Group items tagged

How can a game help students develop mathematical habits of mind? "Then we talked about the game for a bit, and discussed the "habits of mind" they had employed to figure out the game - noticing and wondering, guessing and checking, persevering, struggling productively, learning from mistakes without worrying about making mistakes (since they knew the only way they were going to make progress was to make mistakes and learn from them), and working together. We talked about how these skills are as important as any content they learn in their school classes, and how they can use those skills to make progress on math problems they're not sure how to solve. In fact, much of the math programming we did the rest of the year employed huge doses of Noticing and Wondering and generating ideas about math situations, or scenarios (a math problem with no stated question). Anecdotal reports suggest that by the end of the year, most of the students felt pretty confident that they could generate ideas about most math situations we handed them. Big win!"

"Should schools be mirrors of society, or should they be places apart? With Greenfield, I come down for the latter. Schools have an opportunity to take students' minds in new directions, and they've only got 1,000 hours each year to do it.  " Interesting read. Yes, time is limited, but appropriate use of technology can help to "take students' minds in new directions," often in directions that might not be possible without the use of technology.

"While preparing for the upcoming school year, Twisted Sister's epic protest song began playing as I read the Declaration of Independence. Obviously my mind drifted to imagined Thomas Jefferson and John Adams letting their hair down and dancing around the streets of Philadelphia during a break from drafting the epic document. I realized then that I serendipitously uncovered something that I could use in the classroom - pairing music to primary documents to demonstrate understanding!" Taylor - I read this and immediately thought of you. Assignment for student - Remix the text of a primary document or famous historical speech with a song or multiple songs that add to the theme of the document/speech. Example included in the post.

We could use this to make TEI style testing items and some other interesting things. Keep in mind that images within these items ought to be sortable as well.

"When I get a taxi for the 15-minute ride from my office to the airport, I have two choices. I can hail a cab on the street, and pay a metered fare for the 4.6-mile trip. Or I can walk to the local Marriott and pay a fixed fee of $31.50. Truthfully, I'm always a lot happier paying the fixed fee. I'm happier even though it probably costs more in the end. (A congestion-free trip on the meter comes out to about $26.) Sitting in a cab watching the meter tick up wrenches my gut: Every eighth of a mile, there goes another 45 cents-tick ... tick ... tick." ...this provides interesting context for a math problem using linear equations. When is it worth it to pay the fixed fare vs. paying the per 1/8th of a mile rate? You could "3-Act" this scenario pretty easily: -Take a short video of a taxi fare display clicking upwards. Ask students to give you the first questions that come to mind. When the students ask for it, provide them with a photo of the rate schedule on the side of the taxi and your destination address.

A friend shared this with me and it's a good read. It also summarizes the way that many of our teachers think, and could be an interesting article to share with a teacher and have a discussion about. Ultimate, I have a huge problem with the assumptions and conclusions that are being made here: "Now I'm not calling for abuse; I'd be the first to complain if a teacher called my kids names. But the latest evidence backs up my modest proposal. Studies have now shown, among other things, the benefits of moderate childhood stress; how praise kills kids' self-esteem; and why grit is a better predictor of success than SAT scores. All of which flies in the face of the kinder, gentler philosophy that has dominated American education over the past few decades. The conventional wisdom holds that teachers are supposed to tease knowledge out of students, rather than pound it into their heads. Projects and collaborative learning are applauded; traditional methods like lecturing and memorization-derided as "drill and kill"-are frowned upon, dismissed as a surefire way to suck young minds dry of creativity and motivation. But the conventional wisdom is wrong. And the following eight principles-a manifesto if you will, a battle cry inspired by my old teacher and buttressed by new research-explain why." Why are these seen as two completely different and opposing philosophies of education? That's my question. From my experience, teasing knowledge and understanding out of children stresses the hell out of them. They struggle to give you an answer initially, but when when you are unwilling to spoon feed them or provide them with a "drill and kill" answer, they finally make a connection. In doing so you show the students that their grit and determination has helped them gather a better understanding of the material and become a better student and learner in process.

I may write a decent response to this. She plays just about every false argument card in the book. It needs this treatment - http://www.al.com/opinion/index.ssf/2013/10/huntsville_teacher_common_core.html

This take down of Gladwell's dyslexia chapter http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=8123 makes for a similar parallel.