In this piece from Harvard Education, school leaders grapple with bringing the system of departmentalization to elementary schools. (Gerald Gaff writes extensively about departmentalization’s role in secondary and college.) Opponents say that learning is more than just conveying content to students; it’s social, emotional, and communal.  In these testing times, however, even our youngest learners [...]

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Great session with Troy Hicks and Bud the Teacher. See tweets for more.

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This morning I presented on re-reading as a way to engage disengaged readers.  We had a fantastic gathering of ~150 participants.  You can access the site I created for the talk here.  It was especially helpful to me as a professional to be in a room with colleagues and share ideas and experiences.  What’s more, [...]

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This piece in Digital Directions explores how schools should decide whether to use netbooks or laptops.  It takes the discussion simply cost differences, which, it seems, is often the primary factor for principals. 

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This piece from the NY Times makes a terse argument for the use of iTunes U to share courses with others, even if it seems counter-intutive to traditional university business practices.  Make learning free; make learning easy to access; make learning portable.  Here’s the argument, in brief:

Other universities say that limited resources, copyright concerns [...]

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Here’s what I read on Ed Week:
The state Board of Regents on Monday approved a reform plan for teacher preparation that would place far more emphasis on classroom experience.
OK. Few would argue that giving pre-service teachers more time in the classroom is a bad thing.  In my work with graduate students in a teacher [...]

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The New York City Department of Education’s system for assessing schools’ achievement comes under fire again from the New York Times.  Disregarding that this piece comes out well after the mayor’s election is safely secured, the article points out that not all schools are held to the same standard, even though the systemic differentiation is [...]

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If only students could just play games and learn, all our problem would be solved. 
I mean that with a wink an a smile, of course.
Still, this piece in Ed Week this morning caught my eye.  It’s about various game-based learning sites that help students learn about financial literacy.  This seems to be becoming [...]

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In a piece from Education Week, Pedro Noguera of NYU School of Education criticizes the Secretary Duncan’s recent scolding of teacher preparation programs.  The most notable quote from Professor Noguera, as Ed Week notes as well, is the following:
It makes no more sense to blame schools of education for the failings of public schools [...]

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A NY Times article recently explored how the New York State Board of Regents is considering opening up “alternative” programs to granting teachers certification.  On the one hand, thinking out of the box is more often than not a good thing for bureaucrats to do.  On the other hand, it makes teaching seem like training, [...]

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Next Monday I’m presenting at an all day session at NCTE on publishing student work.  This page has some online resources.  If others have ideas, send them along!

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Last week I tweeted whether or not anyone knew about a Google meeting devoted to education.  Thanks to Lucy Gray, now there’s a video summary (over an hour and a half) and also her own narrative.  The full video is below:

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The feds want to hear from others about what Web 2.0 learning could look like. 
[...] even though today’s Web 2.0 tools can spread information broadly and quickly and foster collaboration on such projects, the effort has apparently been slow in attracting recommendations from educators and ed-tech experts that could help guide its development, some [...]

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A report from the Everyone Graduates Center has come saying that 9th grade is unusually good at holding students back.  What seems to be a study that focuses on a particular year of study could equally be interpreted as a reflection on a wide disconnect between middle schools and high schools in terms of what [...]

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The US Chamber of Commerce has just released a report card, called “Leaders and Laggards,” giving each state an assessment for its use of “educational innovation”.  There are many things worth noting.  Here are two: 1) the report comes at a time when–all too conveniently–the mad rush has begun for Race to the Top funds [...]

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If you’ve ever wanted to integrate personal learning networks into your teaching, this site is a great place to start. The more work I’m doing with the NYC DoE and innovative approaches to teaching the more I revisit implementations of PLNs in schools. 

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A recent study of nearly 83,000 teachers, principals, and librarians has recently come out, a joint effort of Edweb.net, MCH Discover, and MMS Education.  Access the full study here. 
The study goes further than many others to probe into the differences between professional and functional uses of social networking.  These kinds of questions expose certain [...]

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I created wordles for two of the Secretary of Education’s recent speeches: one given at Teachers College, Columbia University and one given to the US Chamber of Commerce’s Education and Workforce Summit. 
Speech 1: Audience, leaders in education —

Speech 2: Audience, US Chamber of Commerce –

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In an education technology conference in Denver a few days ago, several high profile presenters bemoaned the way in which academic scholarship is copyright protected.  In short,
Stanford law professor and activist Lawrence Lessig told the gathering of campus technology chiefs Nov. 5 that restrictive copyright laws are “destructive of science and education,” because academia [...]

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Edweek reported recently that federal spending is advancing beyond elementary literacy and putting up legislation to focus on adolescent literacy.  I’d like to see Kindles and Nooks brought in to the research realm.  Not to mention more on how re-reading with students can help them confront their histories as readers.
(Thanks to @adlit for the [...]

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Ben Macintyre wrote a recent piece in the London Times declaring that the information age is killing storytelling.  I’ve written before about this dichotomy–the literary vs. new literacies–and voices like Emory English professor Mark Bauerlein like to pretend that we live in Either/Or times. 
There is a need for other voices in this discussion because [...]

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Earlier this week, the USDOE put Karen Cator in charge of the educational technology initiatives.  Cator has both experience as an educator and was an Apple executive.  Education Week wrote:

The long-awaited appointment comes at a time when interest in how technology can be used to improve education is growing as more K-12 schools [...]

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A report from the Alliance for Excellent Education has issued a report that calls for a greater focus on the preparation of high school teachers. They say it’s key for students’ success in college and jobs. Edweek described it like this:
The alliance, a Washington-based group that focuses on improving high schools, also urges [...]

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This article from CNN raises concerns around children using social networks.  What could be piece that raises a dialogue about the complexity, allure, and usefulness of social networks takes on a tone of technophobia.  The image at the top of the article reveals the author’s true intention: rhetoric.  The innocent child (dressed in white, of [...]

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This article recently described how 2 out of 5 teachers are disheartened with the profession.  It connects this study–conducted by a NYC-based research group–to Arne Duncan’s recent murmurings that rewarding teachers and focusing on teacher preparation is essential to improving education.  What can teacher preparation programs be doing, I wonder, to help pre-service teachers have [...]

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A recent article in the NY Times has described the changing face of learning in some schools: video games.  The use of video games has been discussed for years now–thanks, in part, to the popularity of James Gee’s work.  What is new, however, is the way in which game designers are turning their attention to [...]

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Well done California and UC, Davis School of Education.  Well done.  THE Journal sums up what they are doing like this:
Using funds from a new $1 million grant awarded by the California Postsecondary Education Commission, a team from UC Davis, led by Joanne Bookmyer, director of teacher research at the Cooperative Research and Extension [...]

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