As we gear up to go back to school I’ve seen a lot of blog posts and Twitter conversations about assessment at schools. Specifically, how do you organize your assessment vs. your colleagues/another school/another district/etc. I’ve read a lot of posts in this topic before and it always made me think about my own personal views of assessment and, as a result, I’ve changed aspects to better represent my understanding of fair and appropriate assessment. Unknown Title. (Accessed 2015). Uploaded by Vera Teschow. Available online at: http://www.verateschow.ca/assessment.html Lately, however, these posts have not been making me think… Read More
Student-Led Back To School Kick-Offs
Last year myself and another colleague took over the supervision of our school’s Student Council. After being involved in student council myself for over 9 years, at the high school and post secondary levels, I was thrilled to have an opportunity to help out our students as they made their voices heard at our school. To be honest, it was a rocky start…. positive… but rocky. Both my colleague and I were new to the school so we still unaware of many of the school traditions and schedules that the student body and staff expected of us. Furthermore,… Read More
What If We Cared About School As Much As We Care About Sports?
Have you seen this video that debuted last week from Key & Peele & Comedy Central?? While obviously created for comedic purposes I think this video raises a lot of good questions: – How would our jobs change if the public was as financially and emotionally invested in education as they were in sports? – Would the quality of education increase or decrease? – What type of teaching methods/curriculum/resources would become the “norm” for classrooms? – Why is education so often pushed to the back-burner for a lot of citizens? _________________________________________________ What do you think?
August Currently
If you haven’t encountered a “Currently” post before, it is just a fun post at the beginning of each month that serves as a way to share what is Currently going on in your life! You can link up and share your own “Currently” post by visiting the wonderful Farley over at Oh’ Boy 4th Grade.
Digital Literacy and the ICT Curriculum
As members of the future workforce and society, today’s students require guidance and education, in order to successfully navigate and utilize the digital world that they were born into. Acknowledging the importance of becoming digitally literate, the provincial and territorial governments of Canada have been developing various forms of information and communication technology (ICT) curricula, which will assist students in their skill development. School-age children have a unique set of experiences awarded to them due to the digital age in which they were born. However, their birth date alone is not sufficient to equip them for navigating the digital world… Read More
Why a Fishbowl?
In the fall of 2011 I began my teaching journey when I started my Bachelor of Education (After Degree) at a small rural university in Manitoba, Canada. While social studies was my primary teachable (and still my subject-area of choice) I immediately became fascinated with technology and the implications it could have on education. As part of my new years resolution for 2012 I began blogging at Miss L’s Whole Brain Teaching as a means of exploring different educational tech tools, growing my own PLN, and learning more about specific teaching methods. I never imagined what… Read More
Welcome to my New Adventure!
Hello! Is anyone here to read this yet?! After being a regular blogger at Miss L’s Whole Brain Teaching since 2012, I have been struggling with the fact that I have not shared anything since the very beginning of this year. Yes, you read that right, a 6+ month hiatus after being a 15+ post a month kind of gal. If you had an opportunity to read my “Moving On” post at the old local, however, I did mention that I had a good reason for my hiatus. *Que announcement music* “Baby T” is currently 35 weeks along!… Read More
The Social Media Debate: Should Schools Be Using Social Media To Connect with the Community?
“The first step in building strong relationships in schools is the first step for building any strong relationships: talk to each other. The more we communicate our hopes, desires, and needs within the school system, the more ideas and solutions we will have to discuss, the more plans we will have to put into action, and the more support and enthusiasm we will have for seeing those plans through.”[1]Communication is essential for building and maintaining relationships with school stakeholders, but how can schools easily communicate information to the masses without it becoming a time-consuming task?… Read More
The Four Critical Digital Skills We Are Failing to Teach Our Students
“… Young people as a whole have enthusiastically integrated a variety of networked media into their daily lives, and can text, upload photos and blog with relative ease. However, using media effortlessly isn’t necessarily the same thing as using it well. Young people are mistakenly considered experts in digital technologies because they’re so highly connected, but they are still lacking many essential digital literacy skills.”[1]Classrooms are now filled with students that, from a generational standpoint, are coined, digital natives; born into the age of digital technology and familiar with computers and the internet from an early age.[2] Does an increase… Read More
Charlie Appelstein: No Such Thing As A Bad Kid
On Friday all of “T-Division’s” teaching staff and EAs had the opportunity to attend a PD session with Charlie Appelstein; a youth-care specialist, author, and father. Being that we are now into December, and only have a short ten days until the Christmas break, I was apprehensive about attending a PD session when there is so much to do in so little time left. On the other hand, classroom energy is always high at this time of year so it was nice to have a day away to think and recharge! Mr. Appelstein was an incredibly entertaining presenter… Read More