ReconfigBehSci. (2022, January 2). RT @trishgreenhalgh: A few tweets on masks for kids (thanks @dgurdasani1). US schools were 3.5 x more likely to have COVID-19 outbreaks if… [Tweet]. @SciBeh. https://twitter.com/SciBeh/status/1477614232556515331

Trump Back-to-School Threats Pressure Educators Fearing Covid. (n.d.). Retrieved September 3, 2020, from https://news.bloomberglaw.com/coronavirus/trump-back-to-school-threats-pressure-educators-fearing-covid-1

This site is the homepage of the Tech Infusion program at Arizona State University (ASU). Housed within ASU's Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College, Tech Infusion is a technology integration curriculum for Pre-K-12 teacher candidates. Through coursework and hands-on practices, teacher candidates are prepared to use technology fluently and innovatively for teaching and learning. The program integrates research, ISTE Standards, and the TPACK (Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge) framework around effective technology integration. This website provides technology-infusion resources for course developers, instructors, and current and future educators. Examples include research articles, edtech tool tutorials, lesson plans, and outlines of the curriculum. Rating: 9/10

Coffey argues the effectiveness of online literature discussions in the elementary classroom. Addressing both synchronous and asynchronous environments, she suggests that computer-based discussions can enhance understanding of literature and promote community within the classroom.

10/10

This manual, published by Hanover Research, outlines theory and practice of technology integration in the K-12 classroom and provides key strategies for professional development to equip teachers to successfully integrate technology.

10/10

The authors present the benefits of coaching in professional development for educators in today's technologically advanced classrooms. Of particular interest is the explanation of the different methods of coaching: executive, coactive, cognitive, and instructional. They suggest that coaching provides more successful outcomes than single workshops and stress that finding the correct method for each situation and organization is crucial.

10/10

Data from annotation informing teaching practices, understanding of learning, success, at admin level.

Real-time grading/assessment for reading = annotation

And note just assessment, but presence: peer learning; teacher-student feedback, ...

A Brief History of Reading Instruction. Includes references to studies that support phonics as the best method for teaching reading and writing. Free textbook for phonics instruction: https://elink.io/p/free-phonics-books-98c2d4e

Personal Learning Environments (PLE) applied to K-12 classroom

personalized mobile learning solutions to create effective learning paths This appears to blend personalized learning and mobile learning. It is prepared by a specific vendor, MagicBox, so they might be assumed to have their own agenda. This page describes some of the affordances of personalized mobile learning, such as the capacity to track and presumably respond to learner preferences. rating 2/5

This should be taught throughout k-12 schooling. Learnng this in college was super helpful but it was taught a little late for me. I know now how to choose sources that present good information but growing up I wouldnt have been able to do that

This article describes how school districts who wish to integrate more technology into their classrooms should approach the integration. Rating: 4/5

Evaluation, when it is not asked for, and when it has consequences as it does in school, is a threat. It narrows the mind... it inhibits new learning, new insights, and creative thought—the very processes that some people think school is supposed to promote. -- Peter Gray

. . .

Why is it clear to us that it's degrading and objectifying to measure and rank a girl’s physical body on a numeric scale, but we think it’s perfectly okay to measure and rank her mind that way?

. . .

what an oak tree actually needs is not your opinion but soil and water and light and air, and what a child needs is love and stories and tools and conversation and support and guidance and access to nature and culture and the world. If a kid asks for your feedback, by all means you can give it; it would be impolite not to. But what we should be measuring and comparing is not our children but the quality of the learning environments we provide for them.

I don't think James ever claimed he was solving "the problems in public education." How about he's shining a light on ways increased public funding could stimulate public education?

Pearson out of US k-12 market

Parents and students in the Mountain View school district consider their use of math software called Teach to One to be a failure.

The Mountain View school district apparently budgeted $521,000 to implement and operate this new-fangled math program in two local schools. Had they adequately beta tested the program beforehand, the school district might have discovered that Teach to One teaches math (we’ve found) in a disjointed, erratic, and non-linear fashion that leaves many students baffled and disenchanted with math. The program contains errors in the math it teaches. Parents end up having to teach kids math at home and make up for the program’s deficiencies. And all the while, the math teachers get relegated to “managing the Teach to One program rather than to providing direct instruction” themselves.

Sounds like they would have been much better off to just use http://khanacademy.org or http://schoolyourself.org So why are they using this expensive, seemingly untested service?

Sara Holbrook had two of her poems used on the Texas state assessment tests. She verifies what I thought as a student. The questions are ridiculous. The test makers seem to think that their interpretation of a work is the only interpretation, and that they can read the author's mind and know their intent.

"Texas paid Pearson $500 million bucks to administer the tests". Is that right? Was that for just one year? What else could we do with $500 million?

She mentions a study showing that the results of another standardized test could be predicted pretty well using just three data points about families in the community: the percentage with income over $200K; the percentage in poverty; the percentage with bachelor's degrees. So the standardized test tells you nothing that you can't guess by looking at local incomes and education levels.

What a scam.

Since there is no proven “right way” to assess and track student learning, the most effective option is to turn this responsibility over to the students. Because learning should stem from intrinsic motivation, teachers can spend time showing students how to track the feedback and their progress from long-term learning experiences. This way students will learn to reflect on their growth, set better goals, and be accountable for their own growth.

-- Starr Sackstein<br> http://hackingassessment.com/<br> http://hackinghomework.com/

Sunil Singh asks us to stop promoting mathematics based on its current applications in business and science. Math is an art that should be enjoyed for its own sake.

This reminded me of A Mathematician's Lament by Paul Lockhart. This is a 25-page essay which was later worked into a 140-page book. (And Sunil Singh has read at least one of them. He credits Lockhart in one of the replies.)

It also reminds me of this article on the history of Gaussian elimination and the birth of matrix algebra. Newton's algebra text included instructions for solving systems of equations -- but it didn't have much practical use until later. (Silly word problems are as old as mathematics.)

We should let people learn at their own pace. We should neither rush them, nor hold them back. If they show a talent, then encouraging them to push themselves is fine.

Math isn't for everyone, and that's fine. The same is true of any other subject. We should help people learn what they are interested in learning.

So interesting to see this "realization" included in the K-12 report but not in the HE report. Fostering curiousity, interest, creativity, and ownership. Short jump to an open pedagogy model but pretty unclear that's where this is coming from.

Neil Fraser says Vietnam is doing well with computer science education.

"If grade 5 students in Vietnam are performing at least on par with their grade 11 peers in the USA, what does grade 11 in Vietnam look like? I walked into a high school CS class, again without any advance notice. The class was working on the assignment below (partially translated by their teacher for my benefit afterwards). Given a data file describing a maze with diagonal walls, count the number of enclosed areas, and measure the size of the largest one."

"If given the opportunity all teachers would stop grading their students. You’ll never find a teacher who loves grading papers, projects or tests. In 20 years as a classroom teacher, I heard more complaints about grading than anything else."

"So, if they hate it so much, why don’t teachers stop grading? Because parents, administrators, and bureaucrats won’t let them."

Mark Barnes

"Real gifted education (not gifted programs) involves seeing every student as an individual, finding out what they need, what they want to learn, and what they care about, and then adapting the instructional environment and curriculum to those needs, wants, and passions."

"There’s no reason we can’t do this for everyone, letting gifted students soar without the downsides of selective gifted programs."

Gerald Aungst

webinar for k-12 oer

Open source curriculum