Literacy in the Digital Age: Five Sites With High-Quality Informational Text Editor’s Note: Teaching Channel has partnered with Student Achievement Partners on a blog series about digital literacy tools and their effective use by educators. One of the most exciting shifts in the Common Core State Standards is the increased use of content-rich, informational text. Let’s think about this. Preparing our students to be college- and career-ready is our priority. Below, we share five sites that will help you find these texts with ease and even differentiate the same article for the different learners in your room. 1. Newsela is an innovative way to build reading comprehension with nonfiction text that’s relevant. Newsela supports differentiation through interest and ability level. We’ve used Newsela with seventh grade students and saw a drastic improvement in their reading abilities. Text sets are another way to utilize Newsela. They’ve recently launched an extension of their site that is explicitly designed for elementary students. 2. 3. 4. Continue the Conversation
Why young kids need less class time — and more play time — at school (iStock) I have published a number of pieces over the last year or so on the importance of allowing young children to play in school rather than sit for hours at a desk laboring over academic tasks. Here is a new post making the case for why less class time — and more play time — will actually lead to a better education for kids, however counter-intuitive that may sound. It was written by Debbie Rhea, an associate dean of the Harris College of Nursing and Health Sciences and director of the LiiNk Project (www.liinkproject.tcu.edu. ) at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth. The LiiNk Project is described in the post. By Debbie Rhea It seems counter-intuitive to think that less classroom time and more outdoor play would lead to a better education for kids. For years, educators have tried different unsuccessful strategies – more testing, more instruction– to reverse these trends. Other countries have figured this out. [Why so many kids can’t sit still in school today]
How Guessing Games Help Kids Solve Math Problems Do you remember the scene in the movie Rainman in which Dustin Hoffman, playing Ray, an autistic savant, instantaneously counts the number of toothpicks spilled on a restaurant floor by a waitress? “Two hundred forty-six total,” Ray intones. His brother, Charlie (played by Tom Cruise), asks the waitress how many toothpicks were in the box she’d just opened. “Two hundred and fifty,” she answers. Charlie smiles at Ray. “Pretty close,” he says. The rest of us can’t estimate with anything close to Ray’s exactitude. “We wanted to know whether thinking intuitively about numbers, such as approximating and comparing sets without counting, helps in actually doing math,” said University of Illinois psychology professor Daniel Hyde in a report on the the UI website. “Hyde and his coauthors report that practicing this kind of simple, instinctive numerical exercise can improve children’s ability to solve math problems.
A doctor’s plea: Restore recess in metro Atlanta schools | Get Schooled Sarah Gard Lazarus, a parent, pediatric emergency room doctor and native Atlantan, writes today about the critical need for recess in schools to improve children’s health and well-being. By Sarah Gard Lazarus I’m a physician. In my practice, I fix things. If someone has a cut, I sew it. Kindergartners get into recess. As a local pediatrician, I advocate for children on a daily basis. The AAP explains that children who get regular recess are healthier, better able to focus, and develop the social and emotional skills necessary to be engaged learners. Children from Finland have some of the highest scores on international standardized tests, much higher that the children in the United States. Young children learn through movement. In many families throughout metro Atlanta, children do not have a safe place to play outside of school. By depriving our children of recess, we are not improving test scores; we are creating unhealthier children and impeding learning.
5 Engaging Uses for Letters in Your Classroom The idea of writing a business letter with a class may elicit eye rolls and under-the-breath scoffs of "Oh, that old chestnut!" from many a contemporary teacher. But if we desire to lead classrooms where we value reflective thought and carefully crafted words, letters can be a surprisingly rich genre to explore. Whether it's a letter that you write to your students or a letter that your students send, here are five first-class strategies that address key skills and envelop your students in learning. 1. Letters on a Rubric This year, I made the decision that on every rubric and scoring guide for a major assignment, I would begin with a brief, heartfelt letter to my students. 2. When I feel like students are becoming a bit too task-centric in their thinking (i.e. their first question when starting a new book is "What will be the project/paper for this book?") For instance, in one open letter to the class, I wondered: There was no major project associated with this reading. Drew reflected: 3.
Sir Ken Robinson: Creativity Is In Everything, Especially Teaching From Creative Schools by Ken Robinson and Lou Aronica, published April 21, 2015, by Viking, an imprint of Penguin Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House LLC. Copyright by Ken Robinson, 2015. Creative Teaching Let me say a few words about creativity. It’s sometimes said that creativity cannot be defined. There are two other concepts to keep in mind: imagination and innovation. Creativity is putting your imagination to work. None of these is true. Creativity is about fresh thinking. Creativity is not the opposite of discipline and control. Creativity is not a linear process, in which you have to learn all the necessary skills before you get started.
Who Controls The Flow Of Information In Your Classroom? - Who Controls The Flow Of Information In Your Classroom? Flow As A Litmus Test For Quality Teaching by Lee Carroll, PhD I’ve been thinking about Teacher Appraisals for years, when finally it hit me like a flash—why can’t they be super-simple? What Are They Worth? First, are teacher appraisals worth doing at all? Is There A Progressive Method Out There? As Head of Department, I’ve been a champion of peer-appraisals for some time. Although there are a few cutting-edge administrators out there, many hew to the top-down way of assessing teachers and never tried teacher-to-teacher. My Discovery Now I’ve discovered something even easier. This year we’ve agreed to use Charlotte Danielson’s state-of-the-art Framework for Teacher Appraisals. Yet in conducting these rigorous reviews, I’ve noticed something. The trait that tells it all for me is—FLOWS. What Is ‘Outflow’? First let me define—outflow indicates the direction of communication. How Did The Teacher Support Student-Initiative? –Albert Einstein
The 10 Skills Modern Teachers Must Have There’s been a lot of talk recently about what it means to be a learner in the 21st Century. Earlier this year, we put together a guide with skills important for students today. So, why not a list for educators, too? Image via flickr and Chicago 2016 Engage in Professional Communities: Teachers can sometimes lead a very solitary existence at school—spending all of their time tutoring before and after school and scarfing down lunch in front of the copier or spending their free period, if they’re lucky enough to have one, at their desks while grading papers. However the Essential skills for today’s teachers go far beyond “knowing how to use an iPad” and into the realm of connectedness. Editor’s note: This is a revised version of an article written by Jeff Dunn that originally appeared on March 12th, 2013.
Some Excellent TED Talks and Books on Forming Better Habits January 7, 2015 Setting up new goals and resolutions have become a common thing with the start of each new year. However, working towards the achievements of these goals can sometimes turn into a frustrating endeavour especially when the goals are not realistic enough. For a successful accomplishment of ones goals, behavioural psychology has the answer: form better and lasting habits. Books: 1- The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business, by Charles Duhigg (Author)2- Rewire: Change Your Brain to Break Bad Habits, Overcome Addictions, Conquer Self-Destructive Behavior, by Richard O'Connor Ph.D. TED Talks: 1- Try something new for 30 days, by Matt Cutts 2- Why some people find exercise harder than others, by Emily Balcetis 3- Why we all need to practice emotional first aid, by Guy Winch 4- Your genes are not your fate, by Dean Ornish
What Do Students Think Of Your Class? Bring TeachThought Professional Development to your School! What Do Students Think Of Your Class? by Terry Heick Google is the company that has become its own verb. Google it. They’re also challenging Apple with their Android mobile operating system (though to be fair, they’re unlikely to catch them anytime soon), not to mention their aggressive entry into new digital markets, from Google Fiber to the Chromebook. They make more money than they could ever spend, and can seemingly do what they please from their Mountain View, California headquarters, where billion dollar patent lawsuits barely cause a ripple. Google is all of those things on a functional level, but in terms of identity it’s slightly less precise as they sort out their identity moving forward. What this all of this mess means to your classroom could be significant. Classroom ‘Identity’ Just as product and service have a kind of identity (often referred to as a “brand”), so does your classroom–whether you plan for it or not.
Rigor Made Easy: 3 Ways to Go Deeper with Students Frequent contributor Barbara Blackburn shares three activities to get below the surface of learning and encourage deeper thinking from middle graders. By Barbara R. Blackburn Raising the level of rigor in your classroom does not have to be difficult or a separate lesson. Rather, using creative and engaging instructional strategies that push students to higher levels of thinking can occur as a regular part of your instruction. Increasing Rigor Through Riddles First, let’s look at a way to increase the rigor of vocabulary. To increase the rigor, ask students to write a riddle about the word or concept. Prices go up. Increasing Rigor Through Problem-Solving When we start a lesson, we typically tell students what we will learn about that day. Three Alike is a game in which the teacher provides three examples to the students, and then asks the group to guess what he or she will be teaching about today. Once students are familiar with both games, you can shift the ownership to them.
Data on teacher prep grads will soon lead to consequences for some programs Eleven states now tie teacher outcomes back to their preparation programs, and an increasing number of states are planning to use that data to decide whether to keep programs open, according to a new report by Bellwether Education Partners. The report comes as many teacher preparation programs and experts are waiting on the U.S. Department of Education to finalize new federal regulations that could require all states to determine how graduates fare after completing teacher preparation programs and report that data publicly. Related: California faces a dire teacher shortage. The 11 states that currently track this data look at a variety of graduate information, including the academic growth of students taught by graduates (as measured by standardized tests), job placement rate of graduates, and the persistence rate once teachers begin teaching. The report said three states, Florida, Massachusetts, and Ohio, currently use graduate data to make decisions about programs.
The Poisonous Mythology of Grittiness Posted by Bill Ferriter on Wednesday, 01/13/2016 Yesterday, I had the chance to do some brainstorming about Design Thinking with John Spencer -- a thinker and a friend that I greatly admire. During the course of the conversation, I asked John why he thought that Design Thinking should play a role in modern classrooms. His answer was a huge a-ha moment for me: "Design thinking builds grit by giving a lot of slack. We have this idea that perseverance comes form a buckle down and get it done mentality. Stew in that for a minute, would you? I'm not sure if that definition is a result of our compulsive obsession with bootstraps, our one-time belief that hard work is the Golden Ticket to Heaven, or the fact that we've been told time and again that instruction in our schools isn't all that 'rigorous', but defining grit as a willingness to struggle through miserable experiences is a poisonous myth that harms students because it suggests that learning has to be painful in order to be meaningful.
Vulnerability = Online Teacher Leadership This is part of Crystal Morey’s Getting Better Together work. Crystal and all the Teaching Channel Laureates are going public with their practice and seeking support in getting better from colleagues and the Tch community. After finishing the 11-week book study Making Number Talks Matter in late December, I began reflecting on the experience of helping to co-construct and co-facilitate #MNTMTch. My “normal” teaching day has seven periods with roughly 135 students. I rarely talk to other teachers — beyond a Friday afternoon collaborative session — and my experience with teacher leadership is still in its infancy. As fellow Teaching Channel Laureate Kristin Gray and I planned the book study, I was nervous to go public with my practice via social media, which was one of the channels we’d use for interacting with participants. Finally, I’ve been a private person online, and was protective and afraid to show my insecurities. Together, we relearned mathematics. My nerves were starting to ease.