Place Based Education
teachers
Personalized Learning
Why Great Teachers Matter to Low Income Students
"Consider the recent national math scores of fourth- and eighth-graders, which show startling differences among results for low-income African American students in different cities. In Boston, Charlotte, New York and Houston, these fourth-graders scored 20 to 30 points higher than students in the same socioeconomic group in Detroit, Milwaukee, Los Angeles and the District of Columbia. Boston fourth-graders outscored those in Detroit by 33 points. Ten points approximates one year’s worth of learning on these national tests, which means that by fourth grade, poor African American children in Detroit are already three grades behind their peers in Boston."
Personalized Learning
Making Data Matter
Interesting day at the EdWeek Leader’s Forum on Making Data Matter. Dan Katzir, Broad, did a great job kicking off the event with lessons learned over 10 years. Amiee Guidera did a great job outlining the Data Quality Campaign agenda. It was disappointing only 6% of the participants responded…
Personalized Learning
Step Function Improvement
As the learning revolution matures, it is likely to be turbocharged by lessons about the neuropsychology of learning and motivation. I don’t think we know much about this and don’t use what we know very effectively, but we are likely to learn far more than we know in the coming decade.
Personalized Learning
For Instructional Management See CMOs
Kalman R. Hettleman writes in EdWeek, “It’s the Classroom, Stupid.” She’s right, instructional management is a big deal and often poorly managed. Here’s her three reasons: First, predisposition. The personal temperament of educators and their professional culture of insularity predispose them to be weak managers.
Personalized Learning
Two Sisters Improve Reading Online
When I was superintendent in Federal Way, two of our best reading teachers happened to be sisters, Gail Boushey and Joan Moser. I had the good fortune to run into them on a flight this week. They’ve published two great books, The Daily 5 most recently, and run an…
EdTech
Go West (to China), Canada, and Take Your Teachers With You
Two great stories surfaced in my Twitter feed today and they speak to the strange and illuminating practices in Chinese education industry. Some if it could be instructional for those of us in the Americas trying to make a business out of teaching. One was a story about Canada…
Personalized Learning
RttT Changed the Landscape
Race to the Top has already changed the landscape–that and Obama and Duncan’s backbone. They’ve done what no Republican president has had the nerve to do–take on teacher effectiveness. Their willingness to incorporate tough language in RttT resulted in 40 states developing very aggressive plans to dramatically improve teacher effectiveness.
EdTech
Common Core, Day 2
It’s the dawn of a new era. America took a big step forward yesterday and you probably missed it. The nation’s governors and state school chiefs released Common Core State Standards to a decidedly mixed buzz—there is something for everyone to criticize. Before the carping, editing and adding reach a…
Personalized Learning
Bloomfire Formalizes Informal Learning
Here’s an article with a little western MI love for Bloomfire , a Kalamazoo start up creating groups “of informal, social-learning opportunities can be dedicated to anything from sales strategies to fishing.” Bloomfire Manefesto is a little groovy, but if you’re not thinking about the future of…
Personalized Learning
Bad Proxies for Good Teachers
Read Rotherham’s Atlantic article on Teach For America (TFA) and what it takes to be a good teacher. It’s a great summary of what the field, TFA in particular, has learned recently about the attributes of good teachers. However, it’s frustrating that we remain so unsophisticated about the predictive…