October 2009 Blog Posts (118)

My Wife Zapped My Blog

Last night after putting my daughter to sleep, I spent a long time writing a blog for today. Actually, it was too long. I'd spent over 45 minutes on it and knew it needed to be trimmed down or converted into a two-part piece, something like that.

See, I want to start adding in a little more about how I, as an author, write. The process of authoring a book, the ins-n-outs, the behind the scenes, from idea to page to literary agent to sale to publisher to bookstores. Looking… Continue

Added by Alan Sitomer on October 15, 2009 at 6:30am — 2 Comments

Teaching Technique-Stop the Tape

TEACHING TECHNIQUE---STOP THE TAPE

Early in my teaching career there was only 16mm film. The Memphis City Schools Board of Education published a film catalog listing hundreds of film available for teachers to show in their classrooms. The usual procedure for the teachers that worked in the school with me was to order a film, get a student to put it on and monitor it and then go to the teacher’s lounge.

Of course no teacher does that today. (hopefully… Continue

Added by William Lambert on October 15, 2009 at 5:30am — No Comments

Looking to communicate regarding 21st Century Learners from other countries

Hello all:

My name is Justin Fox, and I am a Mathematics and Computer Science teacher at the Bronx HS of Science in Bronx, NY. I was wondering if I could ask a few questions regarding your experiences teaching students, as well as your students who are 21st century learners that are considered "Millenials" (also known as Generation Y). In particular, I have the following questions:

1) What grade level/age range do you teach?

2) What subject areas do you teach?

3)… Continue

Added by Justin on October 14, 2009 at 4:54pm — No Comments

What are the Major Differences Between the Teacher-Directed and Student-Engaged Models of Teaching?

When mentoring our pre-service and in-service teachers we need to describe and model both research-based and clinical best practices. Accordingly, our mentees should know some of the major differences between student-engaged and teacher-directed models of teaching.

Some Major Differences Between the Student-Engaged and the Teacher-Directed Models of Teaching

The Student-Engaged Model of Teaching

Teacher structures many opportunities for students to… Continue

Added by Richard D. Solomon, Ph.D. on October 14, 2009 at 8:08am — No Comments

Free SAT Prep for All and the Undeniable Impact of Having Cash to Prep for this Beast

It's SAT season and if there is one thing about working in a Title 1 school, it's that you get to witness a HUGE disparity when it comes to college test prep.

The fact is, those who can afford to take SAT test prep classes are wise to do so. And the parents of kids in upper-socio-economic communities understand the value of this which is why these test prep programs absolutely thrive. As for the parents in communities such as mine, well... they'd love to be able to offer… Continue

Added by Alan Sitomer on October 14, 2009 at 6:30am — No Comments

Twitter Resources for Teachers

I was tasked with preparing some resources for a presentation recently on the idea of using Twitter in our school district. I went back through my first 500 tweets on Twitter to compile this list, which I used at the meeting. Since then I keep receiving inquiries on the subject and decided to post the links here for now so that I will have a location to direct educators for the resources (until I get my Diigo account set up):…

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Added by David Ligon on October 13, 2009 at 6:30pm — 4 Comments

Posters

I always seemed to be intimidated by excel. I didn't know there were fun things to do on it like this. It was a lot easier than I thought excel was. I think next time I ponder whether to use excel or not I will decide to use it. It freaked me out at first to have my face on a huge poster! Too up close and personal for me. I think this project would work well in an older classroom of kids. It would be somewhat difficult. But just like it did for me it made me more confident in excel.

Added by Ashton Servies on October 13, 2009 at 3:49pm — No Comments

Character Poster

For my character poster I chose a picture of me and my boyfriend Aron. I didn't have many pictures of myself on facebook, but this was one that I did have and I actually liked. I chose the characteristic of dependable because I feel that I am the type of person that people can trust and rely on. I was really surprised with this project because I never knew that things of this nature could be created in excel. I had a lot of fun and think I could have played around all night with the different… Continue

Added by Kaleigh Marie West on October 13, 2009 at 2:35pm — No Comments

Online assessment

I'm currently exploring several different websites that allows my students to be assessed online. I have recently experimented with classmarker.com and I have been pleasantly surprised. Any FREE sites out there that someone would like to recommend (or not recommend)?

Added by Brad Klitzke on October 13, 2009 at 1:43pm — No Comments

Character Poster

A few classes ago we made character posters. I really enjoyed that activity. I didn't know that you could do something like that with Excel. I was fun. Being able to make a poster in Excel was unexpected and fun. I enjoyed being able to make a poster about me, about what I am like. I think that this poster making would be good to use in a classroom. It would probably have to be older students because I don't think that K-3 would really be able to do this. I'm still not sure about 4 or 5. I… Continue

Added by Michelle White on October 13, 2009 at 10:25am — No Comments

The changing calculation of college tuition

The University of California is now mulling charging different rates for different majors. In this article, they cite the example of the engineering student. Because such a kid uses more tangible and costly resources in their field of study, colleges are now mulling the idea of making that student pay more for their schooling. For example, since engineering majors erect 20 foot… Continue

Added by Alan Sitomer on October 13, 2009 at 8:19am — 2 Comments

Creating Online Quizzzes with Google Docs for Free

Google Docs is a favorite thing for us teachers. It is a totally free, web-based word processor, spreadsheet, presentation, and form application. It allows users to create and edit documents online while collaborating in real-time with other users, especially for teachers using it in online classroom. In addition to being a stellar way to write, store and manage your documents and slideshows, it is also a fantastically useful way to create online quizzes for online assessment.

Here…

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Added by SunnyY on October 13, 2009 at 3:13am — No Comments

Character Poster

A few weeks ago in class we made a character poster using Excel. The assignment was to find a picture of yourself, a word that describes you, and the definition of the word. We could put it on the poster however we liked---using creativity. I really enjoyed this assignment and I also learned a lot from it. I never knew you could do something like this using Excel, so I was very interested to see how it worked. I always thought Excel was just for crunching numbers and scientific things. I had a… Continue

Added by Libby Kozora on October 12, 2009 at 11:07am — No Comments

How can we provide free online e-portfolios for our students?

Can Web 2.0 tools provide graduates with a way to create an online portfolio of work, at no cost, and help to position them for job search success?

I believe that all students who graduate with degrees in Digital Media or related disciplines should have an online representational electronic portfolio when they complete their studies. This type of tool, accessible to any potential employer, can play a critical role in the job search process. An online portfolio can also… Continue

Added by Kelly Walsh on October 12, 2009 at 9:00am — No Comments

Please help us .

My name is Lucian and I am teacher and education counselor in Special School Caransebes . I like very much to help and work with my students with special needs . Please vote me here ( see and write the code and vote ). Here is our website

http://differentbutequaletwinning.webs.com/

A movie with mobile phone made by my students with special needs in project Friends of fireworks.

ZIUA PORTILOR DESCHISE 2009 - ACTIVITATE IN CADRUL PROIECTULUI… Continue

Added by Lucian on October 11, 2009 at 12:19pm — No Comments

Pot critic wanted: is it a stigma to be a stoner or are they merely cultural connoisseurs?

For those of us with students who don't think they'd ever want to consider a career in writing, this article might be an arrow in your quiver to help inflate a student's sense of why knowing how to properly punctuate a sentence is a skill that they might want to have in their professional, job hunting arsenal.

After all, who's going to… Continue

Added by Alan Sitomer on October 11, 2009 at 6:30am — No Comments

Poetry writing skills.

The white hair

I looked into the mirror in despair

And saw a wrinkled worried face!

I tried to shave and comb my hair

My eyes suddenly looked into space!

******

They saw the coming shadow of death

As I coughed but not laughed aloud

Carousely spendthrifting my wealth!

Of my wife and property I felt very proud

******

My ears suddenly heard a wave.

I could hear it ,yes feel it so near

"Look at thyself… Continue

Added by Saidani miloudi on October 11, 2009 at 5:09am — No Comments

Add Your Comments to our Voicethread! This is one of the multimedia projects from my students at Ridgeway Middle School, Memphis, TN.

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Added by Ken Greene on October 10, 2009 at 7:30pm — No Comments

Asperger's Explained by a Writer with Asperger's

I have a good friend named Alice Smith who was recently diagnosed with Asperger's as a senior in college. That might sound like bad news, but it's not a new condition - she just finally has a name for it and a way of learning more about herself. So it's really good news! Alice is also a talented writer and set out in one of her blog posts to explain Asperger's in an understandable way. And I'm glad she did. All you get from Wikipedia is a list of behavioral observations. That might allow me to… Continue

Added by Chris Fritz on October 10, 2009 at 7:30am — No Comments

My Freakin' School is Wastin' My Freakin' Time!!!

AAaaaaaaaaarrrgghh!!

I had a school-wide faculty after-school meeting this week on Wednesday afternoon -- one that we were not notified we'd be having until Tuesday afternoon. (As if we don't have actual lives outside of this place.) And why?

Cause there was some really important stuff to go over. Like hall passes.

We literally spent 23 minutes discussing the proper implementation of granting hall passes. Which hall pass to assign. When… Continue

Added by Alan Sitomer on October 10, 2009 at 6:30am — 6 Comments