Wednesday, February 27, 2013
For as long as there have been schools, teachers have given homework to students for them to complete out of class. However, it is clear that homework, especially when teachers give it in excess, is unnecessary for the students. Recent studies performed by experts at Penn State University as well as the Curry School of Education have pointed to the fact that more homework does not correlate with better grades. In fact, some studies showed that homework is useless because of all the stress it puts on the young students that it is given to.
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Tuesday, February 12, 2013
In order to be considered a good teacher, one must have certain qualities and characteristics that enable them to work well with their students. Therefore this essay proposes three main components that will make for an ideal teacher: This person must have a passion for teaching, they must have high expectations of their students and they must have the willingness to put their students’ needs above their own.
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Monday, September 17, 2012
The website http://www.forensicsciencetechnician.org/ has a fabulous list of brainstorming links and applications to help kids get started in almost any discipline. Below are their suggestions:…
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Thursday, May 10, 2012
You have to understand, my dears, that the shortest distance between truth and a human being is a story.
-Anthony De Mello
There is something special about stories. They have been told and retold for as long as people …
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Tuesday, May 1, 2012
One of the challenges I face as an English teacher is teaching critical thinking skills to my students, as opposed to merely assessing for comprehension. Ultimately, texts are understood through a reader’s interpretation of the larger organization structures signaled by …
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Tuesday, April 3, 2012
Both learning disabilities and giftedness are socially constructed paradigms that fail to educate the student to his full potential while treating him or her as a holistic person with strengths and weaknesses. …
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Monday, April 2, 2012
We’re still enraptured here at LearningDiversity.org by the Finnish school model, which emphasizes early interventions and individualized support as key components for academic success. …
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Thursday, January 26, 2012
Editor’s Note: Occasionally, teachers offer us lesson plans that they are using within their classrooms to post and share with other educators. This lesson plan comes from Diana Mackiewicz, who has used it in her Global Perspectives class. Global …
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Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Three days ago, the Wall Street Journal published an article entitled, “My Teacher is an App” by Stephanie Banchero and Stephanie Simon. The basic premise is that education as we know it is undergoing a radical change that …
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Monday, November 7, 2011
Last week we encountered a highly unusual situation; in fact, it was one that I had not anticipated whatsoever: a week-long power outage. As a teacher at a boarding school, one thing you must know is that the show must …
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Wednesday, September 21, 2011
Our last few posts (One Year Out: Student Survey Seems to Show Students Want Challenge and Alfie Kohn on the Homework Myth) have focused on the question of academic challenge and the contention that homework may or may …
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Friday, September 16, 2011
A recent study published by the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research has found that teacher credentials are unrelated to student achievement. This particular study has widespread implications, as often in public schooling salary and tenure is based upon certification, degrees, …
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Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Dr. Don Elwell, Director of the Greylight Theater in Illinois, recently published an article at The Alternative Education Resource Organization entitled, “What World of Warcraft Taught Me About Education.” In it, he writes the following:
“This article was …
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Sunday, April 10, 2011
The ongoing debate about the increasing importance of uniform educational standards in the public school system often centers on pedagogical issues. Paul Thomas, in his “A Case Against Standards,” offers a political perspective. Siding with those who construe …
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Thursday, March 24, 2011
Regardless of which paradigm of learning differences and ADHD you subscribe to (medical model or diversity model) you can’t deny that our educational system is inequitable. Some students–regardless of intelligence– will be more successful than others. As a teacher I …
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Wednesday, March 16, 2011
Yesterday I was alerted to an op-ed piece in the New York Times by one of my college friends who wrote that it directly aligned with our own academic experiences during our undergraduate years. She stated that I should take …
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Tuesday, March 15, 2011
For years I taught Physics the usual way we are all familiar with, chapter by chapter until the year ran out. This certainly seemed to be a logical course of action when I taught in public high school but when …
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Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Nobody goes into teaching because it seems cushy and lucrative. Presumably teachers are people who have a passion for an academic subject and enjoy working with young people. Most teachers I know like to think they have a positive influence …
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Friday, March 4, 2011
In the never-ending discussion of how to fix the broken American public school system we are repeatedly pelted with the now familiar litany of “fixes”; better teacher training, more funding, more accountability, and so on. Many people naturally look to …
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Monday, February 28, 2011
The Kahn Academy website provides a free online library of over 2100 educational videos in the fields of mathematics, physics, biology, chemistry, finance, economics, astronomy, and history as well as 100 automated self-paced exercises (mostly in math) with continuous assessment.…
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Learning Diversity
