Edlightenment » best practice

Connecting with the Creative

Mister V — Thu, 10 Feb 2011 01:50:51 +0000

There are some 7.2 million teachers in the United States. Some are good, some are bad. Some are luddites and some are patiently waiting the singularity.

The biggest trick for me, as a teacher (or in my current case, semi-teacher), is to connect with other creative educators who think outside the box. In the past [...]

Using Scenarios in eLearning

Mister V — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 18:52:01 +0000

Great presentation that summarizes much of the information I’m finding with eLearning. From Cathy Moore’s site “making change“.
How to save the world with elearning scenarios View more documents from Cathy Moore.

Just bring your own

Mister V — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 15:25:38 +0000

We’ll get to the point – eventually – when we’ll simply tell our students to bring their own wireless devices (laptop, iPod touch, etc.) and hop on the school network. I would guess that many students (not to mention teachers) would leap at the opportunity to use their own machines.

Of course, there are security [...]

Best Mind Mapping Software

Mister V — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 15:28:58 +0000

I’ve fiddled with the software called Freemind from year to year and, while being impressed with its abilities, never got around to using it with any kind of regularity.

That changed at the end of last year. I created a mindmap of everything needed in 8th grade social studies (check out the fun [...]

Wait – Carrots and Sticks don’t Work?

Mister V — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 14:51:04 +0000

Daniel Pink gave an interesting TED talk on the science of motivation, particularly motivation in a world that places high value on right brain conceptual abilities.

To lift the main idea:

As long as the task involved mechanical skill, bonuses worked as they would be expected: the higher the pay, the better the performance. [...]

MultiTasking Bad for the Brain

Mister V — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 18:02:26 +0000

While teaching in the classroom I was used to being pretty sequential. Focus on the task on hand, execute it, reflect, move on. This new job is an intellectual helterskelter. I’m constantly juggling 5 or 6 ideas in my head (and trying to follow up them) at once. Multitasking the follow through.

Bad idea.

Concrete [...]