Why Schools Shouldn’t Block YouTube

February 25, 2015

youtube-in-schools

I use YouTube across the curriculum. From supporting me in teaching a writing skill or a math concept, YouTube is invaluable. It pains me to hear that it is banned in many schools. Whilst I understand that not everything on YouTube is appropriate for kids, as long as there is proper supervision taking place, I believe the good outweighs the bad. The following are some compelling reasons for embracing YouTube as a learning tool:

1. YouTube is a fresh and engaging way of learning. Think about how much better it is teaching poetry with poetry recitals from some of our best known and respected performers, rather than just the classroom teacher!

2. It allows teachers to broadcast class movies under a safe, privately locked format.

3. Teachers can compile playlists full of great educational clips for their students to enjoy.

4. YouTube is brilliant at helping us troubleshoot. Whether it is learning how to use a computer program, cook a recipe or edit a movie, YouTube is a visual tool for helping us all develop new skill sets.

 

Click on the link to read iPads are Not the Solution

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Click on the link to read The Must Have iPad Apps for the Classroom

Click on the link to read Using Videogames in the Classroom

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Long Lost Dr. Seuss Book Set for Release

February 24, 2015

WHAT-PET-SHOULD-I-GET

What a treat! I can’t wait to read this to my son:

 

Oh, the places Dr. Seuss will go again!

He may have died in 1991, but beloved children’s author Dr. Seuss — real name was Ted Geisel — has a new book on the way.

Titled What Pet Should I Get?, Seuss’ book will be released in July and stars the same brother and sister duo from his 1960 classic One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish. This time, the children are deciding on a pet based on its looks — and how easily its name rhymes.

Seuss’ widow, Audrey Geisel, originally found the materials for the book in 1991. She re-discovered them in 2013, at which point she handed them over to Random House, his longtime publisher.

“While undeniably special, it is not surprising to me that we found this because Ted always worked on multiple projects and started new things all the time — he was constantly writing and drawing and coming up with ideas for new stories,” Geisel said in a press release. “It is especially heartwarming for me as this year also marks twenty-five years since the publication of the last book of Ted’s career, Oh, the Places You’ll Go!”

As for when Seuss actually wrote What Pet Should I Get?, his former art director Cathy Goldsmith believes it was some point between 1958 and 1962, roughly the same time as One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish. She’ll oversee the editorial and creative process of prepping the new book for publication.

“My connection to Ted remains as vital as it was when we worked closely together years ago,” she said in the press release. “I know he is looking down, watching over the process, and I feel a tremendous responsibility to do everything just as he would have done himself.”

When reached for comment, Random House spokeswoman Lydia Finn said, “We are so excited about it!”

Hey, who isn’t?

 

Click on the link to read The Oscars for Children’s Writing Has Been Announced

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Posted in Literacy | Leave a Comment »

What the System Can Do to Great Teachers

February 23, 2015

kelly-hahn-fired

The public school system, in particular, with their draconian rules and regulations, have no trouble letting go of great teachers for the most obscure reasons. This is but one example of my theory that some schools just don’t seem to deserve great teachers. If they did, they would be treated better than this:

 

Parents of preschoolers at a St Louis school say their kids have been heartbroken after losing one of their favorite teachers.

Kelly Hahn was put on leave from Wilkinson Early Childhood Center last December, just two weeks after being named the St Louis Public School district’s ‘Pre-K Teacher of the Year.’

Fox2Now reports that children were coming home in tears after learning their favorite teacher was gone, and a rumor spread that Hahn had been diagnosed with cancer.

‘She is one of those people that I would say is the glue that holds Wilkinson together,’ PTO President Dana Evans told KMOV. 

But sadness turned to anger after parents learned that Hahn had received a letter saying she’d been dismissed for child neglect and endangerment, which parents say stemmed from an incident over a diaper. 

A three-year-old had come to school one day in a pull-up diaper, which is against the rules at Wilkinson.

After Hahn discovered the diaper, she let the child keep it on instead of removing it, and simply notified the parents.

Another teacher notified Missouri Department of Family Services, which conducted an investigation that found no signs of neglect.

St Louis Public Schools Superintendent Kelvin Adams says that the district has separate standards of conduct, though he did not comment specifically on Hahn.

Click on the link to read Teacher Bans the Word “Awesome” From His Class

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Click on the link to read Guess Why this Girl Was Sent Home from Kindergarten

Click on the link to read The Disgraceful Decision to Fire a Teacher for Trying to Break Up a Fight

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Posted in School Rules | Leave a Comment »

We Would Take a Bullet for Our Students

February 22, 2015

teacher-donates-kidney

So many of us would do everything possible to ensure the safety and wellbeing of our students. Whilst it doesn’t surprise me that a teacher is donating her kidney to save one of her students, one must properly understand that teachers are unlike so many other professionals. So many of us were drawn to teaching for no other reason but for the altruistic purpose of changing the world. Ms. Painter should be commended for her courage and dedication and for reminding our critics what sets teachers apart from many other professionals:

 

AN AMERICAN first grade teacher will be saving one of her students lives when she donated her kidney to the six-year-old in a month.

The teacher, Lindsey Painter, has only been at the school since last winter, where she met little Matthew Parker and learned of his condition.

“He does dialysis three days a week; it’s in San Antonio and we do live here in New Braunfels. He travels three days a week and it’s a full day, so he only goes to school twice a week,” Matthew’s mum, Lisa Parker, explained to Fox 4 Kansas City.

Matthew’s kidneys began to fail when he was just three weeks old, which required him to receive a kidney transplant. This will be the second transplant he will have had to have had in only his six year life.

Nearly 100 people were tested to see if they could be a match for Matthew, with his teacher eager to help from the very beginning.

“I knew right away that I needed to find out if I could help Matthew.

“So many people came forward trying to help him and I’m the one that gets to do it. I mean I feel very lucky,” she said.

The surgery is scheduled for mid March and if all goes well, Matthew will go back to a normal life in just a few months.

 

Click on the link to read Teachers Don’t Get Any Better Than This!

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Click on the link to read The Teacher as Superhero

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Teacher Bans the Word “Awesome” From His Class

February 22, 2015

mosman

 

I am not a big fan of bans in schools, but I love the push for teaching children to use a winder vocabulary:

 

SOME parents think it’s an awesome idea, while others don’t think it’s awesome at all.

Children at a school in Mosman have been told not to use the word awesome by a teacher who is trying to broaden her students’ vocabularies.

The word has had a recent resurgence in popularity after last year’s release of The Lego Movie and it’s hit song, Everything is Awesome.

But now a Year 3 teacher at Mosman Public School is asking pupils to try to come up with alternative words such as fantastic or wonderful.

While the Education Department would not confirm if the word had been banned or simply discouraged, one parent wrote on social media: “What an awesome idea, our teacher has banned students saying awesome in class so they expand their vocabulary.”

While the teacher was ­unavailable to comment, Year 3 pupil Claire Davis said the children were told to use alternate words such as fantastic.

“I don’t really say awesome, but the teacher said it doesn’t really mean anything and to use words like fantastic and stuff,” Claire said. “If you use it you may get a bit in trouble. I guess kids use it a lot.”

While some parents loved the idea, others didn’t agree.

“Awesome is such a good Aussie word. What’s wrong with it?” one parent told The Saturday Telegraph.

Education expert Karen Malone said it wasn’t ideal for words to be banned.

“Awesome is a good word. If my class were saying everything they were doing was awesome I’d be pretty happy. Normally, it’s ‘this is boring’.”

 

Click on the link to read Five-Year-Old Forced to Sign a Suicide Contract by School

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Click on the link to read Don’t Fire Caring Teachers

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The Epidemic that is Online Bullying

February 19, 2015

bullying-survey

Online bullying is becoming a bigger problem by the day, and it is high time schools stop handballing the problem to parents and start getting more involved:

 

One in seven children admit to having bullied someone online – often to try to fit in, a poll reveals.

Others claim they turned to bullying to avoid becoming a target of abuse themselves.

The charity Action For Children, which commissioned the survey, said many children bully others because of problems in their own lives.

The poll, published to mark Safer Internet Day today, found 15 per cent of 2,000 youngsters aged eight to 17 questioned had bullied someone online. 

Of these, 59 per cent did so to fit in with a particular social group and 43 per cent wanted to prevent themselves being bullied.

Some 28 per cent admitted becoming a bully due to peer pressure and 12 per cent said they had done it because they were unhappy. 

The survey also found that nearly half of the youngsters questioned admitted they had kept silent after seeing or reading something online that made them feel uncomfortable, rather than telling someone.

Around one in five said they had kept quiet because they were scared of what a bully might do to them, while nearly half said they were not worried enough to let someone know what they had seen and 17 per cent said they were worried they would get into trouble if they told.

bullying-graph

Click on the link to read At Least When an Olympic Athlete gets Cyberbullied They Have a Voice

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What Kids Think About Love (Video)

February 18, 2015

 

Children are so funny and perceptive.

 

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Click on the link to read Watch a Classic Argument in Action (Video)

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Organisations Come Out Against Corporal Punishment

February 17, 2015

Congratulations to all the esteemed organisations that have spoken out against corporal punishment. The sad reality is though, 19 states in the US continue this practice with no sign that any of those states will change their stance.

 

corporal-punishment-tablescorporal-punishment-quotes

 

 

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Click on the link to read 19 US States Still Allow Corporal Punishment in their Classrooms

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Should Students Be Involved in the Hiring of Teachers?

February 16, 2015

student-interview-teacher

I am all for innovation in education, but I am not quite sure what would be achieved by allowing students to interview perspective teachers. One might say that children have a very strong grasp of the type of teacher they work best with. But just wait a minute. Isn’t it the responsibility of management to understand the needs of their students? Surely putting children on the selection panel is an admission that the people in charge are too out of touch to properly understand the needs and preferences of their students:

 

Panels of students are being used to interview and hire teachers at Victorian schools.

The move has been applauded by the Victorian Student Representative Council but the Australian Education Union said students did not have the “depth of knowledge” to decide who was employed at schools.

VSRC young media spokeswoman Tess Shacklock, who sits on a student selection panel at Templestowe College, said students provided an important and different perspective.

“It’s the students who are being taught by the teachers so it’s important that students have a say in whether they are employed. You get a good idea of a person when you look at their resume, but when you see them in a room you really see how they interact.”

The Year 12 student said some prospective teachers were visibly nervous when they sat in front of the young panel.  

Melton West Primary School, Eltham High School and St Helena Secondary College are among a handful of Victorian schools that also use student selection panels.

Teachers vying for a job at St Helena Secondary College are interviewed by a panel of teachers and then another made up of three students who are in years 9 to 12. The students share their notes with the other panel at the end of the day.

 

 

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Posted in Education Matters | 5 Comments »

Teachers Who Bully Students Make Me Sick

February 15, 2015

stephen-bullied

I hate seeing children bullied, especially by their teachers:

A bullied student frequently picked on by students was victimized by the one person expected to help him in those situations – his teacher.

Stephen Davis, 15, a freshman at Streamwood High School in Illinois, watched in horror as a cartoon-like sketch with buck teeth, hairy ears, bloodshot eyes, tentacles, a scar and a runny nose was labeled as ‘Stephen’s ugly ass’ by a substitute teacher, who did this in front of his entire math class.

Davis, who weighs 330 pounds, recorded the entire incident on his phone, leaving no doubt as to what the teacher did. 

‘I was literally livid and embarrassed,’ he told the Daily Herald in an interview.

‘Everyone was standing there pointing at me, laughing, (while) I’m on the verge of tears.’

CBS Chicago also reports that Stephen is a special needs student. 

Click on the link to read 50 Shades of School Madness

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Posted in Professional Conduct | 1 Comment »

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