http://learningmix.org mixing and remixing to find a balance.... Thu, 06 Mar 2008 16:16:34 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en I've been rereading Heidi Hayes Jacob's thoughts on the importance of essential questions in curriculum development. We're currently in the throes of curriculum mapping at my school, so I was originally approaching the ideas from the perspective of my role as Computer Science department head. As I read, however, I've realized ... http://learningmix.org/2008/03/06/essential-questions/ When my Head of School and Board asked me last year to do an evaluation of academic technology use at the school, I asked that we bring in an outside group to assess us because I'm just too close to it all to be objective. I was afraid I would ... http://learningmix.org/2008/02/12/tech-evaluation/ For ten years I have run Taekwondo programs for students and faculty at the schools where I have worked. While I have long believed that martial arts training can be incredibly valuable for children and adults alike, some of my conversations at and since Educon have gotten me thinking about ... http://learningmix.org/2008/02/11/martial-arts-the-model-classroom/ We're currently using personalized wikispaces and edublogs at my school. While we're getting more and more folks interested and on board, the handling of media on the sites is raising some challenges. For example, some uses are uploading photos (often huge, unoptimized photos) directly to their wikis and blogs while ... http://learningmix.org/2008/01/31/photo-storage/ Three times in the last week I've heard people argue that teaching doesn't change because teachers are afraid - or have too much ego - to give up control in their classrooms. While those teachers no doubt exist in the wild, I'm reminded of a quotation I stumbled across some ... http://learningmix.org/2008/01/30/motives/ While I intellectually understood many of the differences between technology use in public and private schools, having the opportunity to attend EduCon 2.0 allowed me to experience those differences at a more visceral level. The conference was filled with smart, passionate, innovative educators from public schools across the nation, many ... http://learningmix.org/2008/01/29/if-versus-which/ As EduCon 2.0 wraps up, my head is spinning, as it usually does at a great conference. I'll try to carve out time over the next few days to reflect on my experiences. The first day was actually the preconference, where the early arrivers had the opportunity to visit SLA ... http://learningmix.org/2008/01/28/educon-20/ Rather than talk about not writing, I'm just going to write.... Going to EduCon 2.0 at the Science Leadership Academy in Philadelphia tomorrow. Chris Lehman was our virtual keynote speaker at the NEIT 2007 conference at Mohonk this year. I was incredibly impressed by what he had to say about progressive ... http://learningmix.org/2008/01/24/catching-up/ I've been thinking about our technology in preparation for a Parent Association meeting, and I figured this would be a good opportunity to start writing here again. As I began this process, I had to admit that I'm not as involved in the Lower School curriculum as I would like ... http://learningmix.org/2007/04/16/computer-science-in-a-k-12-school/ From a response I wrote today on the NYCIST listserv: I find it so interesting how in some ways we all have such similar schools and in other ways our experiences are so, so different. There are schools that have dumped Dell and would never go back; other schools have nothing ... http://learningmix.org/2006/12/20/vive-la-difference/