Three Trends That Define the Future of Teaching and Learning. They're finding each other on their own kid-specific social networking sites, on their blogs, on schools' sites, and of course on Facebook and Twitter. Though Facebook is still a red herring when it comes to school policy (Massachusetts districts have threatened to fire teachers who friend students on Facebook), and educators are split over whether tweeting in class is disruptive or helpful, the sites continue to be pervasive in both higher-ed and K-12. Educators know they can grab students' attention where they naturally live outside the classroom -- the online social world, whether or not it's Facebook. "If you're teaching something that's usually bland and you insert a simple tool that allows students to connect with each other or their peers in other schools and countries whenever they want, you just see kids' faces light up," says veteran educator Chris Lehmann of the Science Leadership Academy.
Educators Unite 2. Tech-Powered. Flickr:Randy Pertiet 3. What these trends mean. In Classroom of Future, Outdated Testing Can’t Keep Up. And this is where Richtel buries the lead, in paragraph 42, about a third of the way through the article: "Karen Cator, director of the office of educational technology in the United States Department of Education, said standardized test scores were an inadequate measure of the value of technology in schools. Ms. Cator, a former executive at Apple Computer, said that better measurement tools were needed but, in the meantime, schools knew what students needed. " Dawson carries the point further, saying that standardized tests only measure students' abilities to take tests, and can't gauge intangible skills such as collaboration and critical thinking. Richtel also neglected to point out an important piece of the puzzle: that standardized assessments are in the process of being recreated.
Tom Vander Ark, who was quoted in Richtel's piece, thinks the writer was not as forthcoming as he could have been. Richtel could have also found a better headline for the story. MindShift | How we will learn. MindShift | How we will learn. School Day of the Future. How Do We Prepare Our Children for What’s Next? When most of us were deciding what to major in at college, the word Google was not a verb. It wasn’t anywhere close to being conceived at all. Neither was Wikipedia or the iPhone or YouTube. We made decisions about our future employment based on what we knew existed at the time.
We would become […] Continue Reading A Glimpse into Future Schools Education Next’s report on five schools that exemplify the model of the future school includes the Denver School of Science and Technology and Carpe Diem Collegiate High School. Continue Reading A Challenge to Doubters: Do Something Impossible Make Your Own List.
Continue Reading 21 Things That Will Be Obsolete by 2020 Flickr: Corey Leopold Inspired by Sandy Speicher’s vision of the designed school day of the future, reader Shelly Blake-Plock shared his own predictions of that ideal day. Continue Reading The School Day of the Future is DESIGNED Continue Reading Continue Reading Continue Reading Continue Reading.