Aggregators and the Roundness of the Earth
I often urge teachers to make good use of news aggregators to find cool stuff without having to go everywhere. I like skimming over Google News and Popurls (not always safe for school) when I’m using a...
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Readable Fonts
I just returned from a week in Ireland with an international contingent of Apple Distinguished Educators. We had a great time, and we shared some great ideas and resources. I particularly enjoyed my...
View ArticleLearning to Learn
During my time in Ireland this summer, I spent a substantial amount of time discussing how we can get people to learn about learning. The goal is to help people learn independently. I say “people” and...
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Getting to Know You
Yesterday we were fortunate enough to have Mark Fernandes from the Luck Companies address the faculty and staff at our county-wide convocation. He spoke at length about the importance of human...
View ArticleSay Good Bye To Flat Hair
Remember Pocahontas and her hair waving in the wind? Yes, in that animated movie that got the Virginia History Standards of Learning all wrong. That poor Pocahontas with her flat hair. She should hang...
View ArticleDon’t Strip Off the Fun Stuff
I work mostly with secondary teachers, and lately I’ve been wondering why we have to strip off any remnants of fun when we walk into the building. In elementary school, classes often have team names,...
View ArticleEmpathy for Students
Over the weekend I bought Math Doodles, an incredible app for my iPad. I will review it when I have a bit of time, but for now, I would rather tell you about a presentation given by the creator of this...
View ArticleSomewhat Reading Vs. Really Reading
As is often the case, NPR made me think this morning. First, I woke up to a story about Jane Austen, reading, and neuroscience. I had read the report earlier this year when a friend sent me the link to...
View ArticleSausages, Standards, and G21
Last night I was fortunate enough to be in the audience when Dr. Yong Zhao addressed a group of school leaders at the University of Richmond. I had heard him this summer at ISTE, but his message is one...
View ArticleVsauce, Photography, and Sources
Over the weekend I watched this video from the Vsauce educational channel on YouTube. I take dozens of pictures with my phone every week, and my whole life I’ve taken pictures with more traditional...
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Scratch Habits
This morning I received an email from a teacher asking for help with a Scratch project. A student needed help getting a sprite to appear at a random corner of the screen whenever the game was started....
View ArticleConnecting the STEM Dots
In October, I clicked on a link in a tweet and discovered hexaflexagons. I watched a couple of videos from Vi Hart’s channel on YouTube, and then I set out to make my own. When I left my office to find...
View ArticleThe New “Reading a Book”
Here’s your challenge: try to get through an entire day in a school without someone telling you kids’ attention spans are not what they used to be. Inevitably, this comment is followed by a string of...
View ArticleWhen In Doubt…
A few years ago, Mrs. Abbott and Mrs. Blackburn brought their Language Arts and Latin students together in a very interesting cross-curricular project to study the origins of words. Now that we have...
View ArticleWhat’s the Secret?
What’s the secret? How can I boil down things I do into pithy sentences that make myself sound as good as possible? Here goes: Be curious. Read widely. Try new things. I think a lot of what people call...
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Technology, Old and New
I walked past the Ceramics Studio this afternoon and caught Mrs. Long making a sample for her students. The process took several minutes. I’ve sped up the video in iMovie. Watching Mrs. Long reminded...
View ArticleLandscape, Please
This morning I helped two colleagues edit video captured by students using mobile devices. I had the opportunity to share a few tips with them to help their future editing. Teach yourself and your...
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Standing Back
This week has been one of the most successful I’ve had in school recently, despite being out for two days. On Wednesday and Thursday I was in Mr. Dacey’s room working with students who were making...
View ArticleWorking Together
This morning I participated in Apple’s Leadership and Learning event in Richmond. I showcased some of the work our students have done in our 21st Century Classrooms. I also had the opportunity to...
View ArticleThe Importance of Making Things
For thousands of years, we learned by doing. We worked alongside our parents and were apprenticed to the experts. Assessment was as authentic as possible; you either could or could not do your job. No...
View ArticleUniversal Design for Learning
This morning I started reading a book titled Universal Design for Learning in the Classroom: Practical Applications. It was a present from a friend who works with pre-service teachers and thought I’d...
View ArticlePlanning and Revising
As the year winds down, several teachers have stopped by to talk about projects that are still in the works around GHS. This has started conversations about planning for next year’s G21, especially...
View ArticleInfectious Apps
What apps do you use in your classroom? Is there a more commonly-asked question at educator gatherings these days? We are in the process of selecting and purchasing apps for our 1:1 pilot at Goochland...
View ArticlePoisoning the Well
Sometimes, allowing our standards to slide for just a moment might make people deaf to our message for a very long time. In the 1950′s, Bernard Kettlewell published the results of his study on the...
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Visuals, Maps, and Making Sense of the World
Of the workshops I led in Goochland this summer, the one on using visuals in the classroom was probably my favorite. Okay, maybe the one on creating movie trailers with iPads was firs, but this was a...
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Craig’s Creative Writing
Yesterday, my very creative friend Tina posted a status update on Facebook in which she commented that Craigslist posts would make interesting book titles. I have to admit I have never visited...
View ArticlePlaying = Learning
Last week I attended my son’s Back-to-School night and walked away smiling. His math teacher, Ms. Griffin, spent a long time talking about games and puzzles and very little time talking about SOL tests...
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Minecraft and Spatial Thinking
How long has SketchUp been around? My earliest blog post referencing SketchUp is from December 20, 2008, but I know it had been around for a long time before that. I enjoy working in SketchUp, and I...
View ArticleThe Case For Downtime
Last week I read an article in The Atlantic about the importance of daydreaming. The author cites studies and makes the point that giving the brain time to drift from one idea to the next, unprompted,...
View ArticleThe 3D Printing Question
I think 3D printing is really cool. The possibilities are endless. I can print my own spare parts, or create my own toys… There have been incredible stories 3D printed bones, or casts to help heal...
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Civil, Polite, Informed
Should we teach our students to tweet? Is tweeting more important than cursive writing? I don’t know. Depends on who asks and when the question is asked. This was my response yesterday. As I was typing...
View ArticleSix Years Into G21
Last week, at the VSTE annual conference, I attended a session about project-based Language Arts classrooms. During the Q&A at the end of the session, I mentioned our G21 framework and a project...
View Article“Grading” Digital Citizenship
Seeing technology as a distraction rather than a learning tool is ridiculously common. I see teachers struggle with this predicament and I feel an obligation to change their minds. When ball point pens...
View ArticleLearning Through Photography
With all the talk about 1:1 computing coming to Goochland, there has been a lot of talk about inquiry-based approaches to teaching and creativity. We have moved away from discussing what apps to use...
View ArticleMy Kids CAN Do That
This year we gave students control over their own passwords for Google Apps. I was a bit worried when we decided this, and we have tools to help teachers manage potential classroom disruptions. I am...
View ArticleThe Mechanics of Understanding
How do we learn? Pick your favorite answer. We learn by doing. We learn by repetition. We learn by teaching others. We learn by… We learn when we are challenged and supported, when we have something to...
View ArticleEngagement, Hope, and Caring
How engaged are you with students in your classroom? Do you talk with your students, or do you talk at your students? Do you think your students believe you care about them? How important is any of...
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Thinking About Citizen Science
I’m currently working on a children’s book about ladybugs, and after collecting video of a larva eating an aphid this weekend, I was trying to find out if ladybug larvae have teeth. In my searching, I...
View ArticleMore Than Names and Dates
It is that time of the year when kids are walking down the hall talking about Standards of Learning tests, how they did, and how much they hate this or that. When I was in high school, I hated history....
View ArticleData-driven Games?
Over the weekend I traveled to an event in Florida and got to talk to Marcelo Stavale Molina very briefly at the end of a session. He is a Brazilian educator and his students do quite lot with Scratch...
View ArticleDeeper Learning Has Legs
It is easy for educators to sit in a faculty meeting or professional development session seemingly paying attention and nodding along to what they hear while secretly vowing to wait until this new fad...
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Ideas Worth Sharing, iPad Edition
Yes, I’ve borrowed the TED tagline, sort of. Why not? When you have a good idea, share it. Apple has put together a small collection of books perfect for our teachers in the iPad 1:1 program who might...
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Learning the Old-Fashioned Way
School learning is a relatively new development in the history of the world. For hundreds of thousands of years, nobody went to school, and the world did not end. Everything progressed slowly, but I’m...
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Feedback: Google, TD, and Schoology as Puzzle Pieces
It is funny how sometimes we have to go far away to hear what people nearby are saying. While I was in Ireland last month, I was sitting in a presentation and the following quote was on a slide:...
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As Captain Picard Might Say…
When I tweet, I feel like I’m talking to myself and my words will simply come back to me in perpetuity as Timehop entries. Yesterday, my name was mentioned in a tweet and I got notifications about it...
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Archie and Veronica Explore the Internet
For the past few minutes, I have been flipping through a copy of Exploring the Internet published in 1999. Surprisingly, I have found the Amazon link. The book is a very interesting stroll down memory...
View ArticleAbout the Author
Ms. Kass and her students are making books about plant and animal cells on their iPads. They are using SketchBook and Book Creator to gather everything they are learning through labs and research. The...
View ArticleReading Is an Evolving Skill
I am always interested in research that gives me real information about opinions I have formed based on anecdotal evidence. For example, I read an article in The New Yorker yesterday about the nature...
View ArticleTraining Vs. Professional Development
I have a really fun job. I provide professional development and training to teachers, often embedded in the classroom teaching model lessons, co-teaching, or just stopping by to help everyone...
View ArticleThe Civility and Civics Of Wikipedia
I love Wikipedia. I argue with anyone who says it is bad, and I’ve even created a document to help teachers use Wikipedia effectively with their students. There is something special about this giant...
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