“The midterms are here. Here’s everything you need to know to hit the polls and cast an informed vote this election season.”
“Teachers in the BMTN [Better Math Teaching Network] choose to focus on deepening their students’ abilities in one of three areas: connect, justify and solve. They are grouped with other algebra teachers at schools across New England working on the same skill. They each test small changes in their classrooms, iterate on those changes, and bring their findings to monthly conference calls where they get ideas, feedback, coaching and encouragement.”
“Sleep deprivation is the invisible ceiling to how good life can be.”
““When we look at our metrics, we’ve already seen a dramatic improvement in schools that have a wall-to-wall IB program,” Chicago schools CEO Janice Jackson told Chalkbeat earlier in October”
“A major obstacle is the way these ideas are being articulated and explained by those pushing them. For example, why are the new ways of learning better? What does the research say? Will this help our kids in college, careers and beyond? How? And what do the new terms mean, for real life? It would help to avoid vague rhetoric like “meeting students where they are,” or “educating the whole child,” along with the cliché about how education has not changed since a time-bound factory model failed our children.”
“They want and need flexibility… But independent schools as structured, particularly at boarding schools, have been slow to support this flexibility because of rigid systems, differing views regarding employment, and the concrete reality.”
“The Challenge Map is designed for education leaders who are looking for resources to help address common education challenges. For each challenge, you’ll find emerging trends and interesting practices League districts are implementing, as well as links to summaries and research-based tools aligned with the specific challenge.”
“Research by Hall and Hord (2014) suggests that an ideal approach to developing teachers and changing schools simultaneously includes both top-down and bottom-up initiatives.”
“The tiny editions are the size of a cellphone and no thicker than your thumb, with paper as thin as onion skin. They can be read with one hand — the text flows horizontally, and you can flip the pages upward, like swiping a smartphone.”
“There are the obvious benefits, like a boost in mindfulness, memory and communication skills. But studies have also found that writing in a journal can lead to better sleep, a stronger immune system, more self-confidence and a higher I.Q.
“Symmetry is among the first geometric concepts kids encounter in mathematics. Through hands-on manipulation, they see that it’s possible to rotate, flip and slide shapes around and end up with the shape they started with. This preservation of an object under change has a satisfying resonance — it’s a hint of a deep sense of order in the universe… There are looser, more flexible types of symmetry transformations, though, and these are the ones of interest in Zimmer’s conjecture.”
“The first sport coats were adopted by 19th-century Europeans and Britons who enjoyed hunting or horseback riding but found such activities difficult in a typical suit jacket. Young American students borrowed the style with a few tweaks, sometimes pairing sport coats with non-matching pants to play outdoor sports like golf.”
Copyright
Every week I send out articles I encounter from around the web. Subject matter ranges from hard knowledge about teaching to research about creativity and cognitive science to stories from other industries that, by analogy, inform what we do as educators. This breadth helps us see our work in new ways.
Readers include teachers, school leaders, university overseers, conference organizers, think tank workers, startup founders, nonprofit leaders, and people who are simply interested in what’s happening in education. They say it helps them keep tabs on what matters most in the conversation surrounding schools, teaching, learning, and more.
– Peter Nilsson