"High Tech High began in 2000 as a single charter high school launched by a coalition of San Diego business leaders and educators. It has evolved into an integrated network of schools spanning grades K-12, housing a comprehensive teacher certification program and a new, innovative Graduate School of Education. "
Welcome to PBL-Online, a one stop solution for Project Based Learning! You'll find all the resources you need to design and manage high quality projects for middle and high school students.
I have been thinking a lot lately about the challenge we face as educators when well-intentioned learners make incorrect, inscrutable, thoughtless, or otherwise off-the-mark comments. It's a crucial moment in teaching: how do you respond to an unhelpful remark in a way that 1) dignifies the attempt while 2) making sure that no one leaves thinking that the remark is true or useful? Summer is a great time to think about the challenge of developing new routines and habits in class, and this is a vital issue that gets precious little attention in training and staff development.
Here is a famous Saturday Night Live skit, with Jerry Seinfeld as a HS history teacher, that painfully demonstrates the challenge and a less than exemplary response.
Don't misunderstand me: I am not saying that we are always correct in our judgment about participant remarks. Sometimes a seemingly dumb comment turns out to be quite insightful. Nor am I talking about merely inchoate or poorly-worded contributions. That is a separate teaching challenge: how to unpack or invite others to unpack a potentially-useful but poorly articulated idea. No, I am talking about those comments that are just clunkers in some way; seemingly dead-end offerings that tempt us to drop our jaws or make some snarky remark back.
My favorite example of the challenge and how to meet it comes from watching my old mentor Ted Sizer in action in front of 360 educators in Louisville 25 years ago. We had travelled as the staff of the Coalition of Essential Schools from Providence to Louisville to pitch the emerging Coalition reform effort locally. Ted gave a rousing speech about the need to transform the American high school.
After a long round of applause, Ted took questions. The first questioner asked, and I quote: "Mr Sizer, what do you think about these girls and their skimpy halter tops in school?" (You have to also imagine the voice: very good-ol'-boy). Without missing a beat or making a face, Ted said "Deco
"A group of junior high and high school students in Cambridge, Mass., are part of an experimental education program that aims to prove they're capable of solving real-world problems early with the help of 3D printers, Arduino and group collaboration."
"Poetry 180 is designed to make it easy for students to hear or read a poem on each of the 180 days of the school year. I have selected the poems you will find here with high school students in mind. They are intended to be listened to, and I suggest that all members of the school community be included as readers. A great time for the readings would be following the end of daily announcements over the public address system.
Listening to poetry can encourage students and other learners to become members of the circle of readers for whom poetry is a vital source of pleasure. I hope Poetry 180 becomes an important and enriching part of the school day."
Ramsey Musallam, a high school chemistry teacher from the San Francisco Bay Area, has been creatively using digital tools in his classroom for several years as a way to drive students to deeper inquiry. In a recent TED talk, Musallam says that a teacher's strongest tool - the force that draws students deeper into learning - is piquing students' curiosity. In his classroom, Musallam follows three rules: curiosity comes first, embrace the mess, and reflect and revise.
"Educurious™ is on a mission to reduce our nation's high school dropout rates. Our project-based curriculum connects students to real issues they care about and equips them with the lifelong learning skills for success."
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The following web2.0 sites would be useful for science educators at the high
school and middle school level.
Some would also be appropriate for higher
elementary grade levels. There are many new 'tools' or websites that take
advantage of the higher speed and bandwidth of today's Internet.
Web 1.0
tools/websites were text based and web2.0 tools/websites are designed for
full-motion video, 3D animations and are generally interactive in some
manner.
Google Search makes it amazingly easy to find information. Come learn about the powerful advanced tools we provide to help you find just the right information when the stakes are high.
"Ron Berger from Expeditionary Learning demostrates the transformational power of models, critique, and descriptive feedback to improve student work. Here he tells the story of Austin's Butterfly. 1st grade students at ANSER Charter School in Boise, ID, helped Austin take a scientific illustration of a butterfly through multiple drafts toward a high-quality final product."
"The use of primary sources as an instructional tool in the social studies classroom will engage students, encourage high levels of learning and raise test scores. But with so much to do and so little time, how can teachers know what strategies and resources work best?"
"Digital media is increasingly present in kids' formal and informal educational settings, becoming as common as pencils and notebooks were to their parents. Yet in many American classrooms and homes, these high-tech tools are severely limited or forbidden. Teachers and parents wonder: What are students doing with these technologies?"
Use the Rubric Maker to make customized assessments for student work. You can create rubrics for primary, elementary, middle, and high school. The default text has been written to be appropriate for each level. After choosing a title and grade level for the rubric, you will be able to choose and edit a variety of existing performances, as well as create performances specific to the content your class is studying.
"it's up to the consumer of the information to decide which images, videos, tweets are authentic. As always happens when there is a high demand for separating signal from noise, people began to put together filters for doing that - and human tools for sorting the more trustworthy information"
The Habitable Planet is a multimedia course for high school teachers and adult learners interested in studying environmental science. The Web site provides access to course content and activities developed by leading scientists and researchers in the field.
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The Brainology® program is a research-based program that helps upper elementary, middle and high school students gain confidence and motivation to learn by teaching them about the brain, how to strengthen it, and how to apply brain-friendly study skills. We help them cultivate a growth mindset, which leads to growth and learning-oriented behavior."