Comments on: Sometimes you hit a home run, sometimes you strike out

By: Lin Jenkins

Lin Jenkins — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 05:00:00 +0000

Maria Droujkova asked “Heck, where IS nice map-making software accessible to kids and non-geeks in general?”

One I’ve used very successfully with elementary school kids is Neighborhood Mapmaker from Tom Snyder Productions. (They also make wonderful simulations… Rain Forest Researchers is one.) My 2nd grade kids loved making maps on the computers– AND printing them out, hanging them around the room, comparing them, and taking them home. My own 35-year-old son still has his huge plastic bin full of maps, from the souvenir maps of Disneyland to his Great Grandpa’s post-WWI maps of Europe, full of places that no longer exist. These treasures stretched his mind, gave him a sense of what changes (place names: is is Aachen, or Aix-la-Chapelle?) and what does not (location– but not always!). He has my dad’s 1934 globe, too. Yes, now he also has a GPS and a netbook in his car– but this is how it started.
http://www.tomsnyder.com/products/product.asp?SKU=NEIV20&Subject=SocialStudies

By: Elona Hartjes

Elona Hartjes — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 05:00:00 +0000

We can’t let the thought of striking out prevent us from going up to bat and hit those home runs- even if sometimes our ball ends up landing in left field. Batter up!

By: SpecialEdHead

SpecialEdHead — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 05:00:00 +0000

I agree with you that many schools today are running on autopilot. I think it comes down to the fact that running a school on a day to day operational basis doesn’t leave a lot of extra time in the regular workday to think about long-term strategy and many administrators aren’t in the frame of mind that says, “We set time aside out of our regular worktime to work on long-term strategy, until we know where we’re going.” It’s a side-effect of the demands of the day, and it’s not because it’s public sector. I worked in a dental office for a time where we never talked about strategy because we were too busy with the busywork. But if we don’t put in the time to think about long-term strategies, then we just fall behind more slowly every day.

By: Greg Carroll

Greg Carroll — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 05:00:00 +0000

Scott,
Why are you apologising for making people think? Getting a reaction means they are reading what you are saying and actually have an opinion. YAY, I say!
Too often we live in a professional and intellectual echo chamber … all we ever hear is our own beliefs (biases, misconceptions, falsehoods and all) mirrored back at us. How many peoples blogrolls are simply what they already say and believe.
I for one subscribe to you blog BECAUSE I don’t always agree with you. That’s the point. Makes me think about what I have always assumed, challenges me to be better and explore possibilities for the kids in our school. Thats my role as a principal!
Professional learning is not simply about confirming what you already know, it is about challenging yourself with the new.
No apologies are due … people should be thanking you. Tell them to lighten up a bit. The edu-blogosphere is full enough of intellectual lemmings already.
cheers
Greg

By: Kate Nowak

Kate Nowak — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 05:00:00 +0000

“we’re never going to get to where we need to be if we don’t push the envelope with both our actions and our rhetoric.”

Yes, indeed. Agreed. It seems the friction comes from reconciling what we know, or think, we should be doing for kids with the immediacy of facing 30 smiling faces in the morning armed with current systemic expectations and available resources. I’m interested in shining a light on the space between “I should be doing X” and “I can’t because I don’t have Y”. Working within the scope of my classroom teacher capabilities what can I do today, in the next year, in the next five years to shrink that space?

“I hope that we all will continue to read each other, share with each other, and critique each other so that we may collaboratively build the thought space that’s necessary to create the schools that our children and grandchildren deserve.”

Me too.

By: Dan Meyer

Dan Meyer — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 05:00:00 +0000

Who won this? Because, um, me and Scott Elias gave it a good faith effort.

By: TheInfamousJ

TheInfamousJ — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 05:00:00 +0000

PS: As a digital native, I’m a huge proponent of the “teach naked” (as in no technology) movement. I think sometimes we lose The Point^TM in the (technology) toys. Your students, also digital natives, don’t find the toys as endlessly fascinating as you do. I promise.

By: Tony

Tony — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 05:00:00 +0000

As long as you’re getting us to keep thinking about what we’re doing, without going too over the top, is alright by me.

By: Dominic Giegerich

Dominic Giegerich — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 05:00:00 +0000

I often wish I was teaching now because I may not have ever gotten into administration. I had internet, computers and the rest, but they were just tools.

I have given my teachers an open invitation to change; the have the permission of the school board as they have approved a one-to-one initiative.

But it IS hard. Scrap the whole native-immigrant metaphor as the new websites are new to everyone…yes we still are immigrants to the technology, but not how to use it.

The kids are as clueless as we are…so the teachers ARE the experts again if they can dive in and learn how to use the hardware.

By: TheInfamousJ

TheInfamousJ — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 05:00:00 +0000

“In a time of computerized technology, any teacher who isn’t doing a cost/benefit analysis of manipulatives used in their lessons needs to retire.”

manipulatives = not the textbook

This supports teachers who make conscious, well thought out decisions in their classroom and bashes those who automatically reach for the next newest shiny thing just because it isn’t something they are already bored with. Remember, teachers, to our students, each lesson is new and exciting. It is we who get bored teaching the same thing year after year.