Soft Technology

I've been doing a lot of reading lately in preparation for the first upcoming Engage Me Academy. Here's one thing I learned . . .

Since my first year as a teacher in 1997 I've been deeply interested in how to get students interested in learning what I wanted and needed them to learn. Lately I learned what I was striving for had a name that has become quite the buzz word in education; I wanted students to become ENGAGED. Eventually I developed a knack for understanding what choices left to my students would most likely lead to this state. Each educational book I read, and really each terrible staff development session I attended, helped me refine my understanding of exactly how to design engaging lessons and staff development events.  I want to help you learn to do the same, and to that end, I'm developing a new 3 1/2 day academy to help teachers learn how to get human nature working with them instead of against them. If you want to know more or sign up to get information, please visit http://www.EngageMeAcademy.org   Feel free to download this image, print it out, and use it however you want. There will ...

The Techs4Tex team spent a fast-paced and exciting day today in Brenham, TX preparing for the upcoming Texas Google Summit coming up May 17, 2104. We began by laying out the schedule (about 20 concurrent sessions). Below is Brenham ISD Tech Director Kim Strauss breaking rules by drawing on the table with a dry erase marker, which amazed us all . . . Also pictured Shepherd ISD's Tech Diva Pam Cadwalder, Brenham ISD Instructional Technology Specialist Troy Kuhn,  Coldspring-Oakhurst Consolidated ISD's awesome ELA specialist Laura Kile. There were also a bunch of other awesome people present, just so you know. We emailed with our keynote speaker Kyle Pace (so excited to have him visit us in TX), and more of our big stars including Shelly Terrell and Tim Chase . We also added a few of these guys who are kind of a big deal to our Lead Learners page, but there are so many amazing presenters sharing their knowledge it was hard to know where to stop. One of the sessions I'm mo...

Someone asked me recently if [insert organization name here] owned Project Based Learning. Well, I'd like us to think about that together because I understand the root of the question. There are some organizations, sales people, companies, etc. who seem to own the idea of Project Based Learning. Do they? In fact, the tenets of Project Based Learning are ideas good teachers have been using for many years, even if they didn't call it that. One teacher in her 60s recently told me, "Oh Amy, I know all about this! This is how we used to teach before all the testing. It was fun!" Yes, it WAS fun! My friend and mentor Jan Robin was one person who taught me about it. She used it in her elementary school classroom back in the 80s and 90s. She told me that at one time, there was even a state standardized test that attempted to have students create a floating vessel out of some popsicle sticks and foil. My knowledge about PBL has come from many different places, but it began in ...