I don’t doubt that there are some individuals who are natural-born teachers, just as Michael Phelps has shown himself to be a natural-born swimmer, and perhaps their talents are revealed on Day One. But there are thousands and thousands of children and youth around the world who are competitive swimmers, and none of them is Michael Phelps. For these children and youth, as for most teachers — and there are approximately 3.5 million full-time K-12 teachers in the United States — technique and practice can yield great improvements in performance. This is perhaps even more true in teaching than in swimming, as there are many goals to which teachers must attend simultaneously, rather than just swimming fast to touch the wall as soon as possible.
Google Launches a Digital Citizenship Curriculum for Teachers
This is an outstanding resource. I highly recommend a closer look!
Lessons
Below is a list of lessons, and the recommended flow for delivery. Lessons are designed to fit within 50 minute classes, but can be adapted to fit your schedule:
- What Makes YouTube Unique - Basic facts and figures (40 minutes) - Teacher’s Guide Lesson 1,Slides Lesson 1
- Detecting Lies - (35 minutes) - Teacher’s Guide Lesson 2, Slides Lesson 2
- Safety Mode - (5 minutes) - Teacher’s Guide Lesson 3, Slides Lesson 3
- Online Reputation and Cyberbullying - (45 minutes) - Teacher’s Guide Lesson 4, Slides Lesson 4
- Policy - The Community Guidelines (20 minutes) - Teacher’s Guide Lesson 5, Slides Lesson 5
- Reporting content - Flagging (20 minutes) - Teacher’s Guide Lesson 6, Slides Lesson 6
- Privacy part 1 - (40 minutes) - Teacher’s Guide Lesson 7, Slides Lesson 7
- Privacy part 2 - (50 minutes) - Teacher’s Guide Lesson 8, Slides Lesson 8
- Copyright - (40 mins) - Teacher’s Guide Lesson 9, Slides Lesson 9
- Additional resources/Appendix including parent resources - Teacher’s Guide Additional Materials, Slides Additional Materials
Or you can download the Full Teacher’s Guide or the Full Set of Slides in PDF.
Remember It Well: How to Learn Better
Stay focused on the topic. Study in the same place all the time. Take copious notes. All proven learning strategies, right? Sure. But if the goal is to retain knowledge, research shows that these commonly held beliefs about how to go about it are misguided. You need to relearn how to remember.
photo via flickr:CC | Mark Brannan
Every topic, every bit of learning has content that can be Googled, and we don’t want teachers wasting precious enquiry time lecturing that content. We want students, instead, to be using class time to collaborate and debate around the questions that are Not Googleable, the rich higher order thinking to which neither the textbook nor the teacher know the answers.
Love it.
You often hear people talk about how technology is so “engaging” for kids. But that misses the point. It’s not the technology that’s engaging, it’s the opportunity to use technology to create something that is valued by the community and by yourself. Yes, a new device can be entertaining for a while, but when the novelty value wears off, what are you left with?
Engagement is not a goal, it’s an outcome of students (or anyone) doing meaningful work. Meaningful to themselves AND to the community they are in. Meaningful because someone trusted them to do something good, and they shouldered the responsibility. This is not something you DO to kids or you GIVE kids, it’s the outcome of this cycle of experiences.
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Sylvia Martinez, Engagement Responsibility and Trust - Generation Yes Blog (via coolcatteacher) I’ve been thinking a lot about this, especially after the Tointon Institute I attended earlier this summer. My school is really trying to make a transition to making technology meaningful and authentic. For so long, student writing has only been for the student and the teacher… but that shouldn’t be the case anymore. Students need a chance (and, honestly, the motivation) to share their writing with a broader audience. Authenticity is my go-to word for the year. (via thinkbrit) |
We require perfection, so we lose the opportunity to develop experience and wisdom and learn from our mistakes.
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| — | Love and Logic, pg 62 Discussing the effects of technology (via positivelypersistentteach) |
Though serious empirical research fails to show any beneficial effects of technology, it also doesn’t demonstrate any harm. The emphasis on technology is in part damaging because of its opportunity cost, both in effort on the part of policymakers and in terms of money. It also distracts from the real problem: teachers who don’t understand enough about math or science.
To sum up, technology helps students learn but in reality that isn’t happening; the graphing calculator is the example of students not understanding math, only how to use their calculator. And this is because we have teachers that don’t understand what they’re teaching.
“Computer technology, while great for many things, is just not much good for teaching, yet.”
Really? Please read this and tell me truthfully: what do you think?
