How a Radical New Teaching Method Could Unleash a Generation of Geniuses | Wired Business He started by telling them that there were kids in other parts of the world who could memorize pi to hundreds of decimal points. They could write symphonies and build robots and airplanes. Most people wouldn't think that the students at José Urbina López could do those kinds of things. Kids just across the border in Brownsville, Texas, had laptops, high-speed Internet, and tutoring, while in Matamoros the students had intermittent electricity, few computers, limited Internet, and sometimes not enough to eat. "But you do have one thing that makes you the equal of any kid in the world," Juárez Correa said. "Potential." He looked around the room. Paloma was silent, waiting to be told what to do. "So," Juárez Correa said, "what do you want to learn?" In 1999, Sugata Mitra was chief scientist at a company in New Delhi that trains software developers. Over the years, Mitra got more ambitious. Over the next 75 days, the children worked out how to use the computer and began to learn.
Teacher to parents: About THAT kid (the one who hits, disrupts and influences YOUR kid) Amy Murray is the director of early childhood education at the Calgary French & International School in Canada. The following post, which appeared on her blog, Miss Night’s Marbles and which I am republishing with her permission, is a powerful open letter directed to parents about THAT kid, the one other kids go home and talk about, the one who is violent, curses and gets angry in class, the one who parents worry will hurt, disrupt and perhaps influence their own children. Murray is also the co-founder of #Kinderchat (www.kinderchat.net), a twitter-based global community for educators of young children. She is a speaker and trainer on learning through play, self-regulation, behavior management, and the use of technology within the classroom. (IStockphoto) Dear Parent: I know. You’re worried that THAT child is detracting from your child’s learning experience. Your child, this year, in this classroom, at this age, is not THAT child. I know, and I am worried, too. That’s okay, you say.
‘If only American teachers were smarter…’ ( Jonathon Rosen for The Washington Post ) Teachers. In this school reform era, they have been targeted as “the” problem for failing schools. Are they? In this post, Jack Schneider, an assistant professor of education at the College of the Holy Cross, looks at the teaching corps and what is true about America’s teachers, what isn’t, and where to go next. By Jack Schneider If only American teachers were smarter. There’s a kind of logic to this argument. The proposed solution, then, is to recruit teachers with better grades from more prestigious schools. If only it were so simple. If assertions about the poor academic preparation of American teachers were accurate, the policy fix would be easy. Adequately educated though they may be, we could still work to select teachers from a more elite slice of college graduates. Yet consider the challenge of such a proposition. The first problem is scale. The second obvious problem is that of pay. So how can we address this problem?
University School Literacy and Culture -- The Thirty Million Word Gap A summary from "The Early Catastrophe: The 30 Million Word Gap by Age 3" by University of Kansas researchers Betty Hart and Todd R. Risley. (2003). American Educator. Spring: 4-9, which was exerpted with permission from B. Hart and T.R. Risley (1995). In this groundbreaking study, Betty Hart and Todd Risley entered the homes of 42 families from various socio-economic backgrounds to assess the ways in which daily exchanges between a parent and child shape language and vocabulary development. The Early Catastrophe Betty Hart & Todd R. Mission: Betty Hart and Todd Risley were at the forefront of educational research during the 1960’s War on Poverty. Experimental Method: Hart and Risley recruited 42 families to participate in the study including 13 high-income families, 10 families of middle socio-economic status, 13 of low socio-economic status, and 6 families who were on welfare. Results: The results of the study were far more severe than anyone could have anticipated.
Brush Up On Your EdTech Vocabulary With This Cheat Sheet Do you know what a flipped classroom requires? How about a 1:1 classroom? If you’re a regular reader of Edudemic, then you probably are more than informed about what these terms mean and how they’re implemented in modern classrooms. That’s probably because we started Edudemic many moons ago on the same day Apple launched the iPad. Since then, a lot has changed in the world of education technology. The guide is designed to help you understand “the latest trends in educational technology” but really – let’s be honest – it’s a great way to finally figure out what a lot of terms mean before your next staff meeting.
Education of Washington's students should come before corporate welfare On Wednesday, the Washington State Supreme Court will face off with the Legislature over fully funding public education under the 2012 McCleary decision. As the state grapples with the issue of education funding, residents are left wondering how such a prosperous state -- home to a number of the world’s most iconic and profitable companies and individuals — fails to fully fund even basic education for Washington’s children. Ultimately, the answer lies in our broken and inefficient state tax system. Our state tax system is the most regressive in the nation, according to the Institute on Taxation & Economic Policy, and yet billions of dollars of taxpayer money underwrite tax breaks and subsidies each year to wealthy corporations that do not need them. This is starving our education system of even the most basic funding. The only way to properly fund education at all levels, from early learning to college, is to repair our tax system and create new revenue streams for education.
Would greater teacher independence help student performance? JUDY WOODRUFF: Next: addressing the high turnover rate among public school teachers. John Tulenko of Learning Matters Television, which produces reports for the NewsHour, looks at a Boston school where the teachers have taken charge. JOHN TULENKO: For more than 20 years, Susan Sluyter loved being a public schoolteacher. But starting around 2001 with passage of the education law known as No Child Left Behind, her feelings began to change. SUSAN SLUYTER: I started to feel deadened. I felt like I had lost inspiration. JOHN TULENKO: Her child-centered approach fell out of favor as testing and accountability became the new buzzwords. SUSAN SLUYTER: Almost like a tsunami of data collection frenzy. JOHN TULENKO: Gradually, her frustrations grew, and last march, Sluyter quit. SUSAN SLUYTER: I felt — I got to a point where I was feeling like I was contributing to — to pain for children. TONY WAGNER, Harvard University: This is an incredibly hard time to be a teacher. AYLA GAVINS: Yes. Tony Wagner:
Study: Middle School Teachers as Savvy as Students with Tech Researchers found that science teachers inside and outside the classroom aren't lagging behind the "digital natives" they teach when it comes to using technology. The study comes from the work of five researchers, hailing from the New York Institute of Technology, University of Connecticut and Utah State University. The result of their research, posted on the academic research website Springer in October, should bolster the confidence of teachers who feel intimidated about using technology in the classroom. The team surveyed 1,079 middle school students, 774 from Utah and 305 New York, as well as 24 middle school science teachers from those states, ages 23–56, to discover how they compare in terms of tech experience. “Our results indicated that today’s school-age learners are no more technology savvy than their teachers. What separated teachers and students in the study was how they interacted with technology and how often.
Building the Culture of an Empowered Mindset Towards Technology Innovation I have been having an incredible year of learning in my half-time role with Parkland School Division, along with speaking and consulting for other schools/districts. I have learned a lot from both positions and I feel that it is very valuable to be able to look at school cultures within your organization, while also looking at what other schools do from an outsider’s perspective. In this work, I have realized how truly important the role of principal is in building, not only in creating a positive culture, but an innovative one. These schools continuously strive to understand the changes happening in our world to not only catch up, but to lead the way in providing amazing learning opportunities for our students. Often times, as the principal goes, so does the culture of the school. I have colour-coded the graphic so it is not confused with a rubric”, but more to show alignment between beliefs and practices.
On LAUSD's Failed iPad Program — Chambers Daily Howard Blume: Los Angeles school district officials have allowed a group of high schools to choose from among six different laptop computers for their students — a marked contrast to last year's decision to give every pupil an iPad. Contracts that will come under final review by the Board of Education on Tuesday would authorize the purchase of one of six devices for each of the 27 high schools at a cost not to exceed $40 million. In the fall, administrators, teachers and students at those schools will test the laptops to determine whether they should be used going forward. The brand new approach is very clear. From an IT perspective, not standardizing on one piece of hardware is a recipe for disaster. How well the various devices function will be examined by both staff and outside reviewers. Why don't we just let parents pick out cleaning materials? It wasn't a perfect process. Pick one horse and ride it.