More carnival: “Educational technology” is not oxymoronic

December 18, 2007

Here’s a new blog carnival you may find useful: The Educational Technology Carnival. The 6th running of that particular midway is posted at Global Citizenship in a Virtual World.

Which rather reminds me that I’ve added to my list of things I want in a technological adapted classroom: Movie lighting. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve been in a different classroom, and discovered that when the projector goes on, the lights must come down in order to see the image — and then discovered that when the lights go down, there’s not enough light to see to take notes, or to see for anything else.

I was filling in for a teacher who uses a lot of video (“Great!” I thought). Students picked up on the problem right away. “Another sleep lab today?” they asked.

But I digress.

I have fought in four districts to get filters off on sites that discuss evolution for biology students. In one district, it was easier to put filters on the creationism sites, IT told me, than get the filters off the sites that discussed the material the students needed. I discovered my own district now blocks this blog, which makes it difficult to refer students to specific material, at least from school. (Time to change districts?) So the discussion on who filters, and why, caught my eye. I’m not sure there is a good result.

This edition of the carnival also points to Rebecca Wallace-Segall’s Wall Street Journal opposite-editorial page piece on student competition in intellectual areas, a hot topic for me right now as I contemplate the Federal Reserve Board’s competition for economics students, the Fed Challenge.

So as you ponder why your school doesn’t give you lighting to view your projected material, why you don’t have adequate audio reproduction, where are you going to get a projector to show the PowerPoint presentation during 4th block, why can’t anyone make a non-boring, really dynamic PowerPoint, and whether your computer lab kids are downloading racy music videos to spike your bandwidth clogging problems, think that on your lunch hour you can take a look at blog carnival that at least empathizes — if it’s not blocked in your school.

Leave a Comment » | Classroom technology, Economics, Education, Education success, Literature, Teaching, Technology, Technology in the classroom, Weblogs, Writing | Tagged: , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Typewriter and quote of the moment: David McCullough

December 17, 2007

I bought my Royal Standard typewriter in 1965. It was secondhand. I have written everything I’ve ever had published on it, and there is nothing wrong with it.

Giambarba photo of historian David McCullough and his typewriter

  • Pulitzer-winner David McCullough, defending his refusal to write on a computer during a Dallas book-signing.

(Found in Dallas Morning News, Alan Peppard, “Salutations, Year in Review, Local Celebrities,” December 17, 2007, page 1E, in graphic on page 4E)

More from McCullough on typing, and on writing, reading and understanding history, below the fold.

Read the rest of this entry »

2 Comments | Capturing history, History, History and art, Quotes, Teaching, Technology, Typewriters, Writing history | Tagged: , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Cue Taylor Mali . . .

December 13, 2007

The last line of Taylor Mali’s slam poem about what a teacher makes — remember it?

Here it is, in real life: “Tuff Guy, Crazy Horse, Happy Teacher.” Go see it. It’s at Edu Blah Blah Blahg.

1 Comment | Education success, Teaching | Tagged: | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Quote of the Moment: Alan Kors, human history in 60 seconds

December 7, 2007

Someone should have said “every really good idea can be summarized in 30 seconds.” To whom shall we attribute that: Lincoln? Einstein? Twain? Jefferson? Jesus? Round up the usual suspects, indeed.

The School of Arts and Sciences at the University of Pennsylvania sponsors a series of lectures — some topic distilled down to 60 seconds.

These are geographies of human thought. A map of what to think, sans details. Here, we get the history of humans in 60 seconds (plus a few), from April 19, 2006:

Prof. Alan C. Kors, University of Pennsylvania

Human History

Alan Charles Kors

George H. Walker Endowed Term Professor of History

  • First, tribes: tough life.
  • The defaults beyond the intimate tribe were violence, aversion to difference, and slavery. Superstition: everywhere.
  • Culture overcomes them partially.
  • Rainfall agriculture, which allows loners.
  • Irrigation agriculture, which favors community.
  • Division of labor plus exchange in trade bring mutual cooperation, even outside the tribe.
  • The impulse is always there, though: “Kill or enslave the outsider.”
  • Gradual science from Athens’ compact with reason.
  • Division of labor, trade, the mastery of knowledge, plus time brought surplus, sometimes a peaceful extended order and, rules diversely evolved and, the cooperation of strangers – always warring against the fierce defaults of tribalism, violence, and ignorance.
  • No one who teaches you knows what will happen.

You can find video here : Kors, Human History, high bandwith; low bandwidth.

A couple dozen such lectures, from 2006 and 2007, here.

Tip of the old scrub brush to Dr. P. M. Bumsted.

Leave a Comment » | History, Lessons of history, Teaching, Video and film | Tagged: , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Student project: Photography + cartography + internet

December 6, 2007

Ignoble Gases nicely describes the mashup between on-line mapping services and digital photography, with a bit of blogging thrown in.

Mapping services now have the capacity to link photographs of a site with its exact latitude and longitude, or exact address.  Maps of cities can feature links to photos of the site (other than satellite or aerial photos) submitted by readers, and other descriptive material.

So, geography teachers:  Have your kids mapped out your town and put it on the web to encourage tourism?  Great discussion topics:  What are the advantages of such technologies, and what are the parent-scaring disadvantages, or dangers of them?

I really cannot do justice to the concepts here — read the article at Ignoble Gases.

Leave a Comment » | Geography - Physical, Internet, Lesson plans, Student projects, Teaching, Technology, Technology in the classroom | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Worried about plagiarism? You don’t know the half of it

November 24, 2007

 

Larry Lessig, speaking at TED, makes the case for kids who use stuff borrowed from others in their classroom presentations.

First, this speech should open your eyes to the danger of our only preaching against plagiarism to kids who borrow copyrighted stuff off the internet (see especially the last two minutes of his almost-19 minute presentation). What’s the alternative, you ask? See what Prof. Lessig says. What are the alternatives?

Second, Lessig shows how to use slides in a live presentation, to significantly increase the content delivered and the effectiveness of the delivery.

Wow.

Tip of the old scrub brush to Presentation Zen. Go there now and read Garr Reynolds’ take on Lessig’s presentation.

Who is Larry Lessig? You don’t know TED? See below the fold.

Read the rest of this entry »

7 Comments | Economics, Ethics, History, Law, Pedagogy, Plagiarism, Presentations, Student projects, Teaching, Technology, Technology in the classroom | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

“Evening at the Fed” Dallas registration deadline Nov. 22

November 21, 2007

Dallas-area economics, government and history teachers need to watch the deadline to register for the Dallas Federal Reserve Bank’s “Evening at the Fed,” scheduled for November 29, 2007.

Deadline to register is November 22.

Good dinner, continuing education credits (professional development), a few good ideas for your classroom. See my previous post, here.

Leave a Comment » | Federal Reserve Bank, Freedom - Economic, Geography - Economic, Government, History, Lesson plans, Teaching | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Practice, even with failure, more important than talent

November 20, 2007

Every teacher needs to get familiar with the work of Carol Dweck. She’s a Stanford psychologist who is advising the Blackburn Rovers from England’s Premier League, on how to win, and how to develop winning ways.

Your students need you to have this stuff.

A 60-year-old academic psychologist might seem an unlikely sports motivation guru. But Dweck’s expertise—and her recent book, Mindset: The New Psychology of Success—bear directly on the sort of problem facing the Rovers. Through more than three decades of systematic research, she has been figuring out answers to why some people achieve their potential while equally talented others don’t—why some become Muhammad Ali and others Mike Tyson. The key, she found, isn’t ability; it’s whether you look at ability as something inherent that needs to be demonstrated or as something that can be developed.

What’s more, Dweck has shown that people can learn to adopt the latter belief and make dramatic strides in performance. These days, she’s sought out wherever motivation and achievement matter, from education and parenting to business management and personal development. [emphasis added]

I can’t do justice to Dweck’s work. See this story in Stanford Magazine.

See a significant update on this article, in October 2012, here.

 

1 Comment | Brain development, Brain learning, Classroom management, Education, Education success, Learning, Pedagogy, psychology, Teaching | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Why not treat kindergarteners like college students?

November 18, 2007

Vouchers in Utah have the wooden stake right in the heart. That’s one proposal in one state. More voucher proposals are promised, and the debate continues.

Voucher advocates generally make a plea that colleges have something akin to school vouchers with Pell Grants (Basic Education Opportunity Grants), Stafford Grants, the GI Bill and other federal programs, plus many state programs, which give money to a student to use at a college of the student’s choice.

Why won’t this work for kindergartners, 8th graders and 10th graders? the voucher advocates ask.

The short answer is that we regard college students as adults. Beyond that are several other differences between elementary schools and colleges that we should, perhaps, explore.

Texas Ed: Comments on Education from Texas has a couple of posts that provide some insights to the issues. In the first one, “We Have Vouchers for Higher Education,” the question is raised about why not let elementary students operate like veterans, and take their government money where they choose to.

In the second, “Vouchers Are About Choice, Not Quality,” we get a glimpse of real life — parents fighting to keep open their neighborhood school, despite there being better performing schools available to take their kids.

We might want to compare systems, at least briefly.

Read the rest of this entry »

1 Comment | College, Education quality, Education reform, Teacher Pay, Teaching, Technology, Tenure | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Quote of the Moment: Ellen Langer on learned helplessness

November 14, 2007

A much more pernicious loss of choice and control is brought about by repeated failure.  After a number of experiences in which our efforts are futile, many of us will give up.  Well-known research by psychologist Martin Seligman and others shows that this learned helplessness then generalizes to situations where the person can, in fact, exercise control.  Even when solutions are available, a mindless sense of futility prevents a person from reconsidering the situation.  The person remains passive in the face of situations that could easily be handled without undue difficulty.  Past experience determines present reactions and robs the individual of control.   . . .

Learned helplessness was originally demonstrated in rats.  When placed in ice water, they have no difficulty swimming around for forty to sixty hours.  However, if, instead of being put immediately into the water, the rats are held until they stop struggling, something very different happens.  Instead of swimming, these rats give up immediately and drown.

Ellen J. Langer (b. 1947), Harvard University psychologist, Mindfulness, 1989, pp. 53-54

2 Comments | Brain development, Brain learning, Education, Education success, Teaching | Tagged: , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Texas History Day, and National History Day 2008

November 12, 2007

Your classes are gearing up for the competition, no?

Alfie Kohn might not like the idea of competition in history. In a state famous for competition in almost everything, but most famous for athletic competitions to the detriment of academics, I find great appeal in a contest that requires kids to find, analyze and write history.

Then the students get together to present and discuss history — and usually about 60 Texas kids go on to the National History Day festival. (Details here from the Texas State Historical Association)

Q. What is Texas History Day?

A. Texas History Day, a part of the National History Day program, is a yearlong education program that culminates in an annual state-level history fair for students in grades six through twelve. It provides an opportunity for students to demonstrate their interest in, and knowledge of, history through creative and original papers, performances, documentaries, individual interpretive web sites, or three-dimensional exhibits.

Over the course of the school year, students research and produce a History Day entry, the results of which are presented at a regional competition in early spring. From there, some students advance to the state fair in May, or even to the national contest held each June at the University of Maryland at College Park. At each level of competition, outstanding achievement may be recognized through certificates, medals, trophies, or monetary awards. The most important rewards are the skills and insight that students acquire as they move through the History Day program.

As many as 33,000 young Texans are involved in the program at the regional and state level each year. More than 900 students participate in Texas History Day, and approximately 60 students represent Texas at National History Day each year.

The 2008 National History Day Theme is “Conflict and Compromise in History.”

Texas has 23 regions for preliminary rounds. Details here. A list of sample topics for Texas students should give lots of good ideas.

The topics and the papers promise a lot. These projects could make good lesson plans. (Who publishes the winning entries? I have not found that yet.)

Don’t forget the Texas History Day T-shirt Design Contest — entries are due by December 14, 2007.

3 Comments | Capturing history, Education, Historic documents, History, Lesson plans, Pedagogy, Teaching, Technology, Texas history | Tagged: , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Black men teaching

November 10, 2007

Will Okun’s question: Does it make a difference to a black student what color her teacher is?

Some students say it makes no difference; some students vigorously argue that black male teachers push black kids harder, but understand them better.

Good, thoughtful post, lots of comments — at Nicholas Kristof’s blog at the New York Times site.

1 Comment | Civil Rights, Education, Education blogs, Education quality, Education success, Teaching | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

A Texas History syllabus

October 28, 2007

It’s a toe in the water of internet-using instruction.  Here’s a syllabus for a 7th grade Texas history class at Pin Oak Middle School in the Houston Independent School district.

Notice that this class, as many in Texas do, puts the geography unit up front, not quite isolated from the rest of the class.  Regardless of how well geography is covered, I think we end up shorting the subject its due.

Kudos to Pin Oak MS, to Mr. Gomez, and I hope to see more.

(Surely there is a class in Texas that is farther along in integrating the internet into the Texas history curriculum — point them to us, Dear Readers?)

Leave a Comment » | Geography - Physical, Geography - Political, History, Teaching, Technology in the classroom, Texas history | Tagged: , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

History text accuracy: Okinawa mass suicides

October 25, 2007

Controversy surrounds history textbooks all over the world. Texans may be a bit more sensitive to the issues while the Texas Education Agency is revising curricula, but others are even more sensitive – such as Turkey, where controversy over the Armenian Genocide threatens to derail Turkey’s 40-year project to join the European Union; Japan, where citizens and other nations protest failures to mention harms done to people by the Japanese Imperial Army during World War II; and even Europe in general, where controversy surrounds efforts to find a unifying, Europe-wide culture.

History is important in our relations with other nations. With increasing globalization, it becomes ever more important that all citizens have basic understanding of their local history, their national history, and world history, if only to avoid the social faux pas in socializing with people from other nations.

The issue is hot in Japan right now. Okinawa, a formerly independent kingdom annexed by Japan in the 19th century (did you know that?), hosted the biggest protest demonstration the island prefecture has ever seen, earlier this month – a protest over the changing of a few words in Japanese school history texts, removing the responsibility for mass suicides on Okinawa from the Japanese Imperial Army.

A story in the New York Times describes the anguish felt by Okinawans:

Brainwashed by Japanese Imperial Army soldiers into believing that victorious American troops would rape all the local women and run over the men with their tanks, Mr. Kinjo and others in his village here in Okinawa thought that suicide was their only choice. A week before American troops landed and initiated the Battle of Okinawa in March 1945, Japanese soldiers stationed in his village gave the men two hand grenades each, with instructions to hurl one at the Americans and then to kill themselves with the other.

Most of the grenades failed to explode. After watching a former district chief break off a tree branch and use it to kill his wife and children, Mr. Kinjo and his older brother followed suit.

”My older brother and I struck to death the mother who had given birth to us,” Mr. Kinjo said in an interview at the Naha Central Church, where he is the senior minister. ”I was wailing of course. We also struck to death our younger brother and sister.”

Mr. Kinjo agreed to tell his story again because the Japanese government is now denying, in new high school textbooks, that Okinawans had been coerced by Imperial troops into committing mass suicide.

The proposed changes to the school textbooks — the deletion of a subject, the change to the passive voice — amounted to just a couple of words among hundreds of pages. But the seemingly minor grammatical alterations have led to swelling anger in the Okinawa islands in Japan, cresting recently in the biggest protest here in at least 35 years and stunning the Japanese government.

How should texts deal with such issues?

China and Korea also protested the rewrite. Hot button issues involve the Japanese invasion and taking of Nanking in 1937, generally known to western historians as “the rape of Nanking;” Japanese treatment of Prisoners of War (POWs), including the Bataan Death March in the Philippines, what amounted to slave labor using POWs in Japan, and Korean women impressed into service as prostitutes to the Japanese Army, at what are euphemistically called “comfort stations.”

Texas history standards writers may benefit from taking a look at some of these other controversies, in other places. These lessons can apply to Texas and U.S. history, where Anglo and European colonist treatment of aboriginal natives is certainly an issue, but also to subjects such as biology and the treatment of evolution, health and the treatment of preventing sexually-transmitted diseases, and environmental science, and the treatment of pollution and climate change issues.

3 Comments | History, History Revisionism, Teaching, Textbook Selection, Textbooks, World War II | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Sometimes Nobel winners do stupid things . . .

October 18, 2007

. . . and then other people who are expert in the field kick their butts.

No, I’m not talking about Al Gore. James Watson, the co-discoverer of the structure of DNA, recently insulted the entire continent of Africa, and a good bunch of North and South America, and western Europe. No, Dr. Watson, race is not a predictor of intelligence.

Greg Laden provides the boot action at his blog, Evolution. Bookmark it. As certain as your heritage is passed to your children by a double-helix structure in the structure of your cells, some fool will repeat Watson’s argument. Veterans of quote-mine wars warn that creationists right now are filing the statement away for use in some future debate, where they will claim falsely that “the science of genetics is evil because it promotes racism.”

So keep that Laden piece handy.

And if all of this is news to you as a social studies teacher? Read the piece thoroughly. Check out Laden’s links, ask questions if you’re unclear on anything he says. Laden takes questions. P. Z. Myers takes questions (and a tip of the old scrub brush to Pharyngula for point out Laden’s post). Comments are open here.

See, this is how science and free discussion work: People get awards for the good ideas they have, and they pay the price for stupid ideas. Discussion, among the experts, is based on real data, real research. Ideas win when they have the data to back them up, not on the word of some authority, regardless whether the authority is well schooled, of the right or far-right political party, or supernatural.

It’s a model for our students.

__________________________

Update:  Even more from Mr. Laden, as he notes in comments.  You have plenty of bookmarks available, right?

6 Comments | Brain development, Brain learning, Citizenship, Civil Rights, Ethics, Evolution, Learning, Rampant stupidity, Reason, Teaching | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

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