From the website:
The DeepRoots scholarship recipients, two-thirds of whom are girls, excel academically at their local schools, but unfortunately lack the financial resources to continue their education. A Deep Roots Scholarship makes it possible for them to go to school.
Obviously, if you're reading this, you're no stranger to blogs and the blogging process. But do you use blogs in your classroom?
Blogging in the classroom has the potential to impact you, your students, and your students' families in a HUGE way. There are also ways to blog that involve the entire school. It's a form of communication, of social networking, and of expressing ideas (all all practicing practical reading, writing, and technology skills). I am a firm advocate for blogging in the classroom! Read on to see why.
Benefits of Blogging in the Classroom
The Madhvani Foundation's underlying goal:
...is to maintain and promote scientific and technical education among the people of Uganda. The scholarship programme is aimed at benefiting Ugandans pursuing either undergraduate or graduate studies at University level in Uganda...they are looking for graduates with vision;individuals who are able to perceive the path to Uganda's future and who not only want to travel the road but also actively participate in its development.
Liam Julian reviews James Tooley's The Beautiful Tree:
In slums around the world, from Lagos, Nigeria and Nairobi, Kenya to rural villages in Ghana and China and places in between, Tooley has discovered poor people opening small private schools that offer alternatives to dismal or inaccessible public education. The schools charge only pennies a day, and most also provide scholarships to orphans or children of the indigent. One in five students in the Hyderabad slums, for example, attends a private school on some kind of need-based scholarship. Whether in Kibera (Kenya) or Gansu (China), these schools all seem to boast committed and punctual teachers, efficient and attentive owners, and satisfied parents...[continue reading]
Tata is also held together by a common culture that has been marinating for 140 years. Employees love to tell tales of how Tata got the better of the British overlords. They also love to point out that Tata created many of India’s greatest institutions, such as the Indian Institute of Science, the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research and the Tata Memorial Hospital. Reverence for Jamsetji Tata, the group’s founder, borders on ancestor worship: his ever-present busts are garlanded with fresh flowers daily. On March 3rd thousands marched through the streets of Jamshedpur, as they do every year, to celebrate his birthday.More here
Aziza Brahim was in exile even before she was born. In 1976, her heavily pregnant mother fled to a refugee camp in Tindouf when Morocco annexed the land where she lived. Azizas family comes from El Aaiun, the capital of the former Spanish colony of Western Sahara. Aziza never met her father, who stayed behind in the occupied city.At the age of 11, she received a scholarship to study in Cuba but left school when she turned 18 to pursue a musical career. Aziza has never forgotten her roots and she returned to the camps, not as a 19-year-old musical ingnue, but as a voice for the Saharawis, a people fighting for independence.
Image courtesy of Freedom to Create
Aziza embodies the new voice of the Saharawis. Her songs evoke exile, the right to freedom and human rights. She dedicates all her songs to her peoples struggle. Her song titles are evocative: Peace, Son of the Clouds, The Battle of Guelta, Memory of the Tank, and Return, a tribute to the Saharawis pursuit of self-determination and independence. She has been nominated for an album of her songs, Mi Canto.
Students are already peer reviewing each other's work using kibin.
Flat Classroom brings world closer - Pelican Press
Another great local press coverage of how our amazing Flat Classroom teachers are collaborating. This is a story that our communities are hungry for. Social media is great but social learning is transformational. The best teachers are attracted to the Flat Classroom projects - apply now at www.flatclassroomproject.net
The 35 Best Web 2.0 Classroom Tools Chosen By You - Edudemic
Awesome! RT @FlyontheCWall for later: The 35 Best Web 2.0 Classroom Tools Chosen By You : http://ht.ly/5CXkW #5thchat
College Readiness with Knewton's Adaptive Learning Platform™
Colleges are struggling because incoming students aren't ready for the rigors of college. Here is a clip of a press release about how some colleges are using Knewton.
"Today, educational technology company Knewton announced that its award-winning Adaptive Learning PlatformÔ has been selected by Penn State University (PSU), University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV), the State University of New York (SUNY), and Mount St. Mary’s University to power college readiness courses that will help condition incoming students for the rigors of college-level academics and identify and address academic areas of improvement for each student. Recognizing the successful implementation of blended learning at ASU, both state universities with large student bodies like SUNY, Penn State, and UNLV, and small selective private universities like Mount St. Mary’s are turning toward Knewton’s Adaptive Learning PlatformÔ to power their college readiness programs.
College preparedness continues to be an issue that impacts students across the nation and can hinder a student’s chance of completing a four-year university program. According to the Alliance for Excellence in Education, 50 percent of students who enter college remediation programs fail to reach graduation. "
Create, Share and Learn with a Global Repository of Tests
Online test site for homework or review. Let the computer do what it does best.
Digital Scholastic is free for the rest of this summer and is being marketed for your IWB. Looks like some interesting content.
The Kids Are Ready | Classroom Applications
Nice write up on how Brad Flickinger is running his elementary classroom with a lot of high-quality technology equipment where the students serve as mentors for each other. Love this model.
Hat tip: Robert Madden
Multimedia Learning Resources - Educaplay
There are some free activities here but this is a tool to develop multimedia activities for LMS systems. It is in beta.
This website helps US public schools install and pay for solar power.
Best College Scholarships and Grants. Compare, reviews & ratings.
Search tool to help you find the best scholarships online. With a high school junior, I'll be working here.
Website by a 17 year old high school students in a Silicon Valley incubator. Looks interesting. "Find and share notes with your friends."
If we don't help them share - they will. If they learn is it cheating?
Educator Application « 140 Character Conference
Got a note that if you want to go to the 140 character conference for education and are an educator you can attend for $1.40. Here is the application, it is coming up August 2/3rd.
"Your readers / subscribers may join us for a special price of $1.40 (seriously) if they apply here and prove they are part of the education community. Otherwise, participation is $140.00 for the two-day event. "
DEN Research | Discovery Education
Membership study of Discovery Educators network and the impact on their professional development. While I have just become someone that you CAN book through Discovery for speaking (to be on their website soon) I do learn a lot from DEN.
Global World History Project: And We're Off...
A teacher is working on a global world history project and is looking for friends and partners. If you teach history in high school, he's looking for more partners.
Beginners » The Krazy Coupon Lady
This isn't related to teaching but IS related to managing a household and saving money. I have some friends who are going crazy about how the krazy coupon lady is saving money. Times are tight and I think my teacher friends out there will like this website.
Design presentations automatically - VisualBee PowerPoint plugin
Visual bee looks at the words and text on your slides and helps "soup up" your powerpoint presentation for you. There is a free plug in for PowerPoint. If you've gotta use it, perhaps some of the intelligence in here would be beneficial for you
Apps are emerging like marble jar to help give children rewards and promote long term behavior improvements. This may work for some kids. I prefer the hug and kiss method myself. ;-)
Museum of Science and Industry | About The Museum | Press | Month at the Museum 2
I love this! Apply to spend a month at the museum and win $10,000 in the process. Here is the info:
"The Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago is once again holding a nationwide search for a live-in roommate for Month at the Museum 2, an innovative experiment where one curious and adventurous individual will have full reign of the Museum for 30 days and win $10,000. Last year’s roommate captured the imagination of people around the world. "
How to Send a Direct or Private Message on Google+ ~ LockerGnome Social Media & Technology
(Hat Tip to Danita Russell for sending this to me)
Here is how you private message people on Google+
Philips' Luminous Wallpaper Will Create the Mood Lighting of the Future | Popular Science
Excited about the LED wallpaper and the potential it has for making learning spaces more powerful and engaging. This self-luminating wallpaper takes "mood lighting" to a whole new level.
Cool article on 3D printing in the classroom. There are so many great applications for this! I'm excited it is finally coming.
Hat tip for this one to the president of our tech support contractor, Paul Blough from Bloughtech - great company to work with.
Kids News and News Articles for Kids - GoGoNews -
"Big news for little people" this website is targeted news for kids aged 7-14 and may be something you can use in your classroom. What a fascinating discussion you could have about July 13th's topic the "crazy basketball court."
A childhood obesity program centering around some really cute puppets. These guys are cute. They have a program you can use in health class too.
From Straightline Films"....Increasing the number of female teachers in rural schools can lead to an increase the number of girls enrolled. So the Girls' Education Project through a trainee teacher scholarship programme is encouraging more women into the classroom...[continue reading]
via NaijaBlog
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Open Access News reports that:
This project will take the work of AJOL [African Journals Online] to the next level, by assisting those journals that wish to move to online management and publishing of their contents, using subscription and/or open access models in print and/or online editions. Online publication will lead to a far greater circulation and contribution of this scholarship (than the 3,000 documents delivered by photocopy by INASP). This project will also build on INASP’s tradition of delivering publishing workshops in Africa each year, which includes an introduction to Open Journal Systems. This project will form the basis of a new initiative, located in Africa and directed by an African researcher, aimed at helping African research libraries support scholarly publishing, with an eye to supplying AJOL with complete journal contents.
Michigan lame-duck Democratic Governor Jennifer Granholm lately has been burnishing her credentials to work in the Obama administration when she is done being Michigan's governor. She already has demonstrated that she can take a successful state and utterly destroy it and drive all of the commerce out of it with high taxes and high regulation, so Obama already had his eye on her, even considering her for the Secretary of Commerce position when he first became President. Now Granholm needs to demonstrate her radical side, so she is opening up her copy of Saul Alinsky's Rules for Radicals and becoming more radical (I assume she has a copy of Alinksky's book- if not, her friends in the NEA or Obama could giver her one- they have plenty of copies).
Rule #2 of being a radical is "Never go outside the expertise of your people." If you are going to organize young people, do it around an issue that they are concerned about and know a lot about, such as a scholarship that they were working towards. So Granholm is now organizing the students of our state, promising that if they pressure politicians and voters to raise taxes again in our state that maybe she'll restore funding for the Promise Grants to college students that she cut.
She addressed about 150 students at a rally in front of the Administration Building at Michigan State University, flanked by university officials and student activists. "I stand with you, but I can't do it by myself," Granholm said.
Rule #1 of a radical is "Power is not only what you have, but what the enemy thinks you have." College kids don't have money, but there are a lot of them, and they are living in a bubble of liberal education where they don't pay any bills, so if you can get them motivated and organizing, then that type of community can put pressure to enact radical policies.
Rule #5 is "Ridicule is man's most potent weapon." Granholm employs ridicule often, ripping into Republicans for 'breaking the promise' even though she was the one who cut the funding for the Promise Grants. She mocks Republicans, says mean things about them, and then pretends like it is the Republicans who are playing partisan games.
Next on the list for Granholm is to "Keep the pressure on and use different tactics and actions and use all events of the period for your purpose." (Rule 8). Granholm really does not care that much about the Promise Grant- what she really wants is to raise taxes. Her mthods and tactics are going to change, but she is going to work every angle that she can think of to try to raise taxes on Michigan's residents, above and beyond the already giant tax increases that she has pushed through during her time as Governor. She feels that if she can raise more revenue for the government and then redistribute that revenue to the correct people, she personally can revive the economy. So she takes more and more money for residents, funneling it into her pet projects like Cool Cities or Wind Turbines, and then when residents flee the state or lose jobs, she needs to squeeze the rock harder to wring more tax money out of it. Her goal is to fund government, and she will use whatever tactic she needs to use, even manipulating college kids by organizing them in rallies about the Promise Grants.
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.”
