When I first entered the world of education as a freshman in college, teaching was all about reaching my students, making connections, conveying knowledge and creating exciting learning opportunities for them. I spent a month in Tohatchi, New Mexico teaching at a boarding school on the Navajo Reservation. This experience opened my eyes to all…
Here is a short, simple video I created to explain how I use Google Reader for my professional life and with my students. If you’re not familiar with Google Reader, it is a wonderful tool for navigating the immense amount of information on the Internet and for keeping up with your students’ online contributions. More…
When I entered public school for the first time in 4th grade after attending private school since Kindergarten, I was almost immediately placed in a “TAG” (Talented and Gifted) program. From that time forward I was always told that I was ‘smart.’ I took accelerated classes, and even attended an alternative school my senior year…
I was honored yesterday to take part in a panel discussion at the #140 Character Conference with Lisa Nielson (@InnovativeEdu) and Kevin Jarrett (@kjarrett), moderated by Aparna Vashisht (@Parentella) and focused around teaching Social Media to students. The talk was part of a conference put on by Jeff Pulver (@jeffpulver) to celebrate connections made through…
Every day I seem to come across another story of a school district, a school or a teacher on the brink of calamity. Whether it be the sweeping ‘reforms’ in New Jersey, the Renaissance School Initiative in my own Philadelphia or budget cuts in Chicago , a disgruntled teacher in Florida or a Newsweek article…
I have been implementing the wonderful program, Junior Great Books with my group of Enrichment students for a little over a month. I have had mixed experiences, though none related to the program itself. Implementing the program has required me to do a lot of reflection on best practices and management issues as well as…
In lieu of all of the wonderful comments on my recent #edchat post, I felt the need to vent some frustrations about the initiative I started with some colleagues a few months back that I blogged about here. Long story short, I started a Google Group around a school-wide initiative aimed at improving the climate…
I was honored last week to be asked to do a blog post about last week’s #edchat topic: “What teaching methods work best with at-risk students?“ Betty Ray has a great guest blogger series going on based around various #edchat topics. You can read my post here: “What’s the Best Way to Teach ‘At-Risk’ Students?” If you are not familiar with…
I have been participating in the weekly Twitter discussion, #edchat, since August 2009. It has been amazing watching the conversation grow and expand, pulling more and more people into the conversation. The topics range from educational technology to best practices in education and schools. Many times the conversation is heated, often it is inspiring and…
Momentum is picking up fast here in Philadelphia for an ‘unconference’ like no other: edcamp Philly! When: Saturday, May 22ndWhere: Drexel UniversityWhat: An unconference of sessions run by attendees focused around education issues, methodology, best practices and exciting projects.Cost: free!This exciting day was inspired by a trip to BarCamp Philly that I blogged about here. Myself and…