This timely book shows how award-winning secondary schools and districts are successfully using technology and making systemic changes to increase student engagement, improve achievement, and re-invigorate the teaching and learning process. Through in-depth case studies, we see how experienced school and district leaders use technology in curricular, administrative, and analytical ways to meet the needs of 21st-century learners, educators, and communities. These cases reveal important details addressed by the leadership of these schools and districts that go beyond what they did with technology to include changes in school culture, curriculum and teaching, uses of assessment data, financial considerations, infrastructure, and involvement with the community.
Making Technology Work in Schools is an easy-to-use guide for transforming your school into a learner-centered, tech-supportive environment. School systems are increasingly adopting ambitious new educational technologies, but how do you make sure they are yielding effective teaching and learning experiences? The authors’ proven, intuitive practices speak directly to academic coaches, school technology leads, district technology directors, and teachers on special assignment who are responsible for introducing new digital tools and programs. Retaining its substantive focus on educational change and the comprehensive PURPOSE Framework, this refreshed second edition updates its real-world examples, practical strategies, and technology categories while adding new content on schoolwide initiatives, needs analysis, professional development, leadership and coaching standards, and more. After reading this book, you will be able to better prepare the educators whom you serve to empower their learners, whether digitally savvy or not, to be engaged, collaborative, and ready for college and careers.
First released in the Spring of 1999, How People Learn has been expanded to show how the theories and insights from the original book can translate into actions and practice, now making a real connection between classroom activities and learning behavior. This edition includes far-reaching suggestions for research that could increase the impact that classroom teaching has on actual learning. Like the original edition, this book offers exciting new research about the mind and the brain that provides answers to a number of compelling questions. When do infants begin to learn? How do experts learn and how is this different from non-experts? What can teachers and schools do-with curricula, classroom settings, and teaching methodsâ€"to help children learn most effectively? New evidence from many branches of science has significantly added to our understanding of what it means to know, from the neural processes that occur during learning to the influence of culture on what people see and absorb. How People Learn examines these findings and their implications for what we teach, how we teach it, and how we assess what our children learn. The book uses exemplary teaching to illustrate how approaches based on what we now know result in in-depth learning. This new knowledge calls into question concepts and practices firmly entrenched in our current education system. Topics include: How learning actually changes the physical structure of the brain. How existing knowledge affects what people notice and how they learn. What the thought processes of experts tell us about how to teach. The amazing learning potential of infants. The relationship of classroom learning and everyday settings of community and workplace. Learning needs and opportunities for teachers. A realistic look at the role of technology in education.
Making Technology Work in Schools is an easy-to-use guide for transforming your school into a learner-centered, tech-rich environment. School systems are increasingly adopting ambitious new educational technologies, but how do you make sure they are yielding effective teaching and learning experiences? The authors' proven, intuitive practices speak directly to academic coaches, school technology leads, district technology directors, and teachers on special assignment who are responsible for introducing new tools and programs. After reading this book, you will be able to better prepare the educators you serve to empower their learners, whether digitally savvy or not, to be engaged, collaborative, and better prepared for college and careers.
Over the past decade, educational instruction has become increasingly digitized as districts rush to dole out laptops and iPads to every student. Yet the most important question, "Is this what is best for students?" is glossed over. Veteran teachers Joe Clement and Matt Miles have seen firsthand how damaging technology overuse and misuse has been to our kids. On a mission to educate and empower parents, they show how screen saturation at home and school has created a wide range of cognitive and social deficits in our young people. They lift the veil on what's really going on in schools: teachers who are often powerless to curb cell phone distractions; zoned-out kids who act helpless and are unfocused, unprepared, and unsocial; administrators who are influenced by questionable science sponsored by corporate technology purveyors. They provide action steps parents can take to demand change and make a compelling case for simpler, smarter, more effective forms of teaching and learning.
In this revolutionary book, a renowned computer scientist explains the importance of teaching children the basics of computing and how it can prepare them to succeed in the ever-evolving tech world. Computers have completely changed the way we teach children. We have Mindstorms to thank for that. In this book, pioneering computer scientist Seymour Papert uses the invention of LOGO, the first child-friendly programming language, to make the case for the value of teaching children with computers. Papert argues that children are more than capable of mastering computers, and that teaching computational processes like de-bugging in the classroom can change the way we learn everything else. He also shows that schools saturated with technology can actually improve socialization and interaction among students and between students and teachers. Technology changes every day, but the basic ways that computers can help us learn remain. For thousands of teachers and parents who have sought creative ways to help children learn with computers, Mindstorms is their bible.
How do you get a fourth-grader excited about history? How do you even begin to persuade high school students that mathematical functions are relevant to their everyday lives? In this volume, practical questions that confront every classroom teacher are addressed using the latest exciting research on cognition, teaching, and learning. How Students Learn: History, Mathematics, and Science in the Classroom builds on the discoveries detailed in the bestselling How People Learn. Now, these findings are presented in a way that teachers can use immediately, to revitalize their work in the classroom for even greater effectiveness. Organized for utility, the book explores how the principles of learning can be applied in teaching history, science, and math topics at three levels: elementary, middle, and high school. Leading educators explain in detail how they developed successful curricula and teaching approaches, presenting strategies that serve as models for curriculum development and classroom instruction. Their recounting of personal teaching experiences lends strength and warmth to this volume. The book explores the importance of balancing students' knowledge of historical fact against their understanding of concepts, such as change and cause, and their skills in assessing historical accounts. It discusses how to build straightforward science experiments into true understanding of scientific principles. And it shows how to overcome the difficulties in teaching math to generate real insight and reasoning in math students. It also features illustrated suggestions for classroom activities. How Students Learn offers a highly useful blend of principle and practice. It will be important not only to teachers, administrators, curriculum designers, and teacher educators, but also to parents and the larger community concerned about children's education.
Textbooks are symbols of centuries-old education. They're often outdated as soon as they hit students' desks. Acting "by the textbook" implies compliance and a lack of creativity. It's time to ditch those textbooks--and those textbook assumptions about learning In Ditch That Textbook, teacher and blogger Matt Miller encourages educators to throw out meaningless, pedestrian teaching and learning practices. He empowers them to evolve and improve on old, standard, teaching methods. Ditch That Textbook is a support system, toolbox, and manifesto to help educators free their teaching and revolutionize their classrooms.
Wherever you are on the path to 1:1 teaching and learning, you need a guide that can help you make the best use of the powerful technology available in today's classrooms. In Power Up: Making the Shift to 1:1 Teaching and Learning, Diana Neebe and Jen Roberts draw on research and their extensive experience working with teachers across subject areas and grade levels to share the keys to success when teaching with a computer or tablet for every student. This is the book secondary teachers need to understand the changes in pedagogy, planning, classroom organization, time management, and collaboration that will help them be successful in a 1:1 environment. Whether providing immediate and detailed feedback to student writers, giving voice to quiet learners, or creating more time for actual work in a jam-packed school day, Neebe and Roberts show teachers how communication, differentiation, and other effective practices can be powered up with personalized technology. Throughout the book, Neebe and Roberts coach teachers through their initial concerns about technology integration, offer advice about avoiding common problems, and encourage innovation. Using detailed classroom examples, questions, and suggestions, they provide a framework for shaping the transformation of a traditional classroom into a student-centered, technology-rich learning environment. Readers will come away with a clear sense of how a fully implemented 1:1 classroom operates. Power Up makes the transition to 1:1 a manageable and exciting journey. It's a key part of supporting teachers and ensuring the success of your 1:1 program.
