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By Thom Markham As Common Core State Standards are incorporated from school to school across the country, educators are discussing their value. It may seem that educators are arguing over whether the CCSS will roll out as a substitute No Child Left Behind curriculum or as an innovative guide to encourage inquiry rather than rote learning.

"Welcome to a series of posts devoted to the use of Project Based Learning. I know you will find new information… whether you are an experienced PBL user, or brand new. In this post I address the concept of "Driving Questions" I know it is a read you will enjoy and share. I have even included some amazing links including some to the BUCK Institute (BIE). They are the international leader in promoting PBL. "

"The idea of teacher as learner and modeling great learning is one critical notion that usually gets seen as a "nice, but not necessary" role in today's data obsessed world. The idea of mentorship and relationships remains the key determination of learning and yet we have a whole sector of folks advocating for bigger factory models of skill and drill learning. I'm more convinced than ever that those middle schools who have adopted a mentoring model with teachers staying with students for 3-4 years is a return to the classic view of learning. The classic view also shows that inquiry is not simply a new pedagogy but one that acknowledges student interest and can potentially remove artificial barriers such as time from the learning. Again, not something earth shattering or new but places things in a historical perspective juxtaposed beside the recent view of learning that it needs to be fragmented and broken down into small bite chunks of learning."

If kids can access information from sources other than school, and if school is no longer the only place where information lives, what, then happens to the role of this institution? "Our whole reason for showing up for school has changed, but infrastructure has stayed behind," said Diana Laufenberg, who taught history at the progressive public school Science Leadership Academy for many years.

"Student pairs or groups will research and report on an important historical figure. This could either be done to review people already studied, to seed background knowledge of upcoming people, or just people the students are interested in. Students will use the project to learn about or practice wiki page creation with the basic elements of text, images, and hyperlinks. They will also get an opportunity to explore writing their own questions, which will become the core skill in later inquiry projects."

"This past year has been one of my biggest learning spikes as a teacher since my first year in the classroom. I have been working with other teachers who are at all stages of their teaching careers and we have been focusing on innovative teaching practices within a school-based inquiry. I have embraced not being the expert, being uncomfortable with not knowing all the answers, and being unsure about how a strategy or a lesson will go. I have found myself increasingly trusting my learners. I am learning like crazy (just like my students) and trying not to burst with excitement! The key has been working with my amazing school staff, along with other dedicated teachers and mentors in our district and throughout the province. I have been collaborating with my colleagues, and I have been implementing new ways of teaching. We are doing wonderful things here in Delta and we need to encourage our colleagues to share their successes with others."

"At the Buck Institute for Education (BIE), we've been keeping a list of the many types of "_____- based learning" we've run across over the years: Case-based learning Challenge-based learning Community-based learning Design-based learning Game-based learning Inquiry-based learning Land-based learning Passion-based learning Place-based learning Problem-based learning Proficiency-based learning Service-based learning Studio-based learning Team-based learning Work-based learning . . . and our new fave . . . "

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

Ideas on using student questions in class and why they are important.

Date: Saturday, May 18, 2013 Time: 9:00a m Pacific/10:00am Mountain/ 11:00am Central/12:00pm Eastern Location: Blackboard Collaborate (Formerly Elluminate) About Genius Hour "Genius Hour is a precious time, loved by all my students. It is when they are allowed to develop their own inquiry question about whatever it is that they want to explore," so says Gallit Zvi (@gallit_z), one of our presenters.

"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. "