Mr. R Davidson's Blog » Blogs and Opinions

Shared Activities for different curriculum Areas

filmrd — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 17:35:30 +0000

http://www.quia.com/

Essay Writing

filmrd — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 15:13:46 +0000

http://www.eduhound.com/cttarchives/111909ctt.cfm

National Educational Technology Standards

filmrd — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 12:35:31 +0000

http://www.iste.org/Content/NavigationMenu/NETS/ForTeachers/2008Standards/NETS_T_Standards_Final.pdf

Technology How To Guide

filmrd — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 12:07:06 +0000

http://www.larkin.net.au/020_technology_howtos.html

..John Larkin, an Australian educator and technology trainer, has
collected all of his useful handouts on a single page. They cover
everything from cables and connectors, storyboarding, how to set up a
Flickr account and everything in-between! Take the time to learn
something new this week with his practical material.

Siemens we can change the world science challenge

filmrd — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 16:13:42 +0000

http://wecanchange.com/

21st Century Skill Guidlines

filmrd — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 15:22:39 +0000

http://21stcenturyskills.org/documents/MILE_Guide_091101.pdf

What if you took away technology?

filmrd — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 17:32:25 +0000

A thought provoking article by Scott McCleod

http://www.dangerouslyirrelevant.org/2006/09/if_you_took_awa.html

A link to a guide on improving PowerPoint presentations

filmrd — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 17:14:08 +0000

http://www.cudenver.edu/Academics/CUOnline/FacultyResources/Handbook/Documents/2009/Chapter_12.pdf

Literacy funding from Larry Ferlazzo

filmrd — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 13:28:06 +0000

You may have heard about the bill that was just introduced by U.S. Sen. Patty Murray, a Democrat from Washington state, into the U.S. Congress that would provide $2.35 billion in funding for literacy programs in K-12 schools. You can read more about it at the Education Week piece titledU.S. Sen. Murray Introduces K-12 Literacy Bill.

Renowned ELL research Stephen Krashen left this comment on the Ed Week article:

Here we go again, more of what doesn’t work: “Providing students with explicit, systematic, and developmentally appropriate instruction in reading and writing, including but not limited to vocabulary development, phonemic awareness, reading comprehension …”. Only briefly mentioned: “the use of diverse texts” but not how they will be used. As usual, no mention of what really works, lots of good stories, read alouds, plenty of access to books, (libraries!!), exciting literature discussions …

The true reading crisis in the US are policy makers who do not read the research.

I read a story in Thomas Friedman’s column today that reminded me of this situation. He was referring to the Middle East conflict, but I think it also speaks to this continuing waste of dollars into less-than-useful literacy instructional techniques and programs:

“These two guys are watching a cowboy and Indian movie. And in the opening scene, an Indian is hiding behind a rock about to ambush the handsome cowboy,” he explained. “ ‘I bet that Indian is going to kill that cowboy,’ one guy says to the other. ‘Never happen,’ his friend answers. ‘The cowboy is not going to be killed in the opening scene.’ ‘I’ll bet you $10 he gets killed,’ the guy says. ‘I’ll take that bet,’ says his friend.

“Sure enough, a few minutes later, the cowboy is killed and the friend pays the $10. After the movie is over the guy says to his friend, ‘Look, I have to give you back your $10. I’d actually seen this movie before. I knew what was going to happen.’ His friend answers: ‘No, you can keep the $10. I’d seen the movie, too. I just thought it would end differently this time.’ ”

I’d bet on Krashen’s analysis that this is not going to end any differently than Reading First’s failure.

Two Links to Educational Resources and a Thought Provoking Video

filmrd — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 18:16:25 +0000

The following links are interesting blogs that feature resources for teachers.

http://langwitches.org/blog/

http://www.freetech4teachers.com/

Big Thinkers: James Paul Gee On Video Games http://www.edutopia.org/james-gee-games-learning-video