professional scientists anywhere in the world on real research projects that benefit us all. 3. Students can create their own projects and find collaborators all over the planet. 4. Citizen scientists can find like-minded people to share ideas. 5. Home-schoolers now have a network of science lovers to use as a resource for their children. 6. Professional scientists now have a turn-key solution to promote their research projects, archive their data, find collaborators and reach out to thousands of people they could not reach before.

Student Voice Summit is in New York this Saturday. You can participate. Here's some more information from my friend Anne Ostholthoff, host of the Ignite Show. "Listening: This Saturday, April 13 in NYC, the first-ever Student Voice Summit happens. It is presented LIVE and sponsored by Dell and hosted by Microsoft in their NYC Office. You can be there - no matter where you are via Livestream: http://new.livestream.com/Dell/stuvoicelive . Also, be sure to follow these students via the #StuVoice hashtag on Twitter @stu_voice and http://www.stuvoice.org/ Here the hope is for a meaningful exchange between stakeholders in the education policy debate"

From September, I am starting a new role. I am going to be a year group leader for year 5. This has come about relatively quickly since my return from mainstream and so I have spent some time over the summer reflecting on my practice and how I am going to develop and inspire the people I work with. One of those people is an NQT. My sister is also starting her first post as an NQT in another school. After speaking on the phone for half an hour this morning, I realised that some of the stuff that I was saying to her is probably some of the stuff that I will be saying to the NQT I will be working with...

"English…done! Reading…done! Assembly…go, go, go! Packed primary timetables can sometimes feel like you're racing through an army drill. It can be difficult to stop, and allow children time for deeper thought and study. Integrating meaningful STEM into the week can often feel like a bit of a headache. Project Based Learning as a method of teaching STEM, could be the solution to this. Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths are the four disciplines many schools are hoping to focus on this academic year, looking at an applied and integrated approach."

So you have heard about blogging with your students and you are considering taking the plunge but just not sure what or how to do it? I am here to tell you; blogging with my students has been one of the most enriching educational experiences we have had this year, and that says a lot. So to get you started, here is what I have learned:

Haiku Deck is one of my all time favorite quick presentation makers when I just have to share something meaningful with my class and only have a few moments to pull it together. (For example, if I realize that students don't know something valuable, etc.) One of the best things about Haiku Deck is its incredible search feature for Creative Commons and automatic citation. If you're 1:1 ipad, this free app is a must have. They are beta testing and online version that should be available soon. Great tool.

Often we search for meaningful ways to integrate digital technology in project based learning activities given to our students. We also would like our students to develop a thorough understanding of the concepts underlying the work - after all this is the purpose of the project. Giving students the opportunity to complete and present their project through a digital lens has one great advantage - student engagement. This in turn causes students to develop a more in depth understanding of concepts.

If you live near the Chesapeake Bay in the USA< you'll want to look at this incredible resource! (Or if you're just studying about it!) From the founders: "Chesapeake Bay Education Website BayBackpack.com Launched Check out our new website Bay Backpack, www.baybackpack.com, which provides educators with the resources they need to engage students in hands-on learning about the Chesapeake Bay. This site is an online resource for teachers and environmental educators to engage students in hands-on learning about the Chesapeake Bay and its local waterways. Bay Backpack provides educators with the necessary resources to give their students a Meaningful Watershed Educational Experience (MWEE), which are extensive projects that allow students to gain a deep understanding of environmental issues in the Chesapeake Bay and its local streams and rivers. Bay Backpack houses over 380 teaching resources on issues like pollution, development, farming and many other environmental topics. To learn more about Bay Backpack, visit www.baybackpack.com. Interested educators can also follow Bay Backpack on Twitter @baybackpack or become a fan on Facebook. Please help us spread the word by forwarding this to anyone that may be interested."

The literature review unequivocally found that it is not possible to provide a meaningful framework to describe or measure the direct impact of ICT on student learning per se. Most educational researchers view media comparison studies as of little value, misleading, and not generalisable. Where such studies have been conducted it has not been possible to identify a purely ICT effect disentangled from other elements of the learning environment. Most educational researchers would view such disentangling as counterproductive. Further, it has become increasingly difficult to measure student learning as more is understood of the complexities of learning. However, this review has identified significant impacts of the use of ICT on students, learning environments, teachers and pedagogy, schools provision of ICT capacity, and school and system organization, policy and practice. These are presented here as five dimensions

Estie Cuellar from Texas has a dream to take nine of her students to the conference. While many of us have raised our money from private donors, Estie is located at a school with many underserved children from families in poverty. I have pledged to do what I can to help her spread the word about her situation. She has scholarships for four of her students to pay their conference fees, however, all schools must raise money for their own airfare. This is a great cause and I hope that there are some people out there who believe in the vision of representing ALL of our society here in America at a conference which plans to turn conferences upside down -- working hard to give students a meaningful place alongside the educators who will be attending the leadership strand of the conference. Julie and I dream of writing a book to fund this conference in the future, but for now, we have to do it all the hard way ( a lot of pavement pounding and hard work.)

Program during May to promote effective comments and communications in the blogosphere.

the 31 day comment challenge is a program to promote effective, meaningful comments run by several amazing edubloggers -- this is an example of something that those interested in facilitating effective communications should discuss and participate in.

Amazing student project to create memories and artifacts. This is an excellent partnership between the New Sweden Historical Society, Stockholm Historical Society, Maine Swedish Colony, Nylander Museum, New Sweden School, and others. It is time for museums and schools to begin partnerships in this way. What meaningful, authentic work. Wow! From Earnie Easter via e-mail today.

Student projects from Earnie Easter's class sharing information about their community.

How about cutting and pasting the most meaningful mini-exchanges? Or simply get a screen-shot of them (whatever is faster for you) and create a page here for those who can/want to discuss together. Or perhaps people want to use it as inspiration to write reflections in their own blogs when time permits. Please point us to those links!

Providing a wealth of resources for K-12 science educators, Science NetLinks is your guide to meaningful standards-based Internet experiences for students.