Soft Technology

I had the pleasure of speaking with some of my favorite math teachers today, and we had a "wouldn't it be cool if" moment, so here goes . . . Wouldn't it be cool if our students used Google's Public Data Explorer or the Pew Research Center  to create some great infographics* with Visual.ly ? Yeah, I think it WOULD be cool! If your students are doing projects like this, please comment and let us know how it's going. We'd love to see their work! *Infographics are a way to visualize data; they help viewers see the meaning behind statistics. How Do You Stack Up to a Hoarder? infographic

Today we held our first Innovation Day in Huntsville ISD. I figured it was going to be pretty cool, but I had no idea how cool. In the first 10 minutes I was on the campus of Samuel Walker Houston Elementary I watched a student dredge chicken for frying, saw 5 girls sewing clothing, helped three boys create a new website, and heard students everywhere talking excitedly about their self-created projects. It was AMAZING. During free-write time yesterday, Mrs. Jessica Moore's student Jenna wrote the piece below completely unprompted. It's the cutest thing I've ever seen. Enjoy! Links about Innovation Day: Stump The Teacher: Innovation Day Larry Ferlazzo's Best Resources for Innovation Day Good.is Why Every School Needs Innovation Day Huntsville ISD Innovation Day Planning and Materials Cultivating Innovation on a K-4 Campus, Guest Post by Jessica Powell

This is an open letter to teachers everywhere, but especially here in Texas, the home of the Standardized Test. It is republished here by permission of the author, who wishes to remain anonymous. Teachers: I’m on your side, I feel your pain, and I am one of you, but having a child who struggles in school has helped me see an entirely different side of things. Please listen with an open mind. Yesterday evening my fifth grade 11 year old son, let's call him Hank, told me that you said something along the lines of "You'll wish you'd paid attention when you fail the STAAR test and are back in 5th grade again next year!" then looked pointedly at him and two other students. His cheeks reddened as he told me this. He frequently complains about more than one of his teachers being speechless with rage after benchmark or common assessment scores are returned and, in his words, "Everyone fails." He’s also reported more than one teacher refusing to speak to the clas...

My friend Rebecca King  (@rebeccakingRK) from Rockdale ISD noticed the power of  Gabriele Galimberti ’s  photography series of the world's children and their prized possessions.  Unfortunately, some of the sidebar adverts were not child friendly. Rebecca wanted her educator colleagues to be able to use the photographs for writing assignments, etc., so she created this presentation for classroom use. Please also visit Amanda Gorrence's  original article  about the photographs. If you developed thinking questions, writing assignments, or other materials for your students to use with these photographs, please let me know in the comments so that I can add your ideas to this post.

The latest season of Project Runway (it's the teams edition--advertised as "There's no I in TEAM") has really got me thinking. How many of you would HIRE someone who came into an interview and announced the following: I prefer to work alone (translation: I'm terrible at working collaboratively). I am really good at book work (translation: I can't apply my knowledge to real-world problems). Now, how many of the TOP secondary students in our current education system would proudly say . . .  I hate working in groups. Standardized test scores are what I have to show for my educational career. Seems there's a giant disconnect between "real world" skills we want to hire and skills learned within traditional schools.  What do you think? Wordle.of the ISTE Nets for Students

"If you don't like change, you're really gonna hate extinction." -Ross Shaffer Dino Photo Bomb