Along Came a Spider: News on the Web [November 2005 Archive]
Different But Equal
One of gifted education's top differentiation experts, Carol Ann Tomlinson, shares her views on how making learning meaningful for every child makes learning meaningful for all children, hosted by the ASCD's Blogspot. The post, a distillation of her presentation at the ASCD's Conference on Teaching and Learning, provides insights such as the four basic principles of differentiation:
teachingandlearningconference.blogspot.com/2005/11/differentiation-puts-kids-over-content.html
Steep Learning Curve for Charter School
In Boston, it's not just the students at the Advanced Academy for Math and Science who had a steep learning curve! The school's founder, Julia Sigalovsky, also had a lot to learn about American school culture. The Academy was originally inspired by the Soviet schools Sigalovsky had attended in her youth, but accommodations have had to be made for the greater individuality and outspokenness of American students—as well as for parents and other stakeholders concerned about a "Communist" school.
www.boston.com/news/education/k_12/articles/2005/11/17/steep_learning_curve/?page=1
Teachers Talk Back
The Education Forum, an education-themed webboard, is a place for teachers to speak their minds and share ideas. But it's more than that—not only is it truly a world-wide forum, allowing teachers literally around the world to share knowledge and ideas about best practices (or simply let off steam!) it's also a great way to find amazing classroom resources and connect with people outside of education who are willing to share experiences with students:
www.educationforum.ipbhost.com
Read an article about the site here:
education.guardian.co.uk/elearning/story/0,10577,1642286,00.html
"Designs" on a School Board
In a move perhaps prompted by the members' support of intelligent design, voters in Pennsylvania replaced eight supporters of intelligent design on their school board with candidates who oppose its inclusion in the curriculum. Contrast this with the outcome found in Kansas, where the state school board recently approved a science curriculum that includes intelligent design:
www.cnn.com/2005/EDUCATION/11/09/evolution.showdown.ap/index.html
"Words of Wisdom"
The Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development recently released new research on the role of vocabulary development in academic achievement—we all know it helps, but how and in what ways? The research examined the effect of the Building Academic Vocabulary program—which had statistically significant results on achievement across disciplines and grades:
www.ascd.org/portal/site/ascd/menuitem.d2b853c7f91ce6bcbfb3ffdb62108a0c/template.article?articleMgmtId=c3d181683e867010VgnVCM1000003d01a8c0RCRD
The Teenage Brain
If you work with adolescents, chances are, you've probably said (or thought) something like, "What in the world were you thinking?" to at least one kid. A new neuroscience study of the adolescent brain actually helps to answer that question! The differences between adult and teenage neural processing are quite striking: teenagers are more likely to process stimuli using "emotion-laden" areas of their brains than adults, who engage in more frontal-lobe ("rational") thought processing. In particular, the "neurocircuitry" that enables us to suppress "incorrect" responses to cues is only just beginning to develop during the teen years—which may be part of the reason why teenagers struggle to make good decisions!
www.boston.com/news/education/k_12/articles/2005/11/10/parents_get_look_at_teens_brains
And if you're interested in the neuroscience of education, you might want to visit Neurolearning.com, the homepage of the Eide Neurolearning Clinic. If you attended the NAGC pre-convention institute given by Drs. Fernette and Brock Eide, you already know how exciting their work is for us in gifted education—if not, go visit their page:
neurolearning.com
or drop by their blog:
www.eideneurolearningblog.blogspot.com
The Internet Goes Interactive
At the beginning of its "life", the Internet was a place to get information, not share it, for most of us. But with the increasing popularity of weblogs like LiveJournal and Blogspot, as well as user-developed information sources like wikis, some experts say that the Internet has entered a second, truly interactive, phase of its existence:
education.guardian.co.uk/elearning/story/0,10577,1642281,00.html
On the Shoulders of Parents
A recent Supreme Court decision focuses on special education, but may have implications for gifted services as well. A 6-2 decision by the court affirmed that it's parents, not schools, who have the "burden of proof" when parents charge that their children are not having their needs adequately met in school. The case provides an interpretation of IDEA, which did not explicitly state where the burden of proof lay:
www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2005/11/14/court_rules_against_special_ed_parents/?p1=MEWell_Pos4
Teens Take The Web By Storm
If you're a teacher or a parent of a teenager these days, it probably won't come as a surprise to you that teens spend a lot of their time online. But you may be surprised to learn that they're more than passive consumers—the rise of various internet "blogs"—weblongs—like LiveJournal and Myspace are allowing kids to create their own online content, which can include not only text information but also artwork and other media:
www.govtech.net/news/news.php?id=97131
Google Print's On
Despite legal attacks from a range of copyright holders, Google Print is going live! The online resource, which at present mainly contains out-of-copyright an d public domain works, allows readers to search through the full texts of a wide range of such resources:
print.google.com
Scopes-ing Again
In the latest in the battle between intelligent design and evolution, the Dover area school system, one of the first among the recent intelligent design cases, will hold elections for a new school board. This conflict, naturally, will be central to the campaign:
www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2005/11/06/MNGE0FJU621.DTL&hw=schools&sn=003&sc=731
And in Indiana, Gov. Mitch Daniels voiced concerns about his own state's response to the battle, expressing his hesitation to sign into law a recent bill that would require the teaching of intelligent design in all schools in the state:
www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051104/NEWS02/511040542/1006/NEWS01
A One-Stop "Shop" for Gifted Resources
Child-Development-Tips.com's Gifted Page provides a great overview of gifted education and resources on giftedness and gifted education, with links to pages on signs of giftedness and resources for gifted children, as well as other links to vitally important topics for parents of children at all levels:
childdevelopmenttips.com/index.php/40
Sound Bodies... With Sound Minds
In Iowa, gifted athletes at one high school will soon be held to a higher minimum standard of academic excellence. Under a new policy these students will be required to pass all their courses in order to participate in athletics events. (And if that doesn't seem like much, ask yourself how many of the academically and creatively gifted children you know struggle with physical achievements!) The initiative comes after examining the academic records of high school athletes, a number of whom did not meet this standard:
desmoinesregister.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051025/NEWS02/510250410/1004
Surfing in School
Okay, you all guessed that means "surfing" the web—but SurfYourWork.com offers much more than that! This online resource is one of many educational tools being made available to schools to enable teachers and administrators to communicate electronically with students, including posting assignments and class discussions. Unlike the blogging utilities discussed in previous News and Views, this tool is specifically designed fro educational use:
www.surfyourwork.com/login/login.php
School Safety: What Do You Think?
The Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development wants to know your opinion: how can we best provide a safe learning environment for our students? The poll-site also provides a valuable list of related links on school safety and student welfare:
www.ascd.org/portal/site/ascd/menuitem.b3130849b563ef5ccb6a7210e3108a0c
A Serious Comic
Past issues of News and Views have feature discussions of the educational value of graphic. But now we have a whole new reason to appreciate the medium: Nelson Mandela, arguably one of the truly great human rights leaders of the 20th century, has recently agreed to a new biography of himself—in comic book form. The biography, to be printed in nine volumes, is published by the Nelson Mandela Foundation:
news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051028/ap_on_re_af/south_africa_mandela
A "Message" of Literacy
In the latest of the conflicting studies on the subject of text-messaging and teenage language-arts skills, a new study in Britain has found that the current generation of teenagers, many of whom have "cut their writing teeth" on text-messaging, are showing higher scores on written exams than any previous group! The differences in results between this and other studies may reflect the measures used to indicate student writing proficiency—this study is among the most comprehensive of its kind—as well as possible cultural differences in both the use of text-messaging and of "academic" writing, in addition to the gradual acceptance in general speech of "non-standard" phrasing:
www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,591-1850922,00.html
"Exorcising" Halloween
For a lot of children and parents, Halloween is a holiday with a lot of positive traditions—costumes, candy, and just enough creepiness to be fun! But for many religious parents, the holiday, and its presence in school, is cause for concern: they site its origins as a "pagan" festival—despite the fact that most traditional holidays in the Christian calendar were originally timed to coincide with and supplant traditional "pagan" festivals. Nevertheless, many Christian parents want to see Halloween removed from schools, and even communities generally:
search.csmonitor.com/search_content/1031/p02s01-ussc.html
Cooling It With Math
Got problems with math? Coolmath.com is the site for you! This site offers resources for "kids from 13-100" as well as teachers and parents. Some highlights include algebra (and precalc) made easy, as well as a range of math games from "Lemonade Stand" to Jigsaw Puzzles, and a free online graphing calculator:
coolmath.com
On the Edge of Art
Get an edge on art! The Kennedy Center's Artsedge webpage offers a range of resources for all kinds of art and all kinds of art lovers! There's an entire section devoted to teaching, but the site also has links to independent exploration areas for students to enjoy on their own. Don't' think it's just painting, either: the site includes resources on dance and music as well:
artsedge.kennedy-center.org
Public TV for Teachers
With excellent shows on a range of topics just ripe for showing in the classroom, PBS has long been a godsend for teachers. Now they're offering a whole new resource with their website, TeacherSource, which offers links to great material for teachers of all subjects. Highlights include featured lessons from all disciplines, as well as cross-curriculum activities and an email news"letter":
www.pbs.org/teachersource
Read an article about the above sites here:
www.startribune.com/stories/144/5699105.html
Worth a Thousand Words
Ever gone looking online for great pictures for your classroom—then stopped with your finger hovering over the "Copy" button, wondering if that great image you'd found was copyrighted (and therefore off-limits)? Worry no more—we have not one but two great education graphics sites for you and your students to feat your eyes upon! Both Pics4Learning and OpenPhotos provide an exciting range of visual options, all arranged by category:
pics.tech4learning.com
openphoto.net
