Thanks Matt

SOS (Save Our Schools) Rally was July 28-31, 2011 in Washington, D.C. Read and watch Matt Damon's speech in defense of teachers. If you haven't seen it or read it you can do so here.


Link for above movie.

The follow-up interview (above) with Matt Damon in which he defends teachers again. The video speaks for itself. (Warning, some language is PG-13).

More informative links:
• "Is Damon Right on Teachers S#$%ty Salary"
• Ed Week: SOS Rally
• SOS March: "Actor Matt Damon rallies teachers in Washington"

Differentiation gone ditsy

Differentiation — tailoring instruction to each student’s needs — is the education professoriate’s new buzzword, writes Malcolm Unwell on The American Thinker. ...[more]

Adding it up: Research shows how early math lessons change children's brains

Researchers from the Stanford University School of Medicine have demonstrated that a single year of math lessons is associated with unexpectedly big changes in the brain’s approach to problem solving and that these changes can be seen in the brain scans of second- and third-graders. ...[more]

3 Practical Uses for Interactive Whiteboards

Posted by Ben Rimes on Apr 27, 2011 in Advocacy, Technology
This post is both a response to Gary Stager’s indictment of interactive whiteboards (IWBs) over at Tech & Learning and a cross posting of a few resources that ...[more]

Flash: School reform ‘won’t fix everything’

School reformers ignore student’s home life, asserts Joe Nocera, the New York Times new op-ed columnist. “At its core, the reform movement believes ...[more]

It's Motivation ... really?

It's motivation, but eveyone wants you to believe that teacher quality is the panacea to huge educational gains. Why does the Department of Education choose to ignore evidence, studies, and data that indicate that teachers contribute to 5-20% of a student's educational output? Maybe because the Gates Foundation claims and is spending lots of money on research trying to prove teacher quality predominantly determines student educational outcome. Please help me here ... even the upper limit of 20% is not a predominant factor. I think this is gross ignorance. Maybe we should focus on some of the real causes of poor student output, like poverty, hunger, no parents, homeless, depressed neighborhood, no jobs, .... Maybe I should not have said "causes" but there is a strong correlation between student outcome and poverty, hunger, and poor role models. I wonder why the government does not want to tackle that BIG problem? ... [more]

These 3 videos of Dr. Diane Ravitch at 2011 AASA National Conference on Education are great:
Part 1 - www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvstR3Bkh4c
Part 2 - www.youtube.com/watch?v=p52Ygnt7B_E
Part 3 - www.youtube.com/watch?v=siRN0WNSqao

You cannot multitask!

Researchers have routinely found that people in their 20s suffer “huge” performance costs when they try to multitask. In other words, 20-somethings, cannot actually study while texting, watching videos, and listening to music. ...[more]

Do you really have to love what you are learning?

Really? I learned to drive an automobile, but I do not really like driving. I learned my multiplication table because I took pride in the fact that I could do it. I hated it, but now realize the importance of my automaticity with simple multiplication in every day life. ...[more]

Learning-by-Heart!

Is learning-by-heart such a bad thing? ...[more]

Do most educational games suck?

Thinking about education games? ... [more]

Why Low Performing Schools Need Digital Media

When the social and digital media revolution gained momentum at the dawn of the new millennium, no one would have predicted that less than a decade later black and Latino youth would be just as engaged as their white, Asian, and more affluent counterparts. ... [more]

Can exercise build bigger brains?

Real excercise helps academic performance; playing video "exercise" games does not! ... [more]

Does education research measure up?

Can I please just have the raw data? Please step aside and let the mathematicians and statisticians come up with case-and-effect conclusions with confidence levels. Is it common nature to "cook" data to fit your purposes ... or maybe not release the data that does not supports your stance. In the legal profession this is withholding evidence and distorting simple facts. ... [more]

Things Schools have Banned

I just find it amazing that schools have banned things are extremely worthwhile to learning and the learning experience. I find it ironic that the title picture has a finger pointing to the word "consequences" in a paper dictionary (banned!). Is the author hinting that consequences have been banned? ... [more]

We can’t let educators off the hook

from Dangerously!Irrelevant blog

Steve Dembo said:

I don’t see it as teachers spurning technology, or choosing not to take advantage of those new ideas and tools. I think most teachers don’t even realize that there’s a decision to be made. It’s not a matter of choosing the red pill or the blue pill… if you don’t know that there are even two pills available as options. ...[more]