by Tim Holt | Aug 31, 2011 | Student Life, The Compelling Need for Change, Voices
Prakash Nair asked the audience if THEY’d tried out a student chair lately and wondered if any adult would be willing to sit in such a seat for eight hours at a time? Most in the audience laughed at his question, but it was the laughter of recognition. No way. Why, asked Nair, do the adults get the comfortable chairs, but the kids don’t? Adult chairs are padded. Adult chairs roll. Adult chairs might even have the cool mesh that keeps backs and legs from getting all sweaty. But the learners? Unyielding polypropylene.
by Sr Geralyn Schmidt | Aug 30, 2011 | Connected Leadership, Voices, Web Tools That Deepen Learning, What We're Reading
The professional development programs that are essential today need to focus not so much on the hardware and software — what “cool tools” we can use — but on changing how teachers view themselves as educators. It’s not just about teaching the three “r’s†and the content packaged in textbooks. It’s about preparing our students with the skills that they need for the future within a new learning ecology. In a connected world, educators have to think and teach differently. This book adopts that attitude.
by Jenny Luca | Aug 26, 2011 | Creating Global Classrooms, Making The Shift, The How of 21st Century Teaching, Voices, Web Tools That Deepen Learning
I work in an Independent School in Melbourne, Australia, and this year we have made a commitment to help our students (grades 7-12) create ePortfolios, using an Edublogs campus as the platform. Here are 5 reasons why we are making student blogging and portfolio development a high priority. The first: These kids need to establish a positive digital footprint.
by John Norton | Aug 25, 2011 | Connected Leadership, Creating Global Classrooms, Less Teacher, More Student, Local Professional Collaboration, Making The Shift, Passion Based Learning, Personal Learning Networks, Teacher Leadership 2.0, The Compelling Need for Change, The How of 21st Century Teaching, The Teaching Life, Voices, Voices Index, Web Tools That Deepen Learning
We launched our PLP group blog Voices from the Learning Revolution just six months ago, and we’ve now shared 65 wide-ranging articles and essays about the future of learning, written by teachers, librarians, IT specialists, principals, district leaders and consultants who are allied with our Powerful Learning Practice communities. Here’s a brief guide to our most recent 36 posts, and a link to our first guide published last May.
by Shelley Wright | Aug 23, 2011 | The Compelling Need for Change, The Teaching Life, Voices
I recently had the privilege of convening for three days with 37 educators who are passionate about education. We forfeited technology for the company of fellow teachers, consultants, administrators, university professors and school trustees. No cell phone reception. No Internet connection. Unplug’d. We were wholly engaged and attentive to the discussions at hand, as we considered what matters and why. This is my contribution.
by Bud Hunt | Aug 19, 2011 | The Teaching Life, Voices
Try very hard not to work all the time. I suck at this, at turning off my work brain and focusing on being a dad or a husband or “just a dude reading the paper at the corner coffee shop,†but I recognize the value of being at rest and at play, of knowing that it’s better to let small work things go in the name of preserving long term relationships. You CAN be that hero teacher that everyone loves and is in awe of, but only for a little while. Then, you burn out and fade away and don’t do anyone any good at all.
