8-20-14 Ed Notes Online Week

Ed Notes Online:

Sellout Fever: Newly Elected Revile - er - Revise NYSUT Officers Get Special Pension Deal From Cuomo, Klein and Skelos

NYSUT is proud to announce the first pension enhancement since 2000. After a long string of pension setbacks our legislative office has finally “turned the tide” and won a remarkable benefit for some of our most needy members.... Despite overseeing the creation of Tier V and Tier VI NYSUT First VP Andy Pallotta was undaunted and insisted we take this fight on. When asked why he was so slow to put

by ed notes online / 46min 

Police and Teachers, Their Unions and the March

There is so much to write about the relationship between UFT, the PBA, Mulgrew and Lynch, and the rank and file teachers and cops. So much to write that I have trouble sorting it all out. I have no personal issues with the police I have run into through my lifetime. But then again I am not black. I do have a problem with Patrick Lynch's assault on Mulgrew for a lack of union solidarity. I can't se

by ed notes online / 0min 

The Trouble With Frank Bruni

How far are we from the day when Whoopi, Campbell and the rest of the ed deform crowd flat out blame the death of Michael Brown on bad teachers? Joining the anti-teacher fray is former NY Times food writer Frank Bruni, another clueless NY Times columnist writing on education (see David Brooks, Thomas Friedman, Joe Nocera, Brent Staples, and even one bad column from the great Paul Krugman).I think

by ed notes online / 1h 

8-19-14 Ed Notes Online Week

Ed Notes Online: UFT 101: Why Does Our Teachers Union Matter? - Weds Aug. 20, 4PMSome of us in MORE are talking about a new teacher support group where we pair vets - especially retirees who might have the time - with newbies. (If you are a retiree or even currently teaching who might be interested, email me at normsco@gmail.com).I am somewhat surprised at how many people - and not just the usual

by mike simpson / 8h 

8-20-14 Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher

Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher who is just looking at the data.:

Hinsdale. Teachers union isn’t signing on the dotted line.

- The Doings Clarendon Hills. The Hinsdale High School Teachers Association is not painting as rosy a picture of contract negotiations with the Hinsdale High School District 86 Board as the board president did Monday. “There was dramatically less progress on Monday than in previous sessions,” association spokesman Michael Palmquist said Tuesday. Board President Richard Skoda said representatives

by Fred Klonsky / 3min

TMD. Randi’s trust problem.

by Fred Klonsky / 32min 

AFT’s Weingarten promises a million bucks for Karen Lewis’ run for Mayor.

  Sun-Times: The head of the American Federation of Teachers says the national union is ready to spend $1 million to help Karen Lewis unseat Mayor Rahm Emanuel if the Chicago Teachers Union president decides to run. “I did say privately to Karen and at our executive council meeting that if Karen was to run, we would be all in,” AFT leader Randi Weingarten told the Chicago Sun-Times in an intervie

15 by Fred Klonsky / 3h 

8-19-14 Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher

Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher who is just looking at the data.: Karen Lewis. Rahm’s CPS hiring stunt.- Karen Lewis is President of the Chicago Teachers Union. (Sun-Times) The City of Chicago is gearing up to enforce its Chicago Public Schools preference policy, which would give CPS graduates preferential standing among other firefighter applicants, providing an un

by mike simpson / 8h 

8-20-14 Engaging Parents In School… | Going Beyond Parent "Involvement"

Engaging Parents In School… | Going Beyond Parent "Involvement":

Nice Post About A Teaching Making A Home Visit

Geniene Delahunty writes a nice post describing a visit she made to a student family’s home. It’s worth checking out….

by Larry Ferlazzo / 1h 

8-17-14 Engaging Parents In School… | Going Beyond Parent "Involvement"

Engaging Parents In School… | Going Beyond Parent "Involvement": “I Want Parents To Know This…”It’s that time of year when you start seeing posts and articles about what teachers want parents to know. I Want Parents to Know This… is a particularly good one by Matt Gomez (thanks to Sheila Stewart for the tip. You might also be interested in these other ones in the “genre”: My Advice To Pa

by mike simpson / 4h 

8-20-14 Answer Sheet

Answer Sheet:

Beyond Ferguson: The troubled state of America’s children, by the numbers

The 2014-15 school year is beginning at a time when all eyes are on the troubling events in Ferguson, Mo., where unrest continues after the Aug. 9 shooting of a black teenager, Michael Brown, by a white police officer and charges of systemic racial injustice have been raised. As all this unfolds, here’s a look […]

by Valerie Strauss / 6min 

The strategic campaign needed to save public education — in nine steps

Leaders of the school standardized test-based reform’ movement have been very smart about using public relations and intentional messaging to their benefit, something their critics have failed to do. Arthur H. Camins, director of the Center for Innovation in Engineering and Science Education at the Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, N.J., discusses where supporters of […]

31 by Valerie Strauss / 5h

8-19-14 Answer Sheet

Answer Sheet: Poll: Common Core support among teachers plummets, with fewer than half supporting itAnybody watching the escalating battle across the country over the Common Core State Standards and aligned standardized testing will hardly be surprised by a new national poll which reveals a significant loss of support over the last year — especially among teachers, whose approval rating dropped fro

by mike simpson / 8h 

8-20-14 Schools Matter

Schools Matter:

The common core does not address the real problem

Sent to the Washington Post, August 20, 2014The Post has reported that according to a recent PDK/Gallup poll, the "Common Core educational standards are losing support nationwide" (August 19). The poll asked those opposed to the Common Core why they were opposed, giving them several possible reasons. The options did not include the reasons many educators oppose the Common Core: There is

by skrashen / 11min 

Tennesse's Soars to 43rd in ACT National Standings

Tennessee's now in its 22th year of a failed experiment that began in 1992 to use value-added assessment to improve Tennessee schools.  In 2013 Tennessee ranked 46th among states for composite ACT scores.This year Tennessee is 43rd for the ACT composite score, but the state still ranks 48th in math, with only Mississippi and Hawaii behind the proud home state of the Sanders Model.  The other long-

by Jim Horn / 3min 

Poem by Doug Storm

TreeThe girth and grip of the tulip trunk thrustWrist deep into the soil of the school playgroundFronts an edifice risen only to crumble.Unfallen and aged, escaping the steel chain,Your crown unbestowed, no body bendssupplicant to you, though all are at base abject.You seek no fealty but stand resoundingagainst the proclamations of pretenders.When your reign ends so all succession.

by Jim Horn / 50min 

8-19-14 Schools Matter

Schools Matter: Workforce Investment Act Becomes $3 Billion Handout to Predatory "Colleges"No bills get through Congress these days without an overwhelming amount of money to be made by both sides of the corporate aisle.  Such a bill sailed through last month without so much as racial slur at the President, something quite unheard of in the age of an ostensibly-black Commander in Chief.

by mike simpson / 8h 

What Kids' Drawings Say About Their Future Thinking Skills : Shots - Health News : NPR

What Kids' Drawings Say About Their Future Thinking Skills : Shots - Health News : NPR:

What Kids' Drawings Say About Their Future Thinking Skills

by MAANVI SINGH

At age 4, many young children are just beginning to explore their artistic style.

The kid I used to babysit in high school preferred self-portraits, undoubtedly inspired by the later works of Joan Miro. My cousin, a prolific young artist, worked almost exclusively on still lifes of 18-wheelers.

These early works may be good for more than decorating your refrigerator and cubicle, researchers say. There appears to be an association, though a modest one, between how a child draws at 4 and her thinking skills at 14, according to a study published in the journalPsychological Science.

The findings don't mean parents should worry if their little ones aren't producing masterpieces early on. But the study suggests intellectual and artistic skills may be related to each other in a way that reveals something about the influence of our genes.

Researchers from King's College London enlisted 7,700 pairs of 4-year-old identical and fraternal twins in England to draw pictures of a child. The researchers scored each drawing on a scale of 0 to 12, based on how many body parts were included. All the kids also took verbal and nonverbal intelligence tests at 4 and 14.

Kids with higher drawing scores tended to do better on the intelligence tests, though the two were only moderately linked. And that was expected, says Rosalind Arden a cognitive geneticist who led the study while at the King's College Institute of Psychiatry. The drawing test researchers used was first developed in the 1920s to measure children's cognition. And studies have shown the test to be useful, but not always accurate.

In a surprise to the researchers, the drawings and the test results from identical twins (who share all their genes) were more similar to one another than those from fraternal twins (who share only half their genes). "We had thought any siblings who were raised in the same home would be What Kids' Drawings Say About Their Future Thinking Skills : Shots - Health News : NPR:

8-20-14 Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day… | …For Teaching ELL, ESL, & EFL

Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day… | …For Teaching ELL, ESL, & EFL:

Wednesday’s (2nd Week) Tweets About #Ferguson #MichaelBrown

[View the story "Wednesday's (2nd Week) Tweets About #Ferguson #MichaelBrown" on Storify]

by Larry Ferlazzo / 27min 

Watch This Video That Uses Legos To Illustrate U.S. Economic Inequality…& Get Depressed

© 2011 mSeattle, Flickr | CC-BY | via Wylio Here are new additions to The Best Resources About Wealth & Income Inequality: The Brookings Institution has created this video to illustrate the lack of economic mobility in the United States to accompany this report: Rich Kid, Poor Kid: For 30 Years, Baltimore Study Tracked Who Gets Ahead from NPR is a good piece to read their shares similar concl

by Larry Ferlazzo / 12min 

Great Video: “Seize The Day” – A Robin Williams Tribute

Melody Sheep has created this wonderful video:

by Larry Ferlazzo / 14min 

Two Good Videos On How We Learn & How I Plan To Use Them In Class

© 2008 philosophygeek, Flickr | CC-BY-SA | via Wylio The Khan Academy (you might want to see The Best Posts About The Khan Academy) recently unveiled three new videos that they have apparently developed with the help of Carol Dweck. Their main new one is pretty decent and titled “You Can Learn Anything.” It’s the first video embedded below. The one I really like, though is of John Legend. I don’t

by Larry Ferlazzo / 14min 

Good Resources On Asking Questions

© 2007 Fabrice Florin, Flickr | CC-BY-SA | via Wylio 5 Ways to Help Your Students Become Better Questioners is a nice piece by Warren Berger that appeared in Edutopia. I’m adding it to The Best Posts & Articles About Asking Good Questions. Here’s a short video of Warren Berger talking about the importance of questions. I’m adding it to The Best Videos Showing The Importance Of Asking Good Ques

by Larry Ferlazzo / 39min 

All My Ed Week Posts From The Past 3 Years On Instructional Strategies – In One Place!

My latest Ed Week column includes links to all my posts there from the past three years on instructional strategies. Here’s an excerpt:

by Larry Ferlazzo / 40min

Teaching Ideas For #Ferguson #MichaelBrown

[View the story "Teaching Ideas For #Ferguson #Michael Brown" on Storify]

by Larry Ferlazzo / 8h 

8-19-14 Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day… | …For Teaching ELL, ESL, & EFL

Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day… | …For Teaching ELL, ESL, & EFL: Monday’s Tweets About #Ferguson #MichaelBrown[View the story "Monday's Tweets About #Ferguson #MichaelBrown" on Storify]by Larry Ferlazzo / 10h8-18-14 Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day… | …For Teaching ELL, ESL, & EFLLarry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day… | …For Teaching ELL, ESL, & EFL: “Thinking Like A

by mike simpson / 8h 

8-20-14 the becoming radical | A Place for a Pedagogy of Kindness

the becoming radical | A Place for a Pedagogy of Kindness (the public and scholarly writing by P. L. Thomas, Furman University):

Complicit: On Facing the Mirror Before Casting Stones

“Let me begin,” admits George J. Sefa Dei in “‘We Cannot Be Color-Blind': Race, Antiracism, and the Subversion of Dominant Thinking,” “by making clear that I see myself as fully complicit in the discussion that I undertake in this chapter” (p. 25). As we face large and powerful social forces such as poverty and racism—along with more narrow issues of education—I believe we all must address that fi

3 by plthomasedd / 1h 

8-19-14 the becoming radical | A Place for a Pedagogy of Kindness

the becoming radical | A Place for a Pedagogy of Kindness (the public and scholarly writing by P. L. Thomas, Furman University): Lessons from Cycling—for Cyclists and EducatorsMy formal expertise and experience are in the field of education, but I have developed as well what I consider equal expertise and experience in two other areas, although the paths have been primarily by self-education: writ

by mike simpson / 6h