8 Things to Look for in Today’s Professional Learning (Part 2) (This is the second of two parts on professional learning.
You can read the first part here. It is based on the visual below that was created by Sylvia Duckworth and adapted from “8 Things to Look for in Today’s Classroom“.) Connected Learning Rationale: The opportunities for learning in our world today are immense and we need to take advantage of the opportunities that are presented to us.
We not only have access to all of the information in our world today, but we have access to one another. Alec Couros, shared the following image on the idea of “The Networked Teacher”; Although the technologies in the visual can change and how we use them can always be altered, the most important part of this visual, in my opinion, are the arrows that go back and forth. Idea: The idea for this is simple. Other elements that could be incorporated: Reflection, Voice, Choice, Opportunities for Innovation Opportunities for Innovation. 8 Things to Look for in Today’s Professional Learning (Part 1) Over two years ago, I wrote “8 Things To Look for in Today’s Classroom”, and more recently, Sylvia Duckworth created the above visual that has been shared numerous times.
As I am in the process of going deeper into the topic, someone asked me if this is something that we could do in professional development. As someone who is a big believer in creating experiences for educators where they partake in the types of learning that should happen in the classroom, I thought this suggestion made total sense. To be honest with you, professional learning in many cases needs an overhaul. If the best thing that professional learning has to offer is lunch, we need to think different. But how many educators are really excited about the types of professional learning opportunities that are offered in their school? Below, I am going to offer some of my own thoughts, not solutions, to different ways that professional learning can happen in schools and districts. Voice Choice Reflection Moving Forward.
Make The Best Use of Evernote with Automated Note Reviews. Evernote is most useful when it’s not used as a junk filing drawer, but as a resource for collecting, managing, processing, and reviewing notes and documents.
A new online resource called Reflectapp may help you get more out of Evernote and remind you of what you collect and save. Evernote and other third-party apps make it pretty easy to import documents and notes into the digital file drawer, but it doesn’t have a useful process for reviewing your content, which means lots of valuable information can be forgotten. So, let’s check out a few possible solutions to this problem. Recall, Review, and Rethink Reflectapp connects with your Evernote account and allows you to set up a schedule to review all of your content, or filter selected notebooks and/or tags. Reflectapp will email you a daily notification to review compiled notes based on the schedule you set. What Steve Jobs' Morning Routine Taught Me About Focus. Nothing in life motivated Steve Jobs more than death.
Every morning, he’d stare in the mirror and ask himself this question: “If today was the last day of my life, would I be happy with what I’m about to do today?” Click to Tweet If too many days went by with the answer being “no,” he made changes in his life. He did this until he hit a consistent yes, which drove him to countless innovations and a company worth $702 billion. Inspired by his success and focus, one month ago I began asking myself the same question: Every morning as I leave my bedroom, I see this handwritten note hanging on my wall. Right now, grab a piece of paper and write this down: John C. Maxwell: How to Carve Out Your Life’s Passion. For the Academy Award-nominated documentary Cavedigger, director Jeffrey Karoff follows Paulette as he carves into the earth, one shovelful at a time.
In the film—which you can find at CavediggerDocumentary.com—Paulette explains, “When I’m working on a project, I’m totally obsessed. How to Easily Organize & Remember All the Life Hack Tips You Read. Can you draw the Apple logo from memory?
Are you sure? Try it right now. The answer may surprise you. Only 1 out of 85 participants got it right in this interesting study on human memory. Even though most of see the Apple logo nearly every day, our memories just don’t store all the little details. But back to you: How many books and articles do you read every year? If you are reading this now, you will forget 80% of it within a month. The good news is that forgetfulness can be beaten. “The increased effort required to retrieve the learning after a little forgetting has the effect of retriggering consolidation, further strengthening memory.” The book also notes that a little forgetting can be a good thing. Their advice is for better study skills, but many of these tools are applicable to all types of knowledge we don’t want to forget.
Mindmory (iOS, Free) Remember life rules with do’s and don’ts. You should like Mindmory for its sheer simplicity. Mindmory also has a Grey Matters view. Reflect.