America has always been a country of contradiction. The European settlers came here to escape persecution, and immediately set up a society that did not tolerate ideas or values that differed from theirs. They proclaimed a country with liberty and justice for all, where all men are created equal. But that doesn’t include black men. Or first nations men. Or poor men. Or women. It’s … Continue reading Ain’t That America?
For the first six years of my career, I taught a middle school computer applications class. Nobody really cared what I taught. They didn’t say that, of course. But the administration knew that kids needed to learn about computers, and they didn’t really know exactly what that should look like, so they carved out some space and just let me do my thing. I never … Continue reading Information Illiterate
It was eight years ago now that I heard Richard Culatta speak at EduCon. At the time, he was the director of the Office of Educational Technology at the US Department of Education. Now, he’s the CEO of the International Society for Technology in Education. In his little talk in the cafeteria of the Science Leadership Academy all those years ago, Culatta talked about pencils. … Continue reading Pencil Sharpeners
I’ve been a little obsessed with Corwin’s Visible Learning MetaX since Matthew Mays shared it at a conference last month. I’ve been skeptical of Hattie’s work in the past, and to some extent, I still am. Recall that Hattie’s work centers around distilling all of the research around education, and analyzing meta-analyses to draw conclusions about what works in education. When you keep summarizing and … Continue reading What Should We Stop Doing?
Two years ago today, Ohio had its first three confirmed Covid cases. Two days later, Ohio reported that we now had four cases. No one was saying that we had one new case; the reporting centered around the total. “But how do we know if things are getting better or worse?” I wondered. If we’re only reporting the totals, we don’t know how fast the … Continue reading Tracking Covid Cases
I carry my work life in my backpack. I try to make sure it has everything I need, everywhere I go. If I’m in a school or at a meeting or in a coffee shop, my backpack has all the stuff. If I’m at home and something comes up that needs my attention, I can grab whatever I need from my bag. It works well … Continue reading Cleaning Out the Backpack
A few weeks ago, I had a request to remove Zoom from our student devices, and block students from reinstalling it. “We’re never going back to that,” the teacher explained. Apparently the fifth graders are using the chat function in Zoom to talk to one another, which she wants to stop. By “that,” she meant remote schooling. At the start of the pandemic, we leaned … Continue reading Unzoomed
Snow days are magic. There aren’t many things that remind us how unimportant we are. But that call from the school changes everything. Suddenly, that homework assignment isn’t due for another day. The test has been postponed. The faculty meeting will be rescheduled (or, maybe it won’t). Basketball practice won’t be happening. Depending on the home situation, Mom and Dad might go into a panic. … Continue reading Snow Days
As we work through plans to replace SMART Boards in our classrooms, I was reflecting today on the classroom environment that they were installed to support. In my schools, we had dabbled with interactive whiteboards for a few years, but the first major initiative to install them was in 2007. And though it took several years before they had expanded to every classroom, it was … Continue reading Smarter Boards
Apparently, today is “National Shoot Up Your School Day.” News outlets are reporting that schools are stepping up security following a rash of viral threats circulating on the TikTok platform. The ones who have spent more than 15 seconds researching their news stories are also including a statement from law enforcement saying they are aware of the issue, but have seen no credible threats. Schools … Continue reading How Do You Know?
I received a letter in the mail from my car’s manufacturer. They’re issuing a safety recall to repair a condition involving the Smart Junction Box: The Smart Junction Box software logic may not properly interpret the signals received from the multifunction switch in certain circumstances. As a result, the turn signal may intermittently activate in the opposite direction of what was intended by the driver. … Continue reading Software Update
In the job interview, they asked if I knew Linux. Sure. I’d played around with it a little. I used it as the operating system for a “server” that I set up in my classroom. I was running a MUD for my students. It worked, too. But it was tough to get eighth graders interested in text-based adventure games, even in the 90s. So I … Continue reading Problem Solving
Taste of Tech 