Friday, December 24, 2010

What I learned this week 12/25/2010

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Wednesday, December 22, 2010

What I learned this week 12/23/2010

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Ban fiction from the curriculum - Hopewell, NJ, United States, ASCD EDge Blog post

Ban fiction from the curriculum - Hopewell, NJ, United States, ASCD EDge Blog post

I apologize if you need to register (it is free) in order to read this article....but it has me thinking about some earlier learning I've done.

Grant Wiggins (of UBD fame) has written a provocative post suggesting we ban fiction. Okay, not necessarily ban it but perhaps rethink it in terms of how much of it makes up our reading curriculum.

Wiggins argues that fiction is a leisure activity....ie not many of us will have a job in which we will be required to read fiction. Instead most of us will be reading heavy duty non-fiction such a reports or other technical documents...yet this type of reading makes up only a small fraction of what children read in school and based on NAEP scores kids aren't very good at reading non-fiction.

Couple that with what Willingham and Hirsch say about reading success being tied so closely to background knowledge it makes me wonder if we might be doing our students (especially boys, Wiggins says) by not reading more nonfiction.

Something to think about for the LA committee as they work on reading lists etc.

Tuesday, December 21, 2010

What I learned this week 12/22/2010

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Monday, December 20, 2010

Students Know Good Teaching When They Get It, Survey Finds - NYTimes.com

Students Know Good Teaching When They Get It, Survey Finds - NYTimes.com
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/11/education/11education.html?_r=1

Researchers are studying value added measures and looking for other measures that correlate well.

Turns out student surveys seem to be a good way to figure out the teachers who "add value".

Student surveys reveal that the following statement correlate to value added teachers:

Classrooms where a majority of students said they agreed with the statement, “Our class stays busy and doesn’t waste time,” tended to be led by teachers with high value-added scores, the report said.
The same was true for teachers whose students agreed with the statements, “In this class, we learn to correct our mistakes,” and, “My teacher has several good ways to explain each topic that we cover in this class.”
Teachers whose students agreed with the statement, “We spend a lot of time in this class practicing for the state test,” tended to make smaller gains on those exams than other teachers.

I don't think the article mentions the age of the students being surveyed. At what age is a student able to objectively and thoughtfully answer these questions?

For a number of years our school administered a survey called CSImpact or something close to that. It surveyed all stakeholders....including students as young as grade 3. In addition, we also gave our own student surveys. I thought the gathered data was not only interesting but relevant and for a number of years (before NCLB) it drove much of our improvement efforts. However, for a variety of reasons, we no longer give the survey.

I've asked us to give some type of students survey but the idea hasn't gained much traction.

After reading this article I think it is time to start asking again.


What I learned this week 12/21/2010

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Saturday, December 18, 2010

What I learned this week 12/19/2010

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Thursday, December 16, 2010

Announcing the 2010 Edublog Awards Winners! – The Edublog Awards

Announcing the 2010 Edublog Awards Winners! – The Edublog Awards
http://edublogawards.com/announcing-the-2010-edublog-awards-winners/

As we come to the end of another calendar year I like to reflect on the year we are so close to completing. Part of that routine involves going through various end of year lists that other people post on their blogs. Of special note I especially like to look over best of the year music lists, music videos, books, children's books, movies, cookbooks.

There are many posts and lists that contain the above information. But when it comes to my online teacher resource/materials "best of" list I only really have one GO TO list and that is the Edublog award winner lists. This list is a great way to find new blogs and other online resources of which you need to follow.

I've reviewed the entire list and plan to add the following to my Google Reader feed:

http://kirstenwinkler.com/
http://fnoschese.wordpress.com/2010/08/06/the-2-interactive-whiteboard/ (influential post, but I will also subscribe to the blog)

To further explore for other resources:

Enjoy the list!

Wednesday, December 15, 2010

What I learned this week 12/16/2010

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Tuesday, December 14, 2010

http://www.youtube.com/theyearinreview
Enjoy the YouTube year in review which also included the top 10 videos by viewership of the year.

#1 was......



Can't say I liked the song but I love the creativity and it inspired me to see if I could autotune to work on Audacity.

Saturday, December 11, 2010

Thursday, December 9, 2010

What I learned this week 12/10/2010

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Wednesday, December 8, 2010

Learning without Borders





Definitely worth the time to watch this videos....excellent job of getting to where we are at right now in education in terms of reform, improvement and technology's impact.

Monday, December 6, 2010

What I learned this week 12/07/2010

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Sunday, December 5, 2010

Thursday, December 2, 2010

What I learned this week 12/03/2010

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.