I love that my Assistant Principal is writing such salient and relevant posts for our middle school experience here at Carolina Day and schooling in general…
DomainDouglas: On Writing and Blogging — Following a Fifth Grader: “If you want your fifth grader to write, give him a blog; perhaps he will surprise you.”
So true.
Even though my beloved southern states normally get the grief of silly legislation in the name of national/religious pride, it’s frustrating to see legislators anywhere debating such literally inane points in the time of national/economic/climate/educational/fiduciary crisis…
N.H. Bill to Ban International Baccalaureate Program Is Defeated – Curriculum Matters – Education Week: “‘Do you want your children to be indoctrinated to be world citizens or do you want them to be residents of this state and this country?’ said Rep. Ralph Boehm, a sponsor of the bill, according to the newspaper.”
Robert Welch Jr called… he wants his poor logic back.
I just purchased a new pack from one of my favorite gear companies, Osprey. I decided on the Day Lite pack and so far it’s pretty amazing.
Yes, it’s small.
However, that’s what I was looking for with my new pack.
I’m a bag snob and spend way too much time reading reviews and talking to folks at our REI store here in Asheville about packs and gear.
My favorite features are the smallish size, the unibody opening aspect and the “hydration slip” for CamelBacks etc. I actually use that for my iPad (inside of a Timbuk2 sleeve):
I use my iPad as my “laptop” (along with my iPhone, which is how I composed this post) when I’m away from my office in my house, which is pretty much 90% of the day. My MacBook Pro is running OSX Lion Server and is pretty much acting as a server for my iPhone and iPad to connect to my personal cloud during the day.
So despite the size, this pack is tremendous.
I’m headed to Charleston, SC on a two day field trip with my 7th graders next week, so that’s when this pack will get the full workout. I have no doubt it will perform well.
Best post I’ve read on the latest “should everyone learn to code?” meme that’s been floating around the tech/edu sphere the last week or so…
Rands In Repose: Please Learn to Write: “Writing is the connective tissue that creates understanding. We, as social creatures, often better perform rituals to form understanding one on one, but good writing enables us to understand each other at scale.”
I wholeheartedly agree that coding is beneficial more for the structure and the application of organized thought than for most people’s practical needs. It’s somewhat similar to studying philosophy or religion in college even though you’re a business major… it might not seem directly applicable but helps you notice the subtlety of life and experiences that you might otherwise miss and that leads to a more enriched life.
So yes, I like to introduce my 6th, 7th, and 8th grade students to HTML, some PHP and even Python or Ruby compilers if they are interested. However, I introduce these elements into our traditional middle school studies to help them see the underlying matrix-like complexities of a website and information delivery, even on a simple looking blog like this.
Go learn to code. It’s good for you. Don’t forget to read some Plato and Ecclesiastes along the way.
Blessed are the people who see beyond the surface of things, because as Douglas Adams reminded us, things are not always what they seem.
I’ll be speaking this Saturday from 9 A.M. to Noon at First Baptist Greenville, SC on the topic of social media, Twitter, Facebook and WordPress, and how those things impact everything you do (no matter what you do) with Merianna Neely.
We’ll be covering the basics of these services and the social web with a primary focus for interested parents and professionals.
You should come if you can.
It’s going to be magical.
$25 fee includes lunch.
Email if you’d like to learn more.
Beautiful book…
MacSparky – Blog – My New Book: The MacSparky Paperless Field Guide: “The book is a deep dive on paperless workflows for the Mac, iPad, and iPhone. It takes full advantage of iBooks Author and includes picture galleries, interactive images, movies, 32 screencasts, and nearly 27,000 words. There is over an hour and a half of video. Not only does this book tell you how to go paperless, it also shows you.”
David Sparks has really set the bar for how the evolution of instructional books should go with this important piece.
Even if you’re a serious geek and have a complete workflow (or not), go pay the $5 for his book and learn a few things about Automator, Hazel, TextExpander and workflows that might be new to you.
From iOS to OSX, this piece has you covered.
Highly recommended.
April May is the cruelest month…
GM Says Facebook Ads Don’t Pay Off – WSJ.com: “General Motors Co. GM -0.97% plans to stop advertising with Facebook Inc. after deciding that paid ads on the site have little impact on consumers’ car purchases, according to a GM official.”
First of many as the FB Empire fades into the quickening dawn.
Just spent the last hour trying to resolve this error on my iPhone and iPad after changing my password (something you should frequently do, of course) before finding this fix:
Fix: Cannot Connect to iTunes Store: “I called Apple support, and they told me to ‘Reset Network Settings.’
Got to Settings – General – Reset – Reset Network Settings.
Basically it resent the Wi-Fi settings and problem solved!
Make sure you to get your router psswd to re-connect to Wi-Fi.”
This is more of a “future” note for me, but hope it helps if you get this annoying message on your iOS device
While I had many great teachers in primary, middle and high school (and college), I didn’t do much “learning for learning’s sake” until after graduate school. That’s not because of the lack of skill or passion of my teachers but was a result of the nature of factory education and schooling.
When I read this, I think about myself and the students I’ve had the chance to work with over the past seven years of my life:
The Nerdy Teacher: Letting Go of Control #PBL: “There is an idea out there that students need to be told what to do and how to do it when it coes to projects. For some students, they have no idea what to do when told they can be creative because they have never been given the freedom to do what they want. It’s terrible when I have to help a student find their creative passions again. Sadly, I feel like some students never recover.”
As we move towards more PBL based learning dynamics at Carolina Day and with StudiesLab, I’m hopeful that creativity will play a big part in opening up my classroom to do cartwheels.
That quote above is from this guy “with no special talents” who didn’t do that well in his schooling.
As we enter that mentally and physically exhausting period at the end of the school year, our tired teacher eyes perk up when we start considering the possibilities of “next year’s” (meaning the new crop of students we’ll be working with in 2-3 months) experiences.
One of the things I’m personally looking forward to is whether or not I can do cartwheels with my co-learners…
Why Flip The Classroom When We Can Make It Do Cartwheels? | Co.Exist: World changing ideas and innovation: “When you decide to change higher ed with the purpose of changing the world, you aim high. Because of academic freedom–freedom of ideas but also freedom from having to produce an income or a profit–you can achieve what few other investments achieve: a return on our society’s future, not just on quarterly Wall Street reports.
The cartwheeled classroom not only connects text books and classrooms to the real world, but it also inspires, uplifts, and offers the joy of accomplishment. Transformative, connected knowledge isn’t a thing–it’s an action, an accomplishment, a connection that spins your world upside down, then sets you squarely on your feet, eager to whirl again. It’s a paradigm shift.”
I’m planting sequoias.
A healthy, supportive, challenging and collaborative school environment (faculty, students and parents) makes all the difference.
It’s one of the things we do well at Carolina Day…
DomainDouglas: “Learning and teaching. These two words are closely related, but unfortunately too much emphasis is put on teachers teaching rather than on students learning. All too often, American teachers view themselves as the holder of knowledge whose job it is to pass that knowledge on to students. This model has created mediocrity in schools for generations. Let’s put the focus where it belongs, on the learner and learning.”
Thanks for being an awesome Captain, Mr Douglas.
Free time is not harmful…
The Case for Breaking Up With Your Parents – The Chronicle Review – The Chronicle of Higher Education: “The current dean of freshmen concurs: ‘Starting at an earlier age, students feel that their free time should be taken up with purposeful activities. There is less stumbling on things you love … and more being steered toward pursuits.’ Some of my students begin to look downright uneasy; some are now listening hard.”
Creativity, independence and the learned ability to subjugate boredom with constructive (or fun) activities are all linked in some strange subjective manner.
Imagine if schools gave new faculty a letter like this on their first day…
The Inspirational Note Apple Gives to New Employees on Their First Day
Chill bumps.
Not just “higher” education, but especially independent middle and upper school education…
The Campus Tsunami – NYTimes.com: “What happened to the newspaper and magazine business is about to happen to higher education: a rescrambling around the Web.”
There will be resistance to the inevitable (and healthy, needed) changes, but the music and news industry is a cautionary tale for schools looking to hold off the rising flood waters for three or four years.
Wendell Berry was right on with the “be like the fox and leave more tracks than necessary” thinking when managing your online (or offline) experience.
How to Muddy Your Tracks on the Internet – NYTimes.com: “‘I have nothing to hide, but I’m uncomfortable with what we give away.’”
To see what I’m talking about specifically, click on the link in the footer below…
Not being political here (Obama’s culture of education hasn’t been anything to sing praises over), but the culture of education as practical job preparation is so damaging to education all the way down:
Romney to students: borrow money from parents, take risks: “‘You really don’t want to take out $150,000 loan to go into English because you’re not going to be able to pay it back. You might want to think about something else that meets your interest,’ Romney said, noting that ‘as an English major I can say this,’ reports ABC News.”
I guess graduates can always just borrow $20,000 from their parents to start their own businesses if they do major in one of those unproductive majors.
Tough, wonderful and challenging post…
The challenge of the introverted student – The Answer Sheet – The Washington Post: Our classrooms contain too many forgotten introverted students who may need help but are not getting it and/or have gifts that aren’t being either elicited or supported. It’s important to remember that while Rich survived his high school experience and learned from it, some quiet students may not. Which is why — amid all the noise and excitement of our extroverted society — we must tap into the hidden gifts of our invisible adolescents as well.
As an admitted INFP myself who spent my middle school and early high school years rolling 20 sided dice in dark corners with a couple of like-minded friends and trying my best to hide when we were marched to the communal lunch room, I’m always particularly interested in spotting those students who have a great voice but have the hurdle/challenge/blessing of being more introverted.
Again, it’s not just about differentiation in education, but also about relationship and a real knowledge of our students.
It’s time to move to portfolios and authentic assessments. Schools that don’t will be left behind…
Movement Against Standardized Testing Grows As Parents Opt Out | MindShift: “‘Our schools are faced with contradictory and incomplete directives regarding high-stakes testing and evaluation, our teachers are humiliated by the thought of publicized evaluation numbers and our students are stressed by the unnecessary testing that has consumed precious learning time,’ the letter says.”
Reminds me of U2′s greatest song, Acrobat:
“I’d join the movement if there was one I could believe in…”
Indeed.
