I was talking to a colleague from a nearby school district the other day. She had just come from a training session on a new math program they’re going to be using. From what I understand, it’s mostly a test-prep kind of tool. It identifies gaps in students’ math skills and provides instruction on those skills to bring them up to par. She didn’t sound … Continue reading Leading the Blind
We are living in an age when information is no longer scarce. The Internet gave everyone access to the information. It was sold to us as an information superhighway. Think of all of the wonderful resources you have right at your fingertips with this fantastic, revolutionary technology. Then, interactive web tools came along and made it really easy for anyone to post content online. We … Continue reading Facts and Feelings
A couple months ago, I surveyed the teachers in my district about classroom technology. Over the last few years, we have focused a lot on improving student access to technology. While this has meant unprecedented growth in tech resources available to students, it also means we haven’t devoted much time or resources on the technology that our teachers use. One problem with surveys like this is … Continue reading Do We Need Teachers?
Moore’s Law is dead. Intel co-founder Gordon Moore observed in 1965 that the number of components on an integrated circuit was doubling every year. He predicted that this growth would continue for another decade. In 1975, he revised the forecast to every two years. In simpler terms, it can be said that computing power doubles about every two years, while the cost remains the same. … Continue reading No Moore
The change that is happening in the middle grades right now continues to astound me. Eighteen months ago, our sixth grade teachers asked that we get rid of the carts of computers in their classrooms and just assign devices to the kids. It’s a small shift, really. Instead of having a set of computers in every classroom, we now have a computer in each student’s … Continue reading The Change is Here
I recently attended EdCamp NEO, hosted in the fantastic new Paradigm facility at Mentor High School. I’ve been to about a dozen EdCamps now. It’s always fun to watch the schedule evolve as the event goes on, and people create the conversations that are most relevant to them. This event had about 100 people, which is the perfect size for an EdCamp. All of the … Continue reading The Scheduled Unconference
I want to free my students from textbooks. They shouldn’t have to carry half their weight around in their backpacks all the time. When they get to middle school, it starts to get out of hand. Each student has 4-6 books. They’re big. They’re heavy. And they have to go back and forth between school and home all the time. Once they move on to … Continue reading A Textbook Description
In 1993, I bought a graphing calculator. As freshly-minted math teacher, I was building my cache of instructional resources. And with my concentration on educational technology, I knew that graphing calculators would play an increasing role in how we teach math at the high school level. It was expensive. I don’t remember exactly what it cost, but the MSRP was $130. It’s safe to say … Continue reading Failing to Innovate
I’m sure you’ve heard about Mark Zuckerberg’s plan to give away $4.5 million to Facebook users who share a “thank you” message, right? Or, maybe you read about Facebook’s plan to start charging a monthly fee for using their social network. Did you know you can post a legal notice on your Facebook wall that protects your copyright and privacy rights? Last year, Pope Francis famously … Continue reading Urban Legends
The doors for lunch opened at noon. We were standing outside in a very crowded hallway, waiting to get in. When the doors opened, there were dozens of volunteers waving flags and welcoming us. We quickly found a table and sat down. It was a reasonably formal lunch. There were cloth napkins and bread plates and dessert forks. The salads were already on the table, … Continue reading Let’s Eat
The Ohio Department of Education is soliciting feedback through December 31 on their new Technology Learning Standards. [Update (1/12/16): many of the links are now broken, but the new standards are here.] This is frustrating. And, largely, meaningless. The new standards are a revision of the 2003 Academic Content Standards for Technology (another link here, since the ODE one is going to break soon). The 2003 standards … Continue reading In Pursuit of Tech Standards
This is an excerpt from a post I wrote in February, 2008: In the fall of 2005, I had read about podcasts, and was very interested in them. I drive 40 minutes each way to and from work every day. If I could find some good podcasts to listen to in the car, I could really improve how I was using that time. If I … Continue reading Remembering Bob Sprankle
Taste of Tech 