It would be cruel of me to mention the numbers 20 and 12 together. Not because I put any stock into the so-called Mayan Prophecies, but because I simply refuse to believe that 2011 is already set to take its final bow. I mean, come on, seriously? Are we really just three weeks shy of…
Technology
Accurately Assessing Math Knowledge
There’s this one kid who always seems to be underfoot when I go home at the end of the day. Everyone claims he’s my youngest son. Even he claims it’s so. Who knows? I do seem to have quite a few memories of him being around since the moment he was born. I walk through…
Calling All Creative Technophiles!
I have seen teachers dumbstruck by the marvel that is the interactive whiteboard. A demonstrator flips the switch, lights dim, and The Beatles’ “Got to Get You Into My Life” seems to play quietly in the background. Manipulating terms, circling important ideas, playing multimedia, allowing students to play the role of educator, getting instant feedback…
Don’t Know the Reason I Stayed There All Season
Having a classroom on the third floor of an 85-year-old school building in New England in the middle of winter was pure joy. Before students started streaming into the building, I could stand in the silence and look out my classroom windows to watch thin trails of pure white steam rising from rooftops of neighboring…
The MacGyver of Room 212 Giveaway
Here at The Mailbox, we were celebrating the start of autumn with a Mexican fiesta. Editor Diane Badden (hostess with the mostest at our Be the Difference blog) and I both bemoaned our lack of proper fiesta headwear—a very large sombrero. I suggested that The Mailbox editors are surely crafty enough that we could all…
Techno Uh-Oh
I’ll never forget the first time I saw an interactive whiteboard on display. It was at a teacher convention, and I think that when I saw it I suddenly had visions of myself jogging around the flight deck of Discovery One on my way to Jupiter.* That hulking piece of interactive technology, mounted professionally at…
Honk If You Teach Social Studies
Honk if you use GPS. Ring if your smartphone app gives you driving directions. Raise your hand if you go geocaching. Heck, raise your hand if you even know what geocaching is! Jump up and down until I call on you if you know which country has the largest volume and value of trade with…
Name That Tune
As your humble Upper Grades Exchange blog writer and The Mailbox’s Web projects editor, I spend a fair amount of time hunkered down in my bunker office cubicle creativity-inspiring work station listening to music and doing the important work that helps to keep this big wheel turning. In fact, music is a hugely important part…
The Next Great Debate? Probably not.
The next great cataclysmic education reform debate is about to erupt with the power of several hundred burning suns. Or maybe not. Perhaps the next great education reform debate will fizzle out like a damp firecracker in a rainstorm. Cursive handwriting: in the standards or not? Mrs. Worthy, Mrs. Singer, and Mr. Winters all managed…
Everything Old Is New Again?
I read this morning that the last typewriter manufacturer is closing its doors. Then I read that the last typewriter manufacturers are, in fact, still open. The one reported factory closure is in India, so there are no more Indian typewriter manufacturers. But they still build them in China, Japan, and Indonesia. Erroneous reports of…