New teaching techniques and learning technology top the agenda at this fall’s conference of the National Council for the Social Studies. Technology is quickly becoming a popular tool in social studies classrooms as teachers find ways to make history come alive for their students, who simultaneously learn about content and improve their technology skills, says […]
Atlanta’s film industry has in recent years boomed to third place behind Los Angeles and New York City, and incoming studios noted a major skills gap when looking for videographers, scene constructors, prop creators and costume designers. Leaders of Fulton County Schools in Georgia responded. Three years ago, administrators met with studio executives to develop […]
Four years of development in Michigan has produced an arts platform where educators can share a curriculum and better methods for assessing student work. The instructional materials align with state and national standards, including the Every Student Succeeds Act, which emphasizes the arts as part of a “well-rounded education.” Arts can teach students valuable soft […]
By revamping the much-maligned No Child Left Behind law of 2001 with the Every Student Succeeds Act in 2015, the federal government gives states more control over their own school accountability standards. Under ESSA, lawmakers maintained annual NCLB testing. But teachers’ unions had sought to eliminate the “highly qualified teachers” provision, which ESSA did. It’s […]
A third-grader studying the Spanish settlement of California found a virtual tour online and shared the trip with her classmates by slipping a smartphone into a Google Cardboard viewing device. Such limitless online resources represent a big, blended leap beyond the essays students in Coalinga-Huron USD in Central California used to write. Blended learning for […]
Many districts teach formal keyboarding instruction as early as second grade—a shift that requires new approaches to a skill that was once taught only in high school. Today’s software feature gamification, captivating graphics and extensive reporting components. Many districts teach formal keyboarding instruction as early as second grade—a shift that requires new approaches to a skill […]
Advances in interactive display technology expand the ability for teachers and students to collaborate in the classroom as evermore powerful mobile devices are used to share content. Advances in interactive display technology expand the ability for teachers and students to collaborate in the classroom as evermore powerful mobile devices are used to share content. “The […]
For a few weeks in early 2016, a computer program helped educators teach the finer points of writing to students in a Fort Worth ISD high school. Like so many schools nationwide, R.L. Paschal High School—under pressure from new state standards—has been working hard to improve writing instruction so students can express their ideas and […]
Recommended books offer ideas for makerspace activities, insight into online teaching, a behind-the-scenes look at reform and philanthropy, and methods for teaching steam in elementary school. Meaningful Making:Projects and Inspirations for Fab Labs and Makerspaces Constructing Modern Knowledge Press From the Transformative Learning Technologies Lab at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Education comes this compendium […]
When Heidi Sipe, superintendent of Oregon’s poor, rural Umatilla School District, asks her elementary-age students what they want to be when they grow up, she no longer gets the answers she once did: football player, firefighter, nurse. Now the students tell her they want to be engineers. Sipe attributes the change to the district’s four-year-old […]
