Video MindShift MindShift explores the future of learning in all its dimensions. We examine how learning is being impacted by technology, discoveries about how the brain works, poverty and inequities, social and emotional practices, assessments, digital games, design thinking and music, among many other topics. We look at how learning is evolving in the classroom and beyond.We also revisit old ideas that have come full circle in the era of the over scheduled child, such as unschooling, tinkering, playing in the woods, mindfulness, inquiry-based learning and student motivation. We report on shifts in how educators practice their craft as they apply innovative ideas to help students learn, while meeting the rigorous demands of their standards and curriculum. MindShift has a unique audience of educators, tinkerers, policy makers and life-long learners who engage in meaningful dialogue with one another on our sites. Contact the us by email.
For Site Visible Thinking Purpose and Goals Visible Thinking is a flexible and systematic research-based approach to integrating the development of students' thinking with content learning across subject matters. An extensive and adaptable collection of practices, Visible Thinking has a double goal: on the one hand, to cultivate students' thinking skills and dispositions, and, on the other, to deepen content learning. By thinking dispositions, we mean curiosity, concern for truth and understanding, a creative mindset, not just being skilled but also alert to thinking and learning opportunities and eager to take them Who is it for? Visible Thinking is for teachers, school leaders and administrators in K - 12 schools who want to encourage the development of a culture of thinking in their classrooms and schools. Key Features and Practices At the core of Visible Thinking are practices that help make thinking visible: Thinking Routines loosely guide learners' thought processes and encourage active processing. License
What Makes Project Based Learning Effective? #Edchat #EngChat I've been meaning to write about my adventures in Project Based Learning for a while. It's a topic many teachers are interested in, but are unsure of how to implement it or know if it is working. After much thought, I have broken down Project Based Learning into the 5 parts that make it effective in the classroom. Long before my Epic Romeo and Juliet Project, the first major project I created was during my student teaching 10 years ago. As I look back at the project (and ahead as I prepare to bring it back), I notice all of the things that made this project work that lead to deep understanding. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Next week, my students will be creating their own Transcendentalist Society. If you have any thoughts on bringing PBL to your classroom, please do not hesitate to contact me. - @TheNerdyTeacher
Inquiry-Questions - home Difference betweeen Inquiry Learning and Taditional Approach How does it differ from the traditional approach? In general, the traditional approach to learning is focused on mastery of content, with less emphasis on the development of skills and the nurturing of inquiring attitudes. The current system of education is teacher centered, with the teacher focused on giving out information about "what is known." Students are the receivers of information, and the teacher is the dispenser. Traditional classrooms tend to be closed systems where information is filtered through layers to students. The inquiry approach is more focused on using and learning content as a means to develop information-processing and problem-solving skills. Assessment is focused on determining the progress of skills development in addition to content understanding. Inquiry classrooms are open systems where students are encouraged to search and make use of resources beyond the classroom and the school.
Steps to Inquiry voicEd.ca has invited Canadian bloggers writing about education to post their “best” entry of 2012. This may a piece of writing to which they feel particularly attached, something that received some good response, or an entry that got others thinking in a different way. We’ll be featuring these pieces in this space over the next couple of weeks with the hopes that readers might find them to be a good review of where our thinking has taken us over the past year. Feel free to join in the conversation, or submit your own entry for posting! The following blog entry is from Louise Robitaille who blogs at Inquiry-based Learning. Step 1: Teachers gather and collect as much information as possible on the subject, to help students with research, investigations and inquiries. Step 2: Teachers help to develop background knowledge for students. Step 3: Teachers share mentor texts and model lessons. Step 4: Teachers give students a choice of what they would like to learn more about.
TWT: Inquiry-based Learning Strategy What is Inquiry-based learning? The old adage, “Tell me and I forget, show me and I remember, involve me and I understand” describes the core of inquiry-based learning. Inquiry is the process of seeking truth, information, or knowledge by questioning. Questioning! The process of inquiring begins with gathering information and data through applying the human senses: seeing, hearing, touching, tasting, and smelling. Inquiry-based learning processes vary. How does inquiry-based learning encourage student learning? Memorizing facts and information is not the most important skill in today’s world. What does inquiry-based learning look like in the classroom? The following example elaborates on the five steps listed above: questioning, planning and predicting, investigating, recording and reporting, and reflecting. Additional Information on the Five Steps for Inquiry-based Learning Questioning, Planning and Predicting, Investigating, Recording and Reporting, and Reflecting.
Inquiry-Based Learning Inquiry-based Learning: Explanation What are the benefits of inquiry-based learning? One of the important missing pieces in many modern schools is a coherent and simplified process for increasing knowledge of a subject from lower grades to upper grades. Students often have difficulty understanding how various activities within a particular subject relate to each other. Much more confusion results when the learner tries to interrelate the various subjects taught at school. Too little effort is devoted to defining important outcomes at the end of high school and planning backwards and across subjects. Specific content such as photosynthesis has much more relevance for the learner if set in a larger context of understanding the interrelationship of the sun, green plants, and the role of carbon dioxide and water. Within a conceptual framework, inquiry learning and active learner involvement can lead to important outcomes in the classroom.
Inquiry-Based Learning - About Us Design-Based Learning (DBL) to Innovate STEM Education | Stanford University School of Education IT Our earthquake curriculum project We developed an earthquake curriculum to conduct design-based pilot studies all over the globe from Ethiopia to California in 5th, 6th grade classes and a multi-grade classroom in El Salvador. Learning about earthquakes is urgent and propitious with the recent earthquake catastrophes in Haiti and Chile. It is crucial to raise awareness in our young learners that an earthquake in one continent can have ripple effect damages to other continents. Within the design challenge, students worked in teams of 4 members to design and build earthquake resistant structures using only index cards, tape, and paper clips through couple of iterations. Throughout our pilot studies, students were enthusiastic, focused, and actively collaborating with their peers. Although we have briefly introduced the use of mobile phones as a documentation tool, it will be integrated formally into an empirical study we will conduct this upcoming summer. Sub Project