In teaching my second set of students in the Social Media conference, I encountered two unique situations. The first was that another adult entered the classroom and told the students that they needed to put up their cell phones and pay attention. It took me a couple of seconds to respond, but then I looked …
There’s something magical about a morning run before the rest of the world wakes up. There’s something magical about the dimness and fog that surrounds you with hope with what this day could hold. There’s something magical about the rustling in the woods that could be an unexpected morning encounter. There’s something magical about the …
I learned early on when I began to blog with students that if you allow too much time to pass between the experience (whether that’s reading, a guest speaker, a field trip) and writing about the experience, then students’ writing becomes stagnant and lifeless. To truly capture their voices, students need time during the experience …
After one day of my Sexting, Facebooking and Tweeting seminar, I am shocked and amazed, as I always am, by how astute students are. We began our discussion by asking, “Why do teachers/adults feel like they need to limit access to devices?” They responded with nice, safe answers like “because they want us to be …
Maybe working with students isn’t about what we want: Yet many teachers are not comfortable with their student’s media: they don’t listen to the same genre of music; they don’t play video games; they don’t watch the same TV shows or movies which appeal to their students. But they should. Allow me to elaborate. When …
Sometimes, I feel like the conversations about Twitter center around the impact that it can have on professional development too much. I certainly value it for that reason, but I don’t think that students will use it in the same way. Although I have heard that some teachers are exploring with Twitter in the classroom …
In preparing for a seminar for youth on social media, I have hit a brick wall. This is not uncommon, I often hit a brick wall in preparing to teach something new, especially when technology is involved; however, in this case I am stuck in the middle. I have no idea if my students will …
An interesting read on the evolution of education analyzing where we started: In terms of human evolution, formal education arrived quite late to the party. For millennia, young Homo sapiens essentially educated themselves: They observed, they imitated, they played, they tried, and they erred. The world around them was their classroom. And where we got …
I know from a teaching perspective that it’s important to teach students that it’s ok to abandon books. You don’t have to love every book that you put your hands on and you don’t have to finish every book that you start. And I know that it’s important to model what you teach, but I …
Maybe Common Core isn’t targeting what students need at all. The modern workplace and lifestyle demand that students balance cognitive, personal and interpersonal abilities, but current education policy discussions have not defined those abilities well, according to a special report released this afternoon by the National Research Council of the National Academies of Science in Washington. You …
