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We need to develop more learning opportunities where students constitute the actual evaluators for the work itself. Imagine if students, teachers and others evaluate and provide feedback to determine the effectiveness of a student's creation: Develop an 60-second speech to be shared with the student council and three advertising posters to be copied and placed around school to decrease bullying. Your work will be evaluated according to our rubric by the students in our class, outside professionals and me - as the teacher. These are the experiences that push learning beyond a one-way conversation between student and teacher. They demystify the assessment process and allow each student to be a creator and simultaneous evaluator, providing multiple experiences for students to recognize and apply the criteria for quality"

Students will participate in activities designed to explore the themes, characters and volatile moral issues raised in Shakespeare's Macbeth.  Students will explore the themes of power, ambition and the social status of women in the play and in this production set in the 1920's.  By engaging students with text from main characters in the play, students will explore their response to the play's key question:  what is the tragedy of Macbeth?  

Too many students are not sure how to from fiction on the Internet. The Internet can provide any version of the truth to support almost any belief. We can teach students how to read the "grammar" of the Internet and to apply strategies to validate information on a website. This popular session provides step-by-step teaching tips that help students and teachers think critically about Internet information and improve their online search strategies.

Socratic Smackdown grew out of a need to support students in developing and practicing discussion skills. During the game, teams of 4-6 students discuss texts and use textual evidence to make connections and ask thought-provoking questions. Students win points whenever they make constructive contributions to the discussion and lose points if they exhibit disrespectful behaviors, such as interrupting their teammates.

"Personalized learning requires teachers to become co-learners and release their iron grip on the learning process. It requires districts to trust principals, principals to trust teachers, and teachers to trust students. It requires a great deal of conversation about what real learning is and why it matters. engaged-students2This student-driven approach to learning allows kids to explore what matters to them, to build things that don't work and to figure out why. It requires them to form opinions and justify them based on solid evidence. And it requires adults who care and can speak carefully and honestly into the lives of kids. All learning should be formative. "

Teaching Students to Closely Read Texts: How and When?

Teaching Students to Closely Read Texts: How and When?

"As the information landscape shifts to offer far more information in an often befuddling manner that some have called "data smog," many schools are learning that traditional approaches to student research are inadequate to meet the essential learning goals set by most states or provincial governments. With hundreds of computers and dozens of classrooms connected to extensive electronic information resources, schools are recognizing the importance of reinventing the way they engage students in both questioning and research. "

PISA. It found that the most successful students are those who feel real "ownership" of their education. In all the best performing school systems, said Schleicher, "students feel they personally can make a difference in their own outcomes and that education will make a difference for their future."

"Failure has been a trending topic on Education Unbound recently, particularly in regards to the disconnect between educational objectives and game-based learning (GBL). The basic problem is that games depend on players failing multiple times as the primary means of learning how to overcome obstacles. Education, in contrast, is predicated on the notion that failure is bad - for the student, the teacher, and the system as a whole. Until this difference of opinion can be overcome, there is little possibility that GBL can ever become the dominant mode of education in America."

"Schema theory explains how our previous experiences, knowledge, emotions, and understandings affect what and how we learn (Harvey & Goudvis, 2000). Schema is the background knowledge and experience readers bring to the text. Good readers draw on prior knowledge and experience to help them understand what they are reading and are thus able to use that knowledge to make connections. Struggling readers often move directly through a text without stopping to consider whether the text makes sense based on their own background knowledge, or whether their knowledge can be used to help them understand confusing or challenging materials. By teaching students how to connect to text they are able to better understand what they are reading (Harvey & Goudvis, 2000). Accessing prior knowledge and experiences is a good starting place when teaching strategies because every student has experiences, knowledge, opinions, and emotions that they can draw upon. "

"In cooperative learning, students work together, think together and plan together using a variety of group structures designed along an instructional path. This dynamic learning model breaks with the dusty forms of frontal teaching that often create classrooms of "lonesome togetherness" -- students who may sit together but live worlds apart. Cooperative learning creates what Daniel Goleman calls "cognitive empathy," a mind-to-mind sense of how another person's thinking works. The better we understand others, the better we know them -- pointing toward (among other virtues) greater trust, appreciation and generosity. "

"LEARNing Landscapes | Vol. 6, No. 2, Spring 2013 23 Michael Fullan , University of Toronto ABSTRACT There is currently a powerful push-pull factor in schooling. The push factor is that school is increasingly boring for students and alienating for teachers. The pull fac - tor is that the exploding and alluring digital world is irresistible, but not necessarily productive in its raw form. The push-pull dynamic makes it inevitable that disruptive changes will occur. I have been part of a group that has been developing innova - tive responses to the current challenges. This response consists of integrating three components: deep learning goals, new pedagogies, and technology. The result will be more radical change in the next five years than has occurred in the past 50 years. T here is currently a volatile push-pull dynamic intensifying in public schools. The push factor is that students are increasingly bored in school"

"Three Ring unlocks the power of your mobile phone or iPad. Now it's easy for teachers and students to document evidence from the classroom. Capture anything, regardless of format, in just seconds. Take a picture of any paper, drawing, or board work. Record presentations or discussions with audio or video. Students can upload their own work from any mobile device or computer."

"The growing access to knowledge, information, people, and tools that our students are getting demands a shift in how we think about the work they do in school."

The interactive activity is designed for students to learn Colors in Spanish and has audio elements.

"I would rather that they ask, What can you actually do with an iPad?" Beth Holland gives many examples of how her students have used iPads

Students are given a small set of letters and a clue, which they must then use to spell the target word. Words are taken from 1 of 4 popular picture books (users select which picture book they want to use).

Student writing samples 1-12. Recommended by Keys to Literacy.

This brief video clip from the History Channel introduces the Vikings and is appropriate for Grade 3 students.

Ritchhart will explore why and how integrating art in the classroom fosters powerful learning opportunities and promotes creative teaching. Ritchhart is a Senior Research Associate at Project Zero where his work focuses on such issues as teaching for understanding, the development of intellectual character, creative teaching, making students' thinking visible, and the development of school and classroom culture. His research and writings have informed the work of schools, school systems, and museums throughout the world.