Podcast Series: Innovations in Education

Explore the full series of eSchool News podcasts hosted by Kevin Hogan—created to keep you on the cutting edge of innovations in education.

New partnership to promote the 16 Habits of Mind

ASCD, in partnership with Wonder Media, presents a series of animations based on the renowned 16 Habits of Mind developed by Dr. Art Costa and Bena Kallick of the Global Institute for Habits of Mind. This groundbreaking collaboration offers a unique tool that empowers students in kindergarten through 2nd grade with creative and critical thinking skills for success in school and life.

The Habits of Mind Animations offer educators a revolutionary new tool in alignment with college- and career- ready standards to help students learn how to persist, how to manage their impulsivity, how to listen with understanding and empathy, how to strive for accuracy, and 12 other essential life skills.

Research shows that young children form strong emotional relationships with animated characters, and using these characters to model behaviors helps break down barriers to students’ understanding of difficult-to-teach concepts.…Read More

For PD, the days of one-and-done are dead and gone!

According to research from the Center for Public Education, “one-and-done” professional development sessions for teachers simply don’t work. With new standards rolling out every year, a one-class-covers-all approach just won’t cut it anymore. Educators aren’t that different from their students when it comes to their learning, so why should they be expected to learn everything at once instead of gradually, as they hope their students can?

Ongoing professional learning opportunities that provide teachers with constant access to support through continually improving online and offline resources are essential for truly effective instruction.

However, many of us still get stuck when attempting to approach this topic. It’s not unusual for a district to assume that teacher learning is straightforward, something that can be covered quickly and checked off in day.…Read More

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These edtech tools are perfect for hassle-free assessments

With the shift in education towards data-driven instruction, teachers spend inordinate amounts of time on assessments: checking for understanding, formative assessment, summative assessment, quizzes, tests, essays, research papers, projects and any other way they can think of to not only assess whether a student has mastered a skill or topic, but also to assess the efficacy of their own teaching.

Assessments are, to put it mildly, a disproportionately huge commitment of time. Creating them, administering them, and grading them are just the beginning. Then you need to aggregate and mine your data to really get a handle on the answers you need regarding the educational environment in your classroom. It takes so much effort on the part of the teacher, not to mention all the paper and by-hand grading and recording that has to happen on the teacher’s personal time.

A Better Solution with Edtech?…Read More

DuPont Pioneer Excellence in Agricultural Science Education Award

A partnership with DuPont Pioneer and the National Science Teachers Association, this award is to recognize excellence and innovation in the field of agricultural science education. Two awards, one middle level and one high school level, will be awarded annually. The awardee will receive a $2,500 grant for their classroom/program, up to $1,000 paid travel expenses to attend the NSTA national conference on science education, mentoring with a DuPont Pioneer scientist, classroom resources from DuPont Pioneer, and access to a DuPont Pioneer product plant or research facility. The awardees will be presented the award at the Teacher Awards Banquet at the National Conference.

 

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5 ways teachers can improve student learning based on current brain research

The brain is an experience-dependent organ. From our very earliest days, the brain begins to map itself to our world as we experience it through our senses. The mapping is vague and fuzzy at first, like a blurred photograph or an un-tuned piano. However, the more we interact with the world, the more well-defined our brain maps become until they are fine-tuned and differentiated. But each person’s map will vary, with some sensory experiences more distinct than others depending on the unique experiences and the clarity and frequency of the sensations he or she has experienced.

Educators can positively influence students’ learning by understanding how the brain is shaped by their early experiences—and how it can be rewired and reorganized to work more quickly and efficiently.

The Plastic Brain and the Critical Period…Read More

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Frontier Internet Cyber Safety Grant

The internet provides students a vast resource for research and learning. Yet, navigating the beneficial and dangerous places online has been an ever-evolving battle. What have you as a teacher and your classes learned when it comes to cyber safety? Tell us, and you could win a $1,000 grant to buy technological equipment or supplies for your room.

 

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NEA Learning and Leadership Grants

Learning & Leadership Grants support NEA members for one of the following two purposes: Grants to individuals fund participation in high-quality professional development experiences, such as summer institutes, conferences, or action research; and grants to groups fund collegial study, including study groups, action research, lesson plan development, or mentoring experiences for faculty or staff. Deadlines for applications are due February 1, June 1, and October 15 each year.
Deadline: June 1, 2017

Emperor Science Award Program

To encourage high school students to explore careers in science, and specifically cancer research, PBS Learning Media and Stand Up To Cancer announced the second annual Emperor Science Award Program. The program will award 100 students a unique mentoring opportunity to work with an esteemed university-level research scientist on a multi-week cancer research project.

New generation of Chromebooks designed for millions of students and educators

[Editor’s Note: At Bett, one of the largest education technology conferences in the world, Google is announcing a new line of Chromebooks for education. Check out @GoogleForEdu and #BETT2017 for more information.]

When I was a student, I juggled different tools throughout my day—a paper notebook for history, a shared desktop for research, and a TI-83 for calculus. In the years since, the potential of computers has begun to replace the need for those various tools—what we did on that expensive calculator for example, can now be done with an app. We believe in the power of technology to help students learn however they learn best and help teachers teach the way they find most effective. At Bett this week we’re introducing  a new generation of Chromebooks designed to adapt to the diverse ways students learn. These convertible Chromebooks have touch and stylus capability, world-facing camera and access to millions of Android apps, so technology can flex to the needs of students, not the other way around.

Today both Chromebooks and Classroom are used by more than 20 million teachers and students, and we’re excited to announce that G Suite for Education has now reached 70 million active users. Chromebooks have been the device of choice because of their simplicity, security, shareability and low cost. We’re committed to introducing even more options for the teaching needs of schools, so look out for a lineup from Acer, Asus, HP, Dell, and Lenovo and the recently announced Samsung Chromebooks—a powerful option for educators. We expect that, in the future, our partners will be able to build an even wider variety of Chromebooks, including detachables and tablets.…Read More