Blogboard

Brock Dubbels, a guest blogger on Education Futures, encourages teachers to use video games in classroom instruction. Dubbels, an 8th grade English teacher from Minneapolis, also teaches a course at the University of Minnesota called "Video Games as Tools for Educators." He believes the latest games, which create rich environments for students to interact with, can be valuable educational tools.

If you are playing as a doctor, you will do the things that doctors do. And as you are acting like a doctor, the game gives you clues to achieve a win-state, in the form of feedback and performance assessment…

The big idea here is that games represent an opportunity to be in a role, doing things that people in those roles do, in places where they do them, and then get assessed in that performance.

Although he says textbooks have a place in the classroom, Dubbels thinks games are better teaching resources because they provide students with a hands-on experience.

Textbooks are great, but limited in what they can present…

We should be moving beyond the static curriculum of textbooks. Games can provide the context and action for our content knowledge in a situated context— [it's] almost as good as being there.

Posted by Stacey Hollenbeck at 12:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Coach Brown of A Passion for Teaching and Opinions is fed up with the sense of entitlement kids possess today, especially in the classroom. He believes early schooling is part of the problem:

Apparently in 1986, California actually created a task force that focused on getting better self-esteem training for kids in schools. So began the "everyone's a winner" situation that we all dread. Kids would do awful in certain situations and constantly be told that they were doing fine. I find this constantly at the high school level, and it isn't all the parents fault.

How can kids get all the way to me (Senior year) and still not understand that doing the work isn't enough? "What do you mean I got an 'F'? I did all the work!" Yeah, but you did it wrong. Then I get the call from the parents talking about flexibility, a call that I had more this year than any other. One parent told me "You have a reputation of being inflexible." ... What I find is that parents don't like that I don't accept the same crap they accept, and I feel that self-esteem is built when a student actually accomplishes something. That means that an "A" student needs to do excellent work, or it isn't an "A". ...

Like it or not, this generation is the most entitled ever in the United States. Kids have more independence, more money, and more control over their environment than ever. They are also more intelligent than ever, which we often confuse with wisdom. They have the brain to make great choices, we are just giving them too many outs when it comes time to use it.

Posted by Amanda Jones at 10:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)

On Dangerously Irrelevant, administrator Linda Orozco describes what she and other California school leaders learned from a Thai monk during an international professional leadership program. The group of school leaders who traveled to Chiang Mai, Thailand did not expect the orange-robed man, soft-spoken and barefoot, to understand the difficulties they faced at U.S. schools. But, they were inspired by the experience.

Towards the end of our time together, he asked us to meditate with him. We closed our eyes and listened to him describe a happy place free of hate, violence and pain. He then filled the void full of love, peace and comfort—an ideal environment we strive to achieve as educators. In closing our eyes, our consciousness opened we were reacquainted to the reasons why we entered this profession…

And in doing so, he moved some of us to tears as we realize how much further we need to go not only as leaders, but most importantly as human beings.

Posted by Stacey Hollenbeck at 10:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Dr. Jan laments that educators are blamed for the problems in today's schools. She says the cause is faulty measurement of student progress, and calls for a radical redefining of educational goals:

From the very first year of my educational practice, we (educators) have all been a bunch of losers who just weren't doing it right. ...

My current school has gone from five consecutive years on the state's low performing list to number one in the state in five of six measured educational indicators; however, I am now beginning to believe maybe what we are teaching (and measuring) is not relevant, rigorous, or replicable beyond our small scope. ...

Quite frankly, what IS it that we wish to accomplish? The bottom line is this: students should exit our educational system with excellence in problem solving and communication and an ability to continue their education beyond a formal preparation. This would prepare them for every eventuality. If we train them in regurgitation and finite sets of information, then we prepare them for YESTERDAY.

Posted by Amanda Jones at 2:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Graduate students in The College of New Jersey’s education program are gathering valuable advice from experienced teachers in a novel way—by preserving their voices. Students compiled oral histories of veteran teachers who offered advice about conquering first-year teaching woes. On Artistry, Equanimity, & Power, Tabitha, an assistant professor at the college, posted the following excerpts as recorded by the students:

“Most importantly, [veteran teacher] Anthony feels that whatever happens during the day, ends that day. If you have a bad day with a class, the worst thing to say to them the next day is, ‘We are not going to have a day like yesterday!’ He advises a beginning teacher to go on from that point and don’t look back.”

“[Mrs. Smith said,] ‘I heard in college that if you try to be your students’ friend they will eat you alive. I became too strict as a result. I gave too much homework and I wasn’t lenient enough.’”

“She explained that she learned two things rather quickly; first, positive reinforcement will give students confidence and help their behavior and second, perhaps most important, is to remain consistent.”

Posted by Stacey Hollenbeck at 3:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Hobo Teacher describes some unusual habits he's developed for dealing with his "teacher withdrawal":

Why the other day I told an entire diner full of people to stay seated until I finish taking attendance. Plus, I keep setting a kitchen timer to 46 minutes to simulate the school's schedule.

Posted by Amanda Jones at 3:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Mrs. Bluebird of Bluebird’s Classroom details why she chose to take a “paid vacation” working at a summer camp for gifted students. Besides getting to visit with friends from her teacher-ed program, she's also looking forward to laid-back teaching lessons and the abundant supplies that she hoards for the coming school year:

The classes are small, and you get time to actually do all that fun, hand's on stuff that I enjoy and the kids love. This year I'm teaching math, art, kites, and a new one on pioneers. I always ask to teach the last two weeks because, one, it's the younger kids (going into 3rd and 4th grade) and two, the camp directors often have a lot of leftover school supplies they don't have the space to store every year and I gladly take them off their hands.

Posted by Amanda Jones at 1:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

NYC Educator, an ESL Teacher from the Big Apple, responds a New York Times article that says the schools chancellor will spend $106 million to reduce class size, a growing crisis in the city. According to the article, the funds, if distributed evenly, would reduce class size by an average of only 0.3 to 0.8 students per class.

This clearly means, for the overwhelming majority of kids, it will have no effect whatsoever. Furthermore, it appears you'll have to be extremely needy for this money to reach your classroom. The fact is, many schools are so overcrowded they couldn't reduce class sizes if they wanted to—there’s simply no place else to put kids.

With schools hovering over 250% capacity, it's a disgrace that this mayor gets away with labeling what now amounts to a drop in the bucket as a major improvement.

Posted by Stacey Hollenbeck at 12:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

CaliforniaTeacherGuy posts a letter to a superintendent explaining why he can't take a position at a school where he really wanted to work. The reasons are financial.

Posted by Stacey Hollenbeck at 11:56 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)