My Beauty Best Teacher

Writing in the Wall Street Journal, Michael McConnell asserts that President Obama's pay czar is unconstitutional and that all of his acts and activities are in the violation of the rule of law in our nation. McConnell is a smart guy- professor at Stanford University Law School, director of its Constitutional Law Center, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, and a former federal judge on the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals- so he kind of knows his stuff.

Obama's "pay czar" Kenneth Feinberg recently called up top executives at private companies that work in the United States and told them that he had decided to slash their pay in half. Where does he get the just and legitimate power to do this?

As part of the hastily enacted and seldom-read legislation establishing the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), Congress authorized the Secretary of the Treasury to "require each TARP recipient to meet appropriate standards for executive compensation." To carry out this task, last June the Treasury promulgated an emergency "Interim Final Rule," waiving ordinary requirements for a public comment period.

As part of this emergency rule, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner created the office of "Special Master" for compensation, delegated his TARP authority to set compensation standards to this officer, and appointed Mr. Feinberg (a lawyer and mediator) to this position, without obtaining Senate confirmation.

This is the government that will soon be deciding what is 'appropriate' energy use, 'appropriate' spending on healthcare, and 'appropriate' content for radio. Read the language of the kind of bills that Democrats are working to pass as laws in our nation- they are putting in unelected, unconfirmed bureaucrats who will run our lives for us. This is not protecting our freedom and property better- this is tyranny.

Therein lies the problem. The Appointments clause of the Constitution, Article II, section 2, provides that all "Officers of the United States" must be appointed by the president "by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate." This means subject to confirmation, except that "the Congress may by Law vest the Appointment" of "inferior Officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the Courts of Law, or in the Heads of Departments."

There is no doubt that Mr. Feinberg is an "officer" of the United States. The Supreme Court has defined this term (Buckley v. Valeo, 1976) as "any appointee exercising significant authority pursuant to the laws of the United States." Mr. Feinberg signed last week's orders setting pay levels for executives at Bank of America, AIG, Chrysler Financial, Citigroup, GMAC, General Motors and Chrysler. They have the force of law and are surely an exercise of "significant authority" pursuant to an Act of Congress. He is not a mere "employee," acting at the direction of a superior. That means his office is subject to the requirements of the Appointments Clause.

While somewhat more disputable, Mr. Feinberg's is probably an "inferior" officer, defined as one subject to supervision and removal by a member of the cabinet. Although he has substantial discretion and independence, Mr. Feinberg reports to the secretary of the Treasury, who can fire him any time for any reason. This means that Congress could, if it wished, vest the appointment of the pay czar in the secretary, without any need for Senate confirmation.

But Congress has not done so. On the contrary, it vested the authority to implement TARP's compensation provision in the secretary of the Treasury. The secretary may sub-delegate that power to someone else—but that someone must be an "officer" properly appointed "by and with the advice and consent of the Senate."

In other words, the pay czar in unconstitutional.

The power to set compensation at large American businesses is especially subject to potential abuse, favoritism, arbitrariness, or political manipulation. It is no reflection on Kenneth Feinberg, who has a sterling reputation and who appears to have approached these sensitive duties with a spirit of commendable integrity, to say that the checks and balances of the Constitution should be scrupulously observed. They were not. Because he is not a properly appointed officer of the United States, Mr. Feinberg's executive compensation decisions were unconstitutional.

You vote Democrat, you get a government that supports the violation of our constitution and a government that takes away liberty, property, and life. You get a tyrannical government, the kind that our founding fathers faught against.

Elementary Students Forced to Write Advocacy Letters to Governor Criticizing Education Cuts, via Michigan Capitol Confidential:

Third through fifth graders at an elementary school in the Walled Lake Consolidated School District were assigned by at least one teacher this week to write letters to Gov. Rick Snyder saying how unhappy they were with his budget cuts, the school district confirmed Thursday.

The students were told the best letters would be forwarded to the governor. One parent said the teachers prepped the students with what the budget cuts entailed because some weren’t aware. Students also were asked to speak in front of their classmates about why they didn’t like the budget cuts.

Walled Lake parent Ernie Hughes said he didn’t think the assignment was appropriate. “Don’t bring politics into the school and use the kids as pawns,” Hughes said.

District Spokesman Judy Evola said in an e-mail it wasn’t appropriate for the elementary age students to write the letters. “The District neither supports this writing assignment or believes it was age appropriate for elementary students," she said.

This news does not shock or surprise me. In my post Liberal Teachers I wrote:

Whole generations of students are being brainwashed by this liberal thinking. And I do mean they are being brain-washed. Teachers are systematically trying to force the students in their classes to think in a certain way. They are forced to only hear one viewpoint on issues, they are forced to only provide answers that the teacher considers right, and they are forced on penalty of shame to admit to and agree to the liberal agenda. True, many students rebel against this system, usually be shutting down mentally or saying they hate school, but most students are worn down bit by bit, and eventually agree that 2+2 does equal 5, and the liberal agenda in this nation is advanced that much further.

There is considerable evidence to me that this is so- textbooks, state curriculum, lesson plans, standardized tests, student comments, and my own observations. On big issues and little issues, the liberal agenda is pushed down students minds, and the cumulative effect of decades of this is beginning to show in our current political environment.

Although Walled Lake district spokesman Judy Evola admitted that the students should not have written the letters and does not support this effort, there were no reports of any disciplinary actions taken and no reports of reviews of the teacher's past activities and projects. Although it is possible that this was the first and only time that this teacher let their liberal views show through in the class and forced innocent children to be pawns in their political games, it is more likely this teacher has systematically attempted to slant her teaching towards liberal values and beliefs and every day to make her students into progressive activists of change along the lines of Saul Alinsky (whom the NEA suggests all teachers read). She probably is like another teacher who I had the chance to substitute teach for once and used her classroom as a forum to spread her liberal values and views (see my post I Knew I Was Different From Liberal Teachers When...).

One can only hope that the district has taken the appropriate steps with this teacher and that in the future this teacher will only lean liberal and will make conscious attempts to be more moderate and will not ever use students to promote their agenda ever again. I do not expect teachers to always be 100% perfect or always be nonpartisan or apolitical- that would make education dry and dull- but there needs to be balance and students never must be made pawns of a teachers views. I'm a conservative teacher and of course my conservative beliefs show (especially after having students for a whole year)- but I play devil's advocate from both sides, come down hard on Republicans and conservatives at times, occasionally parrot out the Democrat and liberal talking points, never force my students to be part of any sort of conservative agenda, and always try my hardest to teacher critical thinking skills and have the students make their own educated and ration decisions about issues and concepts. That's all we should ask of any teacher- and we should be asking it of all the teachers in Walled Lake Consolidated School District.

"The moving finger writes, and having writ, not a single sole can erase a single word of it." Shakespeare

Here is another moving account from a DC teacher at Anacostia senior high school. It tells what special education teachers face day to day in our public school system that is long on promises and short on providing the needed resources and supports. Many would argue that these are 'adult' issues. To which I would counter: "that just doesn't make any sense." Working in a school system that fails to provide adequate and appropriate resources for teachers ultimately impacts student achievement and service delivery. In this case it impacts our most vulnerable population; students with disabilities. Here's what one special education teacher says is happening at Anacostia senior high. (Posted by The Washington Teacher).

"Dear Candi: A meeting was held in response to a special education coordinator's reprimand memo to sped. teachers titled "Overdue Triennials and Annual IEP's." Teachers formed a team to try to address these concerns with recommendations to no avail. Juggling case management responsibility, implementing inclusion without a model while trying to teach are major concerns for sped. teachers at Anacostia SHS. We have far too many students on our case loads to handle our responsibilities effectively. At the beginning of the year Anacostia teachers were given overwhelming caseloads of which 80-85% of student IEP's and triennial evaluations were overdue and out of compliance. Anacostia has more than 300 special education students with approximately 15 teachers. Special education teachers are simply spread too thin. What's wrong with this picture ?

Chancellor Rhee's special education 'central office crew' are mandating that these already overdue annual IEP's and triennials be completed immediately or else. We know what this means "90-day termination plans and the firing squad." The "firing squad" reports periodically on sight to take notes and to observe us . Teachers are expected to simultaneously perform magic, teach, update overdue IEP's, assess students, update DC STARS attendance, meet with service providers and parents all within an assigned instructional period. Special education teachers are also required to attend impromptu meetings and school wide meetings. Student lunch schedules are changed daily as a result of our most recent history of student violence which impacts our schedules as well.

Teachers are raising many questions because these large number of meetings, paper work and case management responsibilities are robbing teachers of required instructional time for disabled students, planning time as well as our lunch periods. The concerns of playing catch up will impact teachers performance appraisals and student test scores. Approximately 99% of the paper work and 100% of scheduling IEP meetings are delegated to sped. teachers instead of being handled by the sped. coordinator. All of our teachers have been told to seek the special education coordinator's advice on IEP issues and concerns. Unfortunately our coordinator offers very little help to us because she is a novice TFA teacher with no experience to qualify for this position. As an alternate solution to this problem, teachers' requested that administrators allow teachers to work outside their regular work day. This request was denied due to a shortage of administrative premium.

Since this is the year of full INCLUSION in our schools, sped. teachers at Anacostia believe that "co-teaching" may be an unrealistic option. One model WILL NOT fit every student or classroom. Anacostia sped. teachers are scrambling for answers and problem solving strategies as we try to address the mandates of NCLB, IDEIA and Chancellor Rhee.The good news though Candi, is that the research shows that special education students placed in a rigorous class room environment with the appropriate resources (educational aides, highly qualified teachers, behavior specialists, regular and assistive technology and accommodations do better academically and socially and are able to transition from high school to work/career and post secondary training. DC public schools has a long way to go to provide this level of academic rigor due to the lack of a citywide inclusion model, necessary teacher positions, appropriate staff development and needed resources. Please help. " Anonymous Teacher.

I gave a presentation at school today about tech in the classroom, and I gave a stack of handouts to the teachers who came. In that stack was a list of other websites they might find useful in their classroom, and that list included Rubistar. I confidently told the teachers at the presentation that all links listed on their handouts would appear on my teacher blog. ...Then, when I visited my blog to make a new post a few minutes ago, I happened to notice that I had yet to create a post over one of my most-used resources: Rubistar. 

If you are a rubric-user at all, you really should join the Rubistar bandwagon!

What is a Rubric?
A rubric is, above all, a fair and easy way to grade otherwise subjective projects, activities, and/or assignments. A rubric looks like a large grid of boxes with words in it. Running across the top, you'll have the point values. Running across the left-hand side will be the categories. In the middle, you'll see descriptions of each category, in varying stages of completion. The top half might look like this:


This particular rubric happens to be for a speech (and it's incomplete), but you can make rubrics for virtually anything that has some "gray area" to it.

I say the rubric you see above is incomplete because I still see some ambiguous descriptions in those middle boxes. For instance, what is "appropriate clothing"? And what is that, vs. the "mostly appropriate clothing"? Before I would hand this one out, I would definitely edit these boxes to make sure they're as clear as possible. There can't be any doubt left in my students' minds as to what I expect. If I were to edit this for student-use, I'd put numerical values to the descriptions in the middle boxes. For instance, I might say "appropriate clothing: dressed 'business casually,' with no holes, wrinkles, or dirt. Hair and face are well-groomed, and students appears clean." or something like that. I'd be as specific as possible. For the body posture descriptions, I might use percentages. For instance, "student maintained correct body posture (standing up straight with no slouching, slumping, or curving of the shoulders) 100% of the time" might be in the 10 point description box. (See what I mean about being specific? That's sometimes the hard part: nailing down EXACTLY what it is I want students to do.)

What's in a Rubric?
Keep in mind that this entire thing is completely customizable. No only can you change the title, categories, and middle-box descriptions, but you can also change the point values. I've seen some teachers grade on a "1, 2, 3, 4" scale, and others grade on a "10, 20, 30, 40" scale. It's really up to you. In the end, all my assignments are worth 100%, anyway; it's just a matter of deciding how much of a "point gap" you want between levels.

Why Use Rubrics?

I use rubrics for all my projects because I feel it's the most fair way to grade. Right up front, the students know a) what elements I'm looking for, b) what I consider "worth 5 points" vs what I consider "worth 10 points," and c) EXACTLY what they should do to get an "A."

I give rubrics to my students at the beginning of projects and ask that they not only keep up with these until the end of the project, but they must review them, as well. Early in the year, I taught my students how to skim the rubric's highest point-value column, looking for specifics as to what would get them a perfect grade on the assignment. I also taught them how to read the different levels. For instance, we made a board game over Romeo and Juliet. In this board game, students had to include at least 15 questions and answers about the play, the Elizabethan times, and/or Shakespeare himself. On that rubric, in the "quantity of questions and answers" category, I made sure to stair-step the point values (all 15 Q&A's earns 9 points. 10-14 Q&A's earns 6 points. 5-9 Q&A's earns 3 points. 0-4 Q&A's earns 0 points). So, when I was talking about time-management with my students, and about how to get the best "bang for your buck," I was trying to reason with them... If you're OK with only getting 6 points on your question and answer quantity section, and you have a very limited amount of time (because you've procrastinated), then how about only doing 10 Q&A's, since you'll earn the same amount of points, whether you do 10 of them or 14? It was examples like that that, I think, really nailed the point of the rubric home. Most of my students have actually expressed that they enjoy and appreciate the rubrics because it sets clear boundaries for them.

This also keeps me fair when I grade creative projects. Otherwise, how would I be able to distinguish between a 90% and an 80%? I can't trust my judgment to be fair and consistent every time (particularly if I'm in a bad mood when I'm grading! Yikes!). This allows me to be very stable with my grading. More than once, I've been in the middle of grading and wanted to dock points for something that I felt was sub-par, compared to others, but when I looked at the rubric, I had no choice but to NOT dock points. So I guess you could say that the rubric has helped some of my kids' grades! :)

Another thing I really like about the rubric is something that really just has to do with me. I feel like I'm a better teacher after I've made a rubric. In order to make one, you have to know EXACTLY what criteria you're looking for in the project, and you have to be able to communicate that very well in a short amount of space on paper. I feel that creating rubrics has made me a more clear and concise speaker, and that I am better at communicating objectives when I use rubrics.

Back to Rubistar

OK, now that all THAT is said and done, let's move back to Rubistar. Rubistar is a free, online rubric maker, designed especially for teachers. (By the way, 4teachers.org has tons of other useful teacher-websites, too, if you wanna check it out!) You can either choose one of the [many] free ones that Rubistar has already made for you, OR you can create your own. You can edit one of the [many] templates, or you can start from scratch. It's really up to you. Once you have a Rubistar account, you can save your rubrics until a certain time, or you can save them indefinitely. (I always save mine indefinitely.)

One you're finished, you have the option to print directly from the Rubistar website, but I usually copy and paste it all onto a Word document, just so I can add a few more features. I add a header (usually the name of the project and/or the class) and adjust the spacing of the boxes and words. I sometimes add a "student comments" section, where students can explain themselves in a few sentences before they turn the project in. I always add a "points earned" and "total grade" section at the very end; this way, students know EXACTLY what his or her grade is when they get the paper back. (To grade on a rubric, just make lines in or circle the boxes that describe the student's performance in each category.)

-----

Students may be a little confused about rubrics at first, but I know they'll love 'em once the year is over, and so will you! Grading goes a lot more smoothly and quickly, and everyone is on "the same page" as to what you're actually expecting on an assignment. Check it out!!

Faith And Sustainable Technologies combines appropriate technology and spirituality in its development approach.They:

Provide teaching and training of appropriate technologies including but not limited to:
a. Reducing deforestation by encouraging the use of solar energy and biogas.
b. Construction and use of slow sand filters and water purification techniques to reduce water borne diseases.
c. Construction, use and maintenance of low cost water pumps for irrigation.
d. Manufacture and use of compressed earth blocks to build permanent structures for
housing etc…
e. Use of bio-digesters and composting techniques as methods of waste management to reduce the spread of disease and improve crops.

• Howard Gardner: Truth, Beauty, and Goodness Reframed | Harvard Graduate School of Education

  At the Askwith Forum on December 1, Professor Howard Gardner discussed the challenges faced by traditional education in light of two forces: the post-modern critique from the humanities and the disruptive potentials of the new digital media. As addressed in his most recent book, Truth, Beauty, and Goodness Reframed: Educating for the Virtues of the Twenty-First Century, Gardner described how the core ideas of truth, beauty, and goodness can survive and even be strengthened in education across the life span.

  tags: news education insight

• Harvard EdCast: Designing a Digital Curriculum | Harvard Graduate School of Education

  There are so many great podcasts out there. I like to hear directly from the companies I work with. Julie's and my first book is from Pearson and this podcast is of interest to me.
  
  "Susan Sclafani, vice president of programs for the Pearson Foundation shares insight into the new digital curriculum being developed to adopt the common core standards."

  tags: education podcast news

• Top Education Books of 2011

  American School has named their top education books of 2011. Not sure how it set up this list but there are a few I want to read.

  tags: education news books ebook

• Projects | Civic Learning and Democratic Engagement | A Crucible Moment: College Learning & Democracy's Future

  A report was released on January 10, 2012 about democratic engagement on US college campuses. You can read this and their recommendations on the Association of American Colleges and Universities website. Of course, social media tools, when used well, can facilitate many of these goals.
  
  "The Task Force calls on educators and public leaders to advance a 21st century vision of college learning for all students—a vision with civic learning and democratic engagement an expected part of every student’s college education. The report documents the nation’s anemic civic health and includes recommendations for action that address campus culture, general education, and civic inquiry as part of major and career fields as well as hands-on civic problem solving across differences."

  tags: education news

• SmarTots - We recommend the Best Educational Apps for your Child

  This website for parents gives you app reviews and also reports on what your child is learning in one integrated interface. The concept here is beautiful. No matter what app your child is using, if they use the Smartots platform, you can see what they're learning. I will be testing this, but the concept is an important one. We need accountability for our apps not just our teachers, otherwise, they are a black box with "educational" slapped on them. We have to play them and how many of us are going to spend hours doing that? 

  tags: education news

• News - SparkFun Electronics

  Today is "free day" on sparkfun. If you join, you can possibly get free electronics, circuit boards, etc. on January 11.

  tags: news education free

• Photo of high school senior Sydney Spies deemed too sexy for yearbook in Colorado - NY Daily News

  This young lady is "in to modeling" has her yearbook photos rejected. She's pursuing "self expression" but is she rally seeking the publicity. Her parent says it is "artistic" and "stunning." This is an interesting discussion about what is appropriate. She's going to put it in as an ad in the back. This is interesting as the "censors" are fellow students who say it is not appropriate. We deal with this sort of thing on senior comments but haven't had problems with photos yet. This is an interesting conversation piece.

  tags: education news

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

• BibMe: Fast & Easy Bibliography Maker - MLA, APA, Chicago, Turabian - Free

  A very easy bibliography maker

  tags: education citations

• ISTE Newbie Swag - ISTE Newbie Project

  Here is the official ISTE Newbie site along with Newbie-wear for ISTE 2011.

  tags: education iste11 iste2011

• International Society for Technology in Education - Blog > ISTE Newbie Project Enters Third Year: Help Send an Emerging Ed Tech Leader to ISTE 2011

  This year's ISTE Newbie project has selected George Couros to come to ISTE 2011. What a great selection If you'd like to help, please read more!

  tags: education iste

• Newbie Project | Nebraska Change Agent

  Did you know that Richard Byrne, the writer of free tech for teachers, was the first person sponsored by the ISTE Newbie project. This is such a worthwile project by Beth Still. In Spring 2008 she wanted to see if it was possible for "a regular classroom teacher from Nebraska to leverage the power of Twitter to accomplish a goal." They raised $1500 to send Richard Byrne to NECC.
  
  So many of us in EdTech have benefited from Richard's blog Free Tech 4 Teachers. See what happens when you pay it forward? When you help others?

  tags: education iste

• monsterproject - 2011Monsters

  40 classrooms participated in the monster project this past year! What a great project for younger age students which encourages reading and writing skills while integrating technology in the classroom. Plus it is about monsters! Kids love (or hate them) either way, fun conversations ensue.

  tags: education globalcollaboration flatclassroom all_teachers edu_news

• Online Collaboration

  Lists of tons of global projects for schools.

  tags: education flatclassroom globalcollaboration all_teachers

• Around The World with 80 Schools | About

  Founding in January 2009, this website requires that you be directly involved with students. The challenge is to connect with 80 different classrooms via Skype. Once completed you will be inducted into the hall of fame! Created by Silvia Tolisano.

  tags: education globalcollaboration flatclassroom

• Teacher fired over ‘friending’ - Boston.com

  Teacher fired this may for Friending students.
  
  The School Superintendant, Peter Shafer, said:
  
  "“We have an ethics policy about appropriate boundaries and behavior, and certainly ‘friending’ students on a social network is not an appropriate boundary to cross,’’ Schafer said this week. He declined to reveal the nature of the allegedly inappropriate communication between O’Keefe and the students."
  
  

  tags: education facebook

• Tips from School Improvement Leaders ~ Leading Your School Through a School Improvement Process ~ Process ~ School Improvement in Maryland

  7 pointers on school improvement. Make sure you delve down into the expanded conversation of these 7 down on the webpage.

  tags: education innovation improvement administrator bestpractices

• 5 Keys to Building Real Trust in a Virtual Group « Learning Pursuits Blog

  A nice post about building trust in virtual groups. For those of you teaching online, this is an informative read.

  tags: education cooperativelearning flatclassroom

• Hashtag Fail « Mr. R’s Blogspot 2.0

  Research tags before you use them. This is a perfect example. A youth revival that decided to use the hashtag #LookAtMeNow when tons of people were using it for not so Christian content. You can laugh but people use hashtags all the time. We spent quite a bit of time picking the hashtag for global conversations and popularity has a cost - if a hashtag becomes popular, some spammer will hit it eventually.

  tags: education hashtag

• Global Virtual Classroom: A Free Online Educational Program

  he Global Virtual Classroom (GVC) is a collection of free, online educational activities and resources. It aims to complement the efforts of governments and educators around the world to integrate technology into their classrooms and curricula and to link their schools to the Internet in educationally productive ways.
  
  They have several contest sites.

  tags: education flatclassroom flatclass globalcollaboration

• Copyright Clarity PETE&C 2011

  Kristin Hokanson's presentation about Copyright. She is one of my go-to people because she explains this so well and helps me see how to best teach my students.

  tags: education learning copyright

• Laptops in Schools | wcsh6.com

  A video that includes information about Hannah, an amazing student in Maine who is empowered with change. She is a product of Maine's 1:1 laptop initiative. Cathy Wolinsky from Maine mentioned Hannah's work in her Flat Classroom Certified teacher closing cermonies.

  tags: education flatclassroom globalcollaboration

• Travel in Egypt

  A teacher who travels and takes students "vicariously" with her through her blog. What is ahead for Egypt after the revolution? is their question. Join in!

  tags: education globalcollaboration flatclassroom

• YHS Art - Collaborating and Learning in the 21st Century

  A global collaboration between several classrooms who use art to communicate. Alaska, China, US. Exciting! Presented by CAthy Wolinsky from Maine in our Flat Classroom Certified teacher closing process.

  tags: education art learning

• My Page - Students Helping Students Raise Global Awareness

  A Ning created by some Flat Classroom Certified teachers as they get ready to deploy their global collaborative project.

  tags: education globalcollaboration

• WebStory - blogging starts from here…

  WEbstory is an offline blog edtor that seems to have a lot of people who really like it. I'm looking for a good offline blog editor that will let me do some extra things on my blog.

  tags: education blogging

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

This is the room where DC related service providers (speech pathologist and a school social worker) were assigned to work at Jefferson Junior High School located in SW. I don't think it gets any worse than this. As a WTU Building Representative for citywide teachers and related service providers - I am appalled at what I see. For too long providers have been fighting the battle for appropriate work spaces across this city . Imagine if you will attempting to provide services to special education students in this wholly mess ! Jefferson administrator gets an ' F ' for failing to honor the WTU contract provision which states that all related service providers must be provided an 'appropriate workspace.' Posted by Candi.

The Economist reports:

African scientists feel neglected by their politicians who, they suspect, do not understand that geeks as well as businessmen are crucial to economic development...It is, of course, possible to free-ride on the science and technology of others. But in Africa, as elsewhere, no one knows better than the locals exactly what technology needs to be created, and no one has a greater incentive to create it. Nor need such technology be of the unsophisticated kind often badged as “appropriate” by well-meaning outsiders. Appropriate technology can be very sophisticated indeed.

photo courtesy of the Economist

• Teacher Dude's Grill and BBQ: The ballot or the bullet

  A Martin Luther King, Jr. Lesson plan from my friend @teacherdude in Greece. This is what he does in his class. Make sure you prescreen movies and make sure that age appropriate films are selected. It is interesting how he handles the discussion in the oft tumultuous Greece.

  tags: education teaching martinlutherking

• Care of Magical Creatures

  This is from one of my favorite teachers on Tumblr - magical teacher. Here, she shares an infographic from AOL the "11 Days that Shaped 2011" to use as a writing prompt and suggests that you have students develop their own infographic for their life in 2011. What are the 11 days that shaped your life this year?

  tags: 2011 teaching lessonplans lessonplan

• Kinect Lesson Plan with Body and Brains: Kicking Your Way to Mastering Math | KinectEDucation

  Get this. A lesson plan using Kinect, teaching math, and aligned with common core standards. This includes handouts. For grades 3-6. If you have a kinect at your school, you'll want to follow kinecteducation.com 

  tags: education kinect teaching math_teacher

• Get Statistics About How You Use E-mail to Use E-mail Less - ProfHacker - The Chronicle of Higher Education

  This is a great post with guidance on helping people use email more efficiently. If you use Google apps for domains, the tools that let you analyze your email use will be great. If you teach digital citizenship and literacy, this is a great starting point for teaching about email. No, email is not free, it costs us time. 

  tags: education email productivity teaching

• The New York Times Accidentally Spams More Than 8 Million People

  Oops. Spam makes the best organization look incompetent. Best option is to admit it, make sure it doesn't happen again. I find schools and organizations that don't have a clue about how to send an email (by using blind copy instead of to everyone on the planet) increasingly annoying because there is always someone on the list who doesn't respect the emails of others and starts spamming. 
  
  Use email well in your organization.If you teach digital citizenship, conversations about spam and proper email etiquette should be part of what you teach. This would be a good conversation starter.

  tags: education teaching digiteen digitalcitizenship

• Teens Stand Up as Abolitionists | hollyboardman

  Teacher Holly Boardman has added her voice to the blogosphere. She's doing great work online promoting the cause of abolition and I've enjoyed reading her tweets. Here is a phenomenal overview of how she has integrated this topic into her literature classroom where she uses writing, literature, and the topic of slavery to make literature of all kinds relevant to her students. How can you make literature relevant and do the world a service? Take a read of Holly's blog.

  tags: education slavery abolition literature_teacher teaching

• Resources for teaching about the Titanic

  January also includes the 100 year anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic. Start on this page and on the left you can drill down by age to find the appropriate resources for the age of your students. (You may have to log in to be able to do this. You'll need a free account.)

  tags: education titanic teaching

• Martin Luther King, Jr. Resources

  Several lesson plans and activities for Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday, coming up in January. This is one of my go to places for resources online. Contribute what you're doing so others can download them. (there is also a download contest right now so you can share a great idea and win as well.)
  
  Lots of good ideas including assemblies from UNICEF, videos, and an analysis of his "I have a dream" speech to use in your speech class.

  tags: education teaching

• Recycling Christmas cards - Resources - TES

  Ideas to recycle Christmas cards. Use those lovely cards in your classroom instead of buying new paper in January and promote an awareness of taking care of the earth.

  tags: education teaching recycling lesson plans all_teachers

• Essay Writing Toolkit - Resources - TES

  If you teach essay writing, you'll want to download this powerpoint toolkit. It is a new resource just uploaded to Tes on December 9th. If you teach writing, you'll see a lot of information here.
  
  "A comprehensive guide to essay writing. The toolkit contains over 50 activities to help students improve their essays, as well as a wealth of other information, ideas and links. All aspects of essay writing are covered."

  tags: education teaching literature_teacher essays literature

• Distracted Driving | One Text or Call Could Wreck it All | Distraction.gov for Teens

  A website targeted to teens about distracted driving. It starts with a test to see how long you can keep your eyes and mind on the road. A great site for health classes or driversed. It is a bit tricky because it tricks you into doing something you might not should do but it does make a point. some kids will say it is lame but it is a start.

  tags: teaching health_teacher cellphone

• VoiceThread iOS App for itouch/ipad + Posterous - Be the Change

  So, you want to use digital storytelling in the classroom. Here Beth Sanders writes about what she is doing with the voicethread app. Some great classroom ideas here.

  tags: education teaching digitalstorytelling

• STEM Research Program for Teachers Accepting Applications -- THE Journal

  The Siemens' STEM program for teachers is an outstanding program for Science, Technology, and math teachers. I highly recommend this program as I've been there for a one day part of their program at Discovery Headquarters and, as always, the work Discovery did was outstanding. You can apply by February 9th. 

  tags: education stem teaching science_teacher

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

rack and pinion gears

"...The Gratis Foundation exists to promote industrialization by developing and disseminating technology to industry,particularly small and medium-scale enterprises...it evolved out of the Ghana Regional Appropriate Technology Industrial Service...To accomplish this mandate, GRATIS established Intermediate Technology Transfer Units (ITTUs) now designated Regional Technology Transfer Centres (RTTCs) in nine regions of Ghana to transfer appropriate technologies to small-scale industrialists through training, manufacturing and the supply of machine tools, plants and equipment..."-website

Bill Turque of the Washington Post did a story based on my blog. While I appreciate the coverage of this issue- The Post incorrectly published that The Washington Teacher had reported that Dr. Phyllis Harris was fired. Correction: The Washington Teacher reported that un-named sources confirmed that Dr. Harris got the official boot. Be that as it may- thanks for reporting Bill on an even greater issue- students with disabilities DO NOT have special education teachers and educational aides in many city-wide schools. Garfield and Ferebee Hope are just the tip of the iceberg. Unfortunately Mr. Turque failed to mention many of the other schools in which there are numerous complaints. Service providers and others continue to act in the role of educational aides and substitute teachers. I have posted Sunday's Post article in its entirety for all to read.

Special Ed Chief Takes Leave of Absence Departure Comes Amid Judge's and Teachers' Criticisms of Services for Special Needs Students

By Bill Turque, Washington Post Staff Writer - Sunday, September 14, 2008; Page C04

The D.C. school system's deputy chancellor for special education, Phyllis Harris, has taken a leave of absence for unspecified reasons. Dena Iverson, a spokeswoman for Schools Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee , said personnel regulations prohibited her from discussing the nature of Harris's leave, which began Tuesday. She did deny a report, posted Wednesday on the blog The Washington Teacher, that Harris had been fired. Efforts to reach Harris at her office and home this week were unsuccessful. Her leave comes less than two weeks after a federal judge admonished the District for its lack of progress in serving children with learning disabilities and physical or behavioral challenges.

On Sept. 3, U.S. District Judge Paul L. Friedman said the District was failing to comply with a 2006 court order to eliminate a backlog of cases involving hundreds of schoolchildren waiting for special education services. The order was part of a settlement of a class-action lawsuit, Blackman v. District of Columbia, brought by parents seeking help for their children.

The District has almost 11,000 special education students, including about 2,300 who have been placed in private schools at taxpayers' expense because the city cannot meet their needs. Friedman, responding to a report by court-appointed monitors, also said the District's approach seemed disorganized. "My fundamental problem here is the lack of accountability, lack of coordination, lack of oversight, a lack of specific people who are rolling up their sleeves to get the job done," Friedman said. He said he planned to order Rhee and State Superintendent of Education Deborah A. Gist to return and explain in more detail how they were addressing the problem.

Harris's leave also comes amid complaints from teachers that special education programs at several schools are suffering from staff shortages. Instructors have told the Washington Teachers' Union that at several schools, including Garfield and Ferebee-Hope elementary schools in Southeast Washington, that special education classes lack certified instructors. In some cases, union officials said, social workers are working as substitute teachers in classes for emotionally disturbed children. Iverson said Rhee's office was working to fix the problems. "The chancellor has made it a priority to have appropriate staffing in every classroom," Iverson said Friday. "We . . . expect to be at appropriate levels shortly."

Rhee named Harris, previously a special education coordinator for the Oakland, Calif., school system, to the deputy post last fall. Despite her current title, much of the significant work on compliance with the requirements of the Blackman lawsuit was actually led by another top Rhee aide, Richard Nyankori, according to court monitors Amy Totenberg and Clarence J. Sundram.Harris did not respond to requests for an interview after the monitors' report was filed Aug. 28. Asked again at the Sept. 3 hearing, Harris told a reporter, "Call me in a month." Posted by Candi.

Kofi Akosah-Sarpong writes:
Prof. Ali Mazrui’s address at the 30th anniversary celebration of the Dakar, Senegal-based CODESRIA on the theme “Intellectuals, Nationalism and the Pan-African Ideal” reveals the growing talks, African-wide, about the implications of the African culture and the continent’s development process. The central theme of Mazrui, currently Chancellor of Kenya’s Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology, address is twofold. Why African intellectuals are mediocre and why this informs their inability to appropriate Pan-Africanism ideals into Africa’s development process. I would prefer why African elites have not being able to appropriate African cultural values into Africa’s development process as other elites in other parts of the world have done in their development process.

Using the East African region as a continental reference, Mazrui, known globally as one of Africa’s leading thinkers, reveals how undemocratic political climates undermined Africa’s intellectual growth, and how, by extension, this impacted on the continent’s development process. Unlike other ex-colonies, such as Japan, of which Mazrui used greatly as an example to show how African elites failed to match their Western education with their African values in both their intellectual development and the continent’s progress, the trouble with African elites and the continent’s development process is that, the elites play with ideas are not informed by Africa’s innate, indigenous values or ideas by rather the Western ideas that they have had in formal schools.

Mazrui himself shows this contradicting and confusing state of the African elites in this statement: “Uganda had for Head of Government a person who had changed his name because of admiration of the author of the great English poem, Paradise Lost. Obote became Milton Obote out of admiration of John Milton.” While in the spirit of universal intellectuality Obote could admire Milton, his admiration for a non-African poet and the fact that he is a Head of State, may have let Ugandan and African youth to admire more non-African elites than indigenous Ugandan and African elites. The central issue here is role model, values, and inspiration in the development process. In this sense, Obote did not deeply help the growth of African values and her progress. If Obote had done so, and by implications of Mazrui’s own account of the mediocrity of African intellectuals, and greatly touted a non-African value not because he was educated in Western paradigms but, like most African elites, because either he did not understand African values deeply enough or was mesmerized by Western values or did not respect African values or was confused about African values in relations to the continent’s progress.

Still, Mazrui’s argument that “The capacity to be curious and fascinated by ideas has to start early in the educational process. The spirit of intellectualism has to be nourished from primary school onwards, but it can die at the university level if mediocrity prevails,” reveals that the problem of Africa’s intellectual growth is not only at the university level but also at the primary school level; where the values, images and examples which are heavily European-centred are formed. So, if the African primary education system is heavily Western structured, it flows and grows to the high school level, and then later to the university level; thus sowing a culture of mediocrity, in terms of African values not predominantly dictating the intellectual life of the African child early enough. It is in this sense, that Ghana’s Dr. Y.K. Amoako, the former UN Economic Commission for Africa executive secretary, has observed that Africa is the only region in the world where foreign development paradigms dominate her development process. Not only does this indicate that Africa’s development process is not “culturally close” to Africans, but also a revelation that African elites are mediocre in both their intellectualizing and their direction of the continent’s progress.

This has made the African elite mediocre in their own innate environment and in their development process struggles. The mediocrity has come about because Africa’s elites do not think deeply from within Africa’s values first and the enabling aspects of their colonial legacies second in the continent’s development process. Mazrui himself testify of the Japanese elites doing so in their country’s development process. “In this connection it is worth bearing in mind important differences between the westernization of Africa and the modernization of Japan after the Meiji Restoration of 1868. Japan’s original modernization involved considerable selectivity on the part of the Japanese themselves (“Western Technique, Japanese Spirit”). The whole purpose of selective Japanese westernization was to protect Japan against the West, rather than merely to submit to western cultural attractions. The emphasis in Japan was therefore on the technical and technological techniques of the West, rather than on literary and verbal culture. The Japanese slogan of “western technique, Japanese spirit” at the time captured this ambition to borrow technology from the West while deliberately protecting a substantial part of Japanese culture. In a sense, Japan’s technological westernization was designed to reduce the danger of other forms of cultural dependency.”

This process should starts from childhood to adulthood based on a curriculum skillfully cast in African values first and any other borrowed ones second; more especially, in preparing African elites’ minds at an earlier stage: from primary and high schools levels. It is in this process that African elites, from their early formation to their university crystallization, will be “culturally close” to the African society, will be culturally close to the African’s progress in the continent’s development journey. By not being culturally close to the African society, African elites could not undertake the Japanese cultural selectivity in relations to their colonial legacies and the enabling aspects of the global culture, and, have, therefore, become both heavily technologically and culturally dependent upon the Western world despite their superb innate culture having huge technological and cultural values for progress. Writes Mazrui, “The nature of westernization in Africa has been very different. Far from emphasizing western productive technology and reducing western life-styles and verbal culture, Africa has reversed the Japanese order of emphasis. Among the factors which have facilitated this reversal has been the role of the African university as a vehicle of Western influence on African culture.”

The challenge for African elites today is how to overturn the contradiction they have caused in Africa’s progress by thinking first from within African values first, by matching African values with the enabling aspects of their colonial legacies and the global values, and by intellectually linking this “to the wider world of scholarship and science.”

Over the last several days, I have been battling with liberals on the internet who want to score political points with the awful tragedy in Arizona. I have been trolling on many different sites, commenting and battling comments on my comments, trying to communicate that it is wrong to try to politicize this awful tragedy- that it was not a conservative who committed it, that it wasn't Sarah Palin, that it wasn't tea party people, etc. Today, I finally felt that the conversation was changing and that those who had made those arguments had lost credibility and respect such that they would cease and desist with using the killings of innocent people to engage in character assassinations of people they don't agree with politically, and then I read the following article in Slate from Jacob Weisberg that was published today.

In The Tea Party and the Tucson Tragedy: How anti-government, pro-gun, xenophobic populism made the Giffords shooting more likely Weisberg writes:

There's something offensive, as well as pointless, about the politically charged inquiry into what might have been swirling inside the head of Jared Loughner. We hear that the accused shooter read The Communist Manifesto and liked flag-burning videos—good news for the right. Wait—he was a devotee of Ayn Rand and favored the gold standard, so he was a right-winger after all. Some assassinations embody an ideology, however twisted. Based on what we know so far, the Tucson killings look like more like politically tinged schizophrenia.

Let's start with this paragraph. Weisberg first establishes that Loughner has a lot of typical liberal views, such as his belief in wealth redistribution and  supporting free speech over honoring the American flag, to which I could add that the sicko also bought other views associated with liberals like the 9/11 Truther argument and opposition to drug control, and we should probably add to that list that in high school he was characterized as being very much liberal, and apparently enthusiastically supported Democrat Obama in the 2008 election.

But then Weisberg submits as evidence that the sicko was 'right wing' that he read Ayn Rand and favored the gold standard. Is that indeed evidence of 'right-wing' views- the wringings of a libertarian who disliked the traditional social structure and supported abortion? And apparently the nutjob shooter's preference for a gold standard wasn't because he wanted a more stable and solid fiscal system, but was because he thought that elites in the government (likely right-wing elites) really controlled the monetary supply in our nation and he wanted to fight against that. The evidence is not very strong at all that the nutjob was a conservative- the evidence that he is a liberal is considerably stronger. But for now I'm going to be nice and just go with what he registered as and call him an 'Independent'. Let's continue with the article that Slate published...

It is appropriate, however, to consider what was swirling outside Loughner's head. To call his crime an attempted assassination is to acknowledge that it appears to have had a political and not merely a personal context. That context wasn't Islamic radicalism, Puerto Rican independence, or anarcho-syndicalism. It was the anti-government, pro-gun, xenophobic populism that flourishes in the dry and angry climate of Arizona. Extremist shouters didn't program Loughner, in some mechanistic way, to shoot Gabrielle Giffords. But the Tea Party movement did make it appreciably more likely that a disturbed person like Loughner would react, would be able to react, and would not be prevented from reacting, in the crazy way he did.

Here is where the utter derangement of liberal bloggers like Weisberg is demonstrated. Weisberg says that since what was going on inside Loughner's head wasn't important (which I disagree with), we should instead blame what was going on inside of his head. To do so though would be beyond foolish though, because by all accounts, Loughberg was increasingly withdrawing from the world around him (the world that Weisberg characterizes as increasingly conservative) and was focusing more on his dreaming and sleeping and philosophizing and smoking pot. As he became increasingly isolated and along and unconnected to the world around him, the world around him returned to conservative values- based on that information, you could definitively assert that it was not the increasingly conservative views of Arizona that affected him, but rather his past liberal views and the liberal environment of 2006-2009 that shaped and formed him and then left him to float away and disconnect from a world that went conservative in 2010. Let's continue with the article though, since this liberal blogger just gets more and more wrong with each statement that he writes...

At the core of the far right's culpability is its ongoing attack on the legitimacy of U.S. government—a venomous campaign not so different from the backdrop to the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995. Then it was focused on "government bureaucrats" and the ATF. This time it has been more about Obama's birth certificate and health care reform. In either case, it expresses the dangerous idea that the federal government lacks valid authority. It is this, rather than violent rhetoric per se, that is the most dangerous aspect of right-wing extremism.

Often the two issues are blurred together, because if government is illegitimate, rebellion is an appropriate response (hence the Colonial costumes). Conservative entertainers like Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin like to titillate their audiences with hints of justified violence, including frequent reminders that they are armed and dangerous. Palin went so far as to put a target on someone who subsequently got shot. Whether or not the man who fired the gun was inspired by Palin isn't the point. The point is that you shouldn't paint targets on people, even in metaphor, or jest.

Did you all follow the logic for this liberal? Oklahoma bombing to birth certificate to climate of violence to assassination of Congresswomen? Really? That's what he is committing to? I would contend that he is simply grabbing unrelated examples that he cherry-picks from history to prove his point, rather than evidence pointing him towards a conclusion.

On a related note, I play a game with my US history students where I ask them to time-travel back to 1776 and pick which side of the US Revolution they would be on- the Colonists or the British. Myself, seeing how much I love liberty and freedom, I'd side with the Colonists. Weisberg and other liberals though would likely side with the British- look at how he constructed his argument above- he thinks that rebelling against government is an illegitimate response to misuse of government power and that the Colonists were examples of this. He's a Loyalist! I'd suggest tar and feathering the guy if it wasn't now frowned on to joke about violence.

The next parts of his editorial are simply reasons why the government should take our guns from us- we'll skip over that for now and simply go to his conclusion-

Again, none of this says that Tea Party caused the Tucson tragedy, only that its politics increased the odds of something like it happening. It was in criticizing writers on his own side for their naivete about communism that George Orwell wrote, "So much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot." Today it is the right that amuses itself with violent chat and proclaims an injured innocence when its flammable words blow up.

Again, in his editorial that was published by Slate he didn't write any even slightly convincing arguments that connects the Tucson tragedy with anything related to conservative politics, the tea party, the right-wing, or anything related to those. Orwell's quote is a great one to bring up here, because much of what left-wing Weisburg wrote was simply baseless accusations that sounded good (ie, fire) being thrown around by someone who don't even have a clue what they are writing about.