1872 Portrait photo of John Muir1
As a former history teacher, I think that these conversations with the past — with Tweeple in History — are quite interesting and potentially they are enormous discussion starters in classrooms where discussion is used for learning. A while back I wrote [...]
There is much I can say about my Mom. But one of the first that comes to mind is that she is passionate about everything that she does.
I started this blog post last week after returning from the Nebraska Association of School Boards conference on Omaha. But [...]
A bridge is a sticky connector only if people need to get to the other side1
It appears to have started with a Facebook status update from Science Leadership Academy Principal, Chris Lehmann.
When having audience is no longer novel, simply having one is no longer motivating. We still [...]
From the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation web site.
Brenda forwarded this AP article to me while I was on the road.
Gates Foundation gives $335M for teacher quality
SEATTLE — Three school districts and a coalition of charter schools have agreed to be test kitchens for some [...]
As some of you know, I like to begin my presentations with something that I’ve just learned — something that I didn’t know yesterday. It usually starts with a blog entry that comes into my RSS reader or a newspaper or magazine article that comes into Google News. Often it’s [...]
It’s not a scoreboard that’s going to keep us prosperous and fulfilled.
It’s working to make our children into the people they need to be,
to carry us into a future we can’t even see,
people who will invent that future…
A while back, I did a little work [...]
This was definitely one of the most interesting places to present — and I’ve presented in some strange places. There was no real sense of the front of the room, which worked well, as I wanted participants to be just that, actively engaged in the conversation.
If you’ve been [...]
Brenda had promised that travel would be scaling back after last week in Edmonton — and when you look at the calendar, it certainly looks that way. I just didn’t know that I’d be headed back up to Canada just barely more than 24 hours after landing from Alberta on [...]
Interestingly, each computer has something different on the screen. This is probably fine. Students should be free to use their machines as a thought extensions, utilizing the tools in ways that make sense to them, to help them make sense of what’s being taught.1
My week is over, with [...]
It’s probably just me, but it’s the ridiculous that I want to see in a keynote address.
Large screen photo of 2009 Keynoter Malcolm Gladwell1
Ok, let me see if I can retrace the thoughts that led to that conclusion. I am seeing more conferences, these days, embracing [...]
Education Leaders mesmerized by Will Richardson’s Keynote Address at the Long Island Technology Summit
It was a good day yesterday and I do not believe that Will Richardson and I could have complimented each other’s messages any better if we’d planned it. The theme seemed to be “hyperconnected youngsters” [...]
I surely needed to be doing something else today, but one of my deepest interests, data visualization, is such a seductive distraction for me — and ever since I saw Hans Rosling’s dazzling TEDTalk on “the best stats you’ve ever seen,” I have been intrigued by graphs that [...]
I have not seen any compelling reason to upgrade my iPhone to a 3G system — until a few days ago when I read about Wikitude, a new iPhone app that turns your phone into an augmented reality device. Point your phone and Wikipedia articles about the [...]
My Article in NZ Interface Magazine
Those of you who know me, can probably see me cringe, when I glance at a magazine article headed with “If you can’t Use Technology Get Out of Teaching!” And then I see that I’m quoted all over the article. It [...]
Last week was one of those trips where I was either presenting, driving, flying, or sleeping. There was one wonderful time of relaxed comradery, when I went out to eat with Steve Dembo (IL), and Scott McLeod and other notables from the Iowa ed tech community. It was a laid-back [...]
I am such a weak man. I went down stairs last night to buy a Diet Coke and look what I came back up to my room with. Dark chocolate cake with raspberry filling. I am such a weak man!
You know you’re in Texas when an attractive woman [...]
(cc) image from WikiCommons by Persiatj
I often write about the need for a new type of textbook, one that is digital, interactive, social, open, and a product that actually results from student learning as much as student learning results from the product.
I frequently get comments of agreement, [...]
Reading is more than it use to be.
Flickr Photo (Thinks to do While Traveling by Train) by Akbar Simonse
Thanks to Tom Hoffman for getting the word out about The Common Core State Standards Initiative from the National Governors Association Center for Best Practices [...]
Flickr Image (LHC Tunnel) by Mario Alemi
I’m on another of those wonderful stretches at home catching up with family, trying to catch some movies and mostly spending every spare minute trying to get as much office work done as I can (some writing and work on Citation [...]
Flickr Photo “Starbucks – makes da people – come together!” by Andre A
I frequently find myself awake at 3:00 in the morning and unable to get back to sleep. However, I never have trouble getting to sleep at 10:30 in the evening. It usually [...]
Flickr Photo by Sharyn Morrow
I keep getting reminded that many of the people in my audiences are not of my generation, though I suspect that this is more true of those who read my blog or follow me on Twitter than those who sit politely in front [...]
Flickr Photo by Ilkka K00
I just got off the phone with a market researcher for a major (textbook) publishing company, and we had a wonderful conversation about innovation, learning tools, teachers,… They’re asking some pretty interesting questions that I do not believe I’ve ever head from education [...]
My wrist watch is not digital
When talking about the differences between our generation (my generation) and our school youngsters’, I frequently point at my watch (when I remembered to pick it up on my way out of the house). I explain that my watch is not digital. It [...]
Science has traditionally been done by scientists in their labs, trying to prove or disprove some hypothosis. Their experiments work or they do not work. They learn something important or the do not. We learned, when the result were significant and they were reported. What if Science opened [...]
Well, my vacation is over. I leave for the airport in a few hours on United Airlines (gear under my arm) for Lexington, Kentucky, by way of Chicago.
It’s been glorious to be at home, enjoying salad lunches and evening walks with Brenda, working into a routine, starting a new book [...]
It’s one of those ideas that has occurred to me during those moments when a perfect example presents itself, but then loses itself in the stack of other ideas of similar birth and death. But here, at the beginning of the school year (at least in the Northern [...]
I do not mean this title in the way that many might mean it right now. I’m talking about cloud computing, and referring to yesterday’s New York Times Bits post, Now Even the Government Has an App Store. Obama’s CIO, Vivek Kundra [...]
Flickr Photo by Sandy Kemsley
It’s what some teacher in Japan wrote back after I sent her instructions for Joining Class Blogmeister, “Doumo arigatou gozaimashita.” One of the fiction series I’ve been reading lately is set, partly, in Japan, so I recognized the phrase a Japanese (before logic [...]
I do not usually pass things on that come to me via e-mail labeled, “Your readers might be interested in…” But this would certainly be worth it of you won…
Apply to become a TED Fellow @ TED2010!
Ever dreamed of attending a TED Conference…of being around some [...]
Women now represent 49.83% of the American workforce, expected to exceed 50% by October or November
I flagged this one to pass on several days ago, but have been so focused with another writing project and working on a Citation Machine upgrade (APA 6th edition), that I’ve not been thinking about [...]
I crave routine. For the past week and a half, I have started my morning with a bowl of Cream of Wheat (It’s better than grits) followed by a mile walk to the local Starbucks, a bag (above) over my shoulder. Unpacked, I [...]
Click the images to enlarge
Brenda pointed these out to me yesterday evening. They are in a wooded area of our backyard, at the base of a Maple tree. It’s been raining and yesterday was the most humid day I’ve seen this [...]
Screen shot of The Preservation of Favoured Traces. It illustrates the evolution of ideas across the six editions of On the Origin of Species.
This is one of the coolest things I’ve seen for a long time. Data visualization is one of the most interesting applications of [...]
Before I start bellyaching, you should take a look at PicPocketBOOKS. They have some interesting features.
“Now kids can enjoy their favorite books from your iPhone! Forget the playstations, game consoles and DVDs, our mobile picture books will entertain and educate your child in the car, plane, train [...]
Flickr Photo by Judy Baxter
We all know how much our students love technology. They spend so much time on their mobile phones reading and typing, conversing, Googling, playing, working, and living — it’s a given that our students live in their pockets.
So, if we want to [...]
Flickr Photo by Noah Darnell Here
Browsing through some blogs the other day, I ran across this one (What are we Doing?) from Mike Meechin, a Florida social studies teacher. Meechin tells of a high school junior in his class, who asked a question, “about [...]
“Engage!” from like-titled blog post on SS Glim
An article in EduTopia’s August 26 newsletter reminded me of a conversation I had the other evening with Doug Peterson, in Windsor. The article is How to Keep Kids Engaged in Class, and it describes ten [...]
I’ll be working with directors and superintendents this afternoon, from the Greater Essex County School Board, here in Windsor, Ontario. The theme of the entire conference is Vision to Practice, with a little dreaming, believing, and achieving thrown in. One of the agenda’d questions I’ll be asked is, “What is [...]
From the video, United Breaks Guitars
From the video, United Breaks Guitars
I’m pretty sure that it was in Pittsburgh last week, that a young man came up just after my address, to tell me the story of “United Breaks Guitars.” It was my first exposure to the [...]
Flickr Photo by MacKensie Cornelius
Ann Flynn, of the NSBA, asked me about K-12 Nutrition Staff who are using Web 2.0 tools to communicate with students or parents. Are your schools Twittering menus, soliciting comments on the quality of their meals through blogging, offering social bookmark links [...]
Personas sifts through references and through a natural language process, characterizes netizens with your name.
I pulled it out of a Twitter message that linked to Personas, a project of the MIT Media Lab. Personas is a component of the Metropath(ologies) exhibit, currently on display at [...]
The caption under this Storybook Rabbit (Amber) Flickr photo was, “Never sit on the left side of the room when you have a right-handed teacher. This was like sitting behind a column at a baseball game. Except much less exciting.”
I would add that the teacher [...]
Flickr Photo by Lauren Brown
This one caught my eye because I’ve done a good deal of work in Alberta lately — but also because of part of the title, Who can Unlearnall the Facts That I’ve Learned?. It’s an article from VUE Weekly, an independent [...]
I’m not sure why this Jared Zimmerman Flickr Photo seemed ideal for this post — but here it is.
On Sunday (Aug 9) I wrote about a recent THE Journal article about the decline of computer science classes in U.S. schools. It was based on [...]
Richard Ludlow is modeling his startup on Hulu. | Photograph by Robyn Twomey
I’m a half-hour from boarding a small jet for St. Louis. A bit of excitement occured a half-hour ago when lights throughout the airport started flashing and an announcer came on saying that an emergency had [...]
Front Cover of August T.H.E. Journal
Brenda just laid the August issue of THE Journal on my desk. Glancing over at it, I saw the headline, “Not Your Father’s Classroom,” with a photo of “modern” classroom, evidently from the Columbus Signature Academy.
What strikes me about [...]
