sbisd early adopters

"n his classroom, Musallam follows three rules: curiosity comes first, embrace the mess, and reflect and revise. "

"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."

"When a teacher's goal is to enhance students' capacity for self-directedness, the how and why of providing feedback is crucial. Here are five forms of feedback, presented in descending order of their effectiveness in growing self-directedness."

"Slazinger claims to have learned from history that most people cannot open their minds to new ideas unless a mind-opening team with a peculiar membership goes to work on them. Otherwise, life will go on exactly as before, no matter how painful, unrealistic, unjust, ludicrous, or downright dumb that life may be. The team must consist of three sorts of specialists, he says. Otherwise the revolution, whether in politics or the arts or the sciences or whatever, is sure to fail."

"we constantly wrestle with two big questions: How do people learn, and how can they do it better in a constantly evolving context? In pursuit, the theme of "21st century learning" often surfaces, a popular label that, while perhaps cliche, still seems to be necessary as we iterate learning models, fold in digital media resources, and incorporate constantly changing technology to an already chaotic event (i.e., learning). This has produced our 9 Characteristics of 21st Century Learning, a kind of overview we created in 2009, and our Inside-Out School model that is meant to be a kind of bridge between current school design and what's possible moving forward."

"Established Goals (ISTE NETS Standards) 2. Communication and Collaboration: Students use digital media and environments to communicate and work collaboratively, including at a distance, to support individual learning and contribute to the learning of others. Students: a. interact, collaborate, and publish with peers, experts or others employing a variety of digital environments and media. b. communicate information and ideas effectively to multiple audiences using a variety of media and formats. 4. Critical Thinking, Problem-Solving & Decision-Making: Students use critical thinking skills to plan and conduct research, manage projects, solve problems and make informed decisions using appropriate digital tools and resources. Students: b. plan and manage activities to develop a solution or complete a project. 5. Digital Citizenship: Students understand human, cultural, and societal issues related to technology and practice legal and ethical behavior. Students: d. exhibit leadership for digital citizenship. 6. Technology Operations and Concepts: Students demonstrate a sound understanding of technology concepts, systems and operations. Students: b. select and use applications effectively and productively. d. transfer current knowledge to learning of new technologies. Enduring Understandings: Students will understand that: Responsible digital citizens demonstrated shared characteristics, habits and attitudes. We can work together to teach others what we have learned. We can use web 2.0 tools to collaborate and communicate with a global audience. Essential Questions: What are the characteristics, habits and attitudes of a responsible digital citizen? How can we work together to teach others about responsible digital citizenship? How can we collaborate and communicate with others online? Assessment Evidence GRASPS Task Goal: Your goal is to produce a multimedia handbook about basic technology tools and digital citizenship for ISB

Welcome to the official guide to technology and learning by Edudemic! This part of Edudemic is meant to offer you, the teacher, some of the best and most popular resources available today. We've combed through hundreds of resources in order to narrow down our guides into something easy to read, easy to use, and easy to share. Below are links to the guides we have made so far. They're always a work in progress so be sure to let us know if we missed something or if you have more resources you want us to call out in the guides. We're always looking for the best and most useful resources so don't be shy, share! - See more at: http://www.edudemic.com/guides/#sthash.WpqFjsU4.dpuf

"The first thing we attempted to clarify was what exactly is a grade? If I were to look in my grade book and see that Johnny has a B, what picture does that actually paint? That B should tell me that Johnny is pretty proficient. He obviously has some flaws, but I would venture to say he is fairly well-versed in the subject at hand. The question is, however, what actually went into that B? "

Developing good questions is what it is all about! I really like Einstein's quote! I think I have a tendency to focus too much on answers. Going to work on this!

"How much time do we spend developing powerful questions - in our classrooms, schools or policy-making bodies? What message about the value of curiosity and questioning do we send students, teachers and education leaders in our "there's a right answer and a wrong answer, and students better get the right answer or someone's getting fired" approach to education reforms? Are we bypassing an opportunity to ask and wrestle with the questions that might lead to sustained transformation in exchange for more statistical data?"

" Added by Samantha Morra on 2013-05-29 digital storytellingStories bring us together, encourage us to understand and empathize, and help us to communicate. Long before paper and books were common and affordable, information passed from generation to generation through this oral tradition of storytelling. Consider Digital Storytelling as the 21st Century version of the age-old art of storytelling with a twist: digital tools now make it possible for anyone to create a story and share it with the world."

"This collection of blogs, articles, and videos from Edutopia aims to help teachers deploy social media tools in the classroom to engage students in 21st-century learning."

Cool Stuff!

Interesting viewpoint about how we look at educational priorities. It appears the Finnish example has focused on social equity as the basis for its success. A far cry from how we approach education.

WOW! 33 skills. How many do you possess? Thoughts? 

"Pinterest, a social sharing website that allow users to create and share virtual bulletin boards, has been the darling of social media over the past year. Its primarily female user base continues to grow by leaps and bounds. While you likely know teachers who have free Pinterest accounts, you may still be wondering if you belong on yet another social media site. "YES!" (Uttered quickly and with much enthusiasm!) And here's why. While Pinterest is exploding with fashion boards, trendy home decor, and to-die-for travel destinations (that sadly don't fit my budget), it also includes many boards for educators. Pinterest, heavy on visual appeal, can serve as a great resource for such areas as: classroom decor, language arts. content areas, lesson plans, technology tools, professional books, and much, much more! Your boards can also be a resource for students (age 13+ according to Pinterest regulations), teachers, and parents. If you're a newbie to Pinterest, listed below are a few must-know terms and how-to's. With a few quick tips, Pinterest can help you organize the internet jumble of resources for teachers and students. If you're a full-fledged addict, er, Pinterest Pro, skip to How Educators Use Pinterest or simply download today's Pinterest Cheat Sheet that also includes many ideas for boards."

Join me! http://dlmooc.deeper-learning.org/

"Coauthors Harada and Yoshina authored the first text that focused on learning assessment in a school library context. In this revised and expanded version of "Assessing for Learning: Librarians and Teachers as Partners," they continue to shed light on the issue of school librarians helping students to assess for learning. The book begins with a brief discussion of national reform efforts and the importance of assessment for effective learning within this context. The balance of the book provides numerous strategies and tools for involving students as well as library media specialists in assessment activities, emphasizing the importance of students assessing for their own learning. It also provides specific examples of how assessment can be incorporated into various library-related learning activities. All chapters in this second edition have been updated with additional information, and three new chapters on assessing for critical thinking, dispositions, and tech-related learning have been added."