geek.teacher

Heck yeah!

Over at Edutopia they’re running a Reader’s survey.  It’s on a wide variety of topics, including best education blog (which one of my inspirations, Vicki Davis, was nominated for), best technology tool, etc.  My personal favorite, though:

What’s wrong with this picture?  IT’S TWO RICH GUYS WHO DONATE MONEY AND ONE ACTUAL LIFE-LONG ADVOCATE AND ROLE MODEL FOR EDUCATORS!  Seriously!  If you haven’t read Savage Inequalities by Kozol, go do it, now.  It will change the way you look at your mission as a teacher.  To add insult to injury:

Now, if I know nerds (and I do), Star Wars nerds will stuff the ballot box for Lucas, and computer nerds will stuff the box for Gates as soon as words gets out.  So, frankly, the results already become meaningless.  Regardless, for all that is good and decent, educators, please vote for Kozol.  Then I recommend never visiting that stupid site ever again.

Thanks to @garystager for the tipoff.

Two hour season-finale tonight! This was a great reminder for me of everything we’ve seen that happens to the Oceanic Six after the island, in what appears to be more or less chronological order.

Monkeys control robots with their minds

Robots could soon rove Antarctica

I always thought the Apocalypse presented an either/or scenario, as in “either Planet of the Apes or Terminator.”  Little did I suspect that it would be both!

i frequently enjoy Rhymes with Orange, but this is just too great.

It’s funny how you can be so surrounded by an idea that the counter-argument never even comes to mind.  Considering that I will frequently throw my self into the role of devil’s advocate, I find it frankly embarrassing that I never thought to challenge the common wisdom that cell phones in school are the enemy until I recently saw some thoughts about it at the Conference recently.  The ridiculousness amplifies itself when I consider how much I use my iPhone for…well, everything now.  Thankfully, some people out there, smarter than I, challenge the conventional wisdom and give me ideas that I can use in the future.  Check out this NY Sun article where Lisa Nielsen talks about ways to use cell phones in the classroom, which, of course, one can’t actually do when cell phones are banned.

Finding Lisa’s blog there has now brought me up to 37 education blogs I’m following.  Considering a month ago I know that number was below ten, that’s a whole lot of new and interesting info to pop up for me.  Hooray!

Today I totally blinked out at the wrong moment.  i covered an art class today with sixth graders, and everything moves along nicely.  I stare them down a little, they get to work, and do their thing, mostly behaving.  Then I mess up.

Two girls walk up to me.  One says, “She needs to go to the nurse.”

Of course, I have to do the stupid thing and ask “Why do you need to go to the Nurse?”

After a couple of awkward silent seconds, I tell her to fill out her planner so I can sign it.

I know to look out for the panicked look on face when asking to go to the nurse or bathroom, but now I need to keep in mind the question can come by proxy to avoid embarrassment, instead of me further extending it.

Read and enjoy the new Carnival of Education.  I for one found Gifted Identification: When giftedness is the problem to be fascinating.  

Gifted Traits Can Cause Classroom Problems

High verbal ability, unusually large vocabulary

The child seems older and more mature than he or she is, leading to unrealistic expectations on the part of the teacher; has difficulty developing listening skills; uses this verbal gift to manipulate or dominate others.

Early reading

The child presents problems primary teachers who may not know where to begin to meet the child’s language arts development.

A questioning attitude

The child questions authority as well as rules, regulations, and generally accepted facts; teacher may feel threatened, which could result in hostile feelings towards child.

NOTE: Can be viewed as oppositional defiance disorder.

Lots more over there.  Check it out.

Athena on the attack

I know, I am being a bad blogger this week, but…adorable kittens!

To make this somewhat on topic, my students really liked Kerpoof.

Can learning disabilities be prevented? is the question Joanne Jacobs is asking.  RtI is the new hotness in Special Education, because it’s basically applying interventions to students before they can be identified as having a learning disability.  If teachers think a kid might have some learning problems, the RtI kicks in, they come up with things to do for the kid, and do it.  If that doesn’t succeed, then they try and test for Special Ed, I suppose.

Sometime in the future, I would not be surprised to see RtI fail some kid, and have the parent sue the district for compensatory Special Education.  Time in RtI is time they’re not receiving Special Education, and if they are truly disabled, I don’t think that would be forgiven easily.