March 4, 2013

Today is March 4th, a special day in our family, and the only day of the year which is also an action.  And what an action it is!  I love the implied optimism of the date, "March Forth!"  March forth into the great unknown.  March forth in the direction of your dreams, and if you've had a recent set-back or failure, by all means…

The Future Of Education Eliminates The Classroom, Because The World Is Your Class

WRITTEN BY: Marina Gorbis

Its not as easy as you think.  Consider our blog post at EdWeek.  Interested in what you think.

A Happy Tale From a Common-Core Classroom

My classroom once hid a tale of two cities, largely driven by state testing. When I started teaching 16 years ago, the curriculum that I selected for my honors and intermediate students…

Inspiring Others

Your climate, your culture

By David Jakes on February 28th, 2013…

When teachers choose pension plans

By Chester E. Finn, Jr. and Amber M. Winkler / February 21, 2013

That the arcane issue of teacher pensions has turned into an emotional battleground can be evinced by recent headlines:

“Cuomo Pension Plan Sparks Fight With New York Unions” (March 14, 2012, Huffington Post)

“Don’t demonize teachers because of pension system’s faults” (October 21, 2012, Los Angeles Times)

“Pension…

The Learning Virtues

By …

15 Ideas for Motivating Your Child to Do Well in School

I like to say good morning to our students.  No, actually I love saying good morning to our students.   When I say this I mean to several hundred students as they arrive, and not a few as I may see them passing in the hall.  It’s a simple act that has a powerful set of returns.  In fact, today I took this simple act a step further and held the door open to those high school students who are dropped off, or who drive to school.  They slowly trickled in at one of the entrances to our secondary…

Just how many ineffective teachers are out there?

by Professor Aaron Pallas

How many New York City public schoolteachers are so incompetent that they should be fired? That’s the 250-million-dollar question that must be addressed by both sides wrangling over what kind of teacher-evaluation system the city is going to build.

New York…

February 11, 2013

As an elementary classroom teacher (mostly 5th Grade), I was always worried about being out sick or attending a conference for a bunch of reasons - I wasn't sure if the sub would cover all the work, if the children would make good choices (i.e.- would they behave) and honestly, I always missed my kids. The feeling was usually mutual (depending on the class or time of year) and upon my return my kids would ask me to never be absent again because it wasn't…

Teaching Values: Let's End Our Misguided Approach

"Schools and teachers don't get to choose whether they teach values. Schools and teachers are always affecting values by, for…

Ideas that Work

Professional-development reform: 8 steps to make it happen

By …

Kickboard, a web-based school analytics platform that allows educators and school leaders to capture, analyze and securely share critical student performance data, announced today that it has received $2 million in Series A funding led by New Markets Venture Partners and Two Sigma Ventures, with participation from several angel investors. The new round adds to $800,000 from previous seed and angel rounds, bringing the total amount…

Thirty Years Later: A Nation Still at Risk?