Symphony

This headline was confusing to me, so I had to look a bit further.  But after reading through the context of President Obama’s comments about technology as a “distraction”, his meaning became more clear. I think the gist of the President’s concerns are found as he discusses the role that constant information has taken...
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This is a great site for resources on Robert Marzano’s instructional strategies. If you are familiar with Marzano, then you will find this site particularly interesting as it connects instructional technology resources with each of his strategies.  If you are not familiar with Marzano, each strategy is briefly defined so that you can implement...
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This article has an interesting take on the “digital divide” and how it applies to college freshmen. The study looks at 500 college freshmen from California and surveyed their technical computer skills.  The findings looked at high school and home computer skills and found that many students may have used technology for academic purposes,...
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This is something that most of us would assume, but here is the data to back it up. Just providing access to the internet will not necessarily benefit students.  They must know how to use it. The study surveyed freshmen from the University of Illinois to test their “internet know-how”.  Students from lower socio-economic...
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I found this article on brain research, and thought of A Whole New Mind. The general background of this research was to explore the correlation between IQ tests and brain usage.  Specifically, which brain regions affect our intelligence? The tentative conclusion: Intelligence is determined by a wide range of areas and the brain’s ability...
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I was asked once by a colleague to relate Dan Pink’s Right-Brain aptitudes to Bloom’s taxonomy.  To be honest I have always preferred to apply Bloom’s Taxonomy through the verbs that are usually associated with his work.  My colleague and I threw out as many verbs as we could remember, and I wrote them...
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It looks like this Chicago school is going to implement quite a few of Dan Pink’s right-brain aptitudes, even though they did not call them by name. The article highlights a school that is implementing a new curriculum supported by Partnership for 21st Century Skills.  They will move to a collaborative, inquiry-based learning model...
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I’ve been hearing about this launch by Google, and it looks pretty darn cool. I am a big Google Apps fan, and I use it extensively in my international studies program.  If you want to develop a collaborative environment, I really think it’s the best.  Plus, you can get an enhanced education version for...
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This android app caught my eye, as I am always looking for technology-based tools for design thinking. As our students continue to be less and less paper-based, we might find that digital brain storming will become indispensable.  And from a classroom perspective, what a perfect solution to the shortage of whiteboard space and laptops.
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This data cries for Dan Pink’s symphony aptitude from A Whole New Mind. Just take this one statistic: Of those people who get their news online, 75% get that news from forwarded e-mails or social networking sites. We have to develop our students’ ability to take large amounts of information and find patterns.  How...
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