Two apps that will transform your life Rather than writing a column this week, I'm using this space to pitch two software ideas I've had: ideas I'd turn into real programs if I had either the expertise or patience to do so. My hope is that a talented programmer will stumble across this page, make them a reality, and then be forced to give me a cut of the profits, absolutely none of which will be donated to a good cause. I'm fishing for coins, basically. Idea 1: Blackmailr™ Let's face it, efficiency is boring. Still, only the most tedious nazi finds it easy to complete chores without some kind of sword of Damocles hanging over them. Enter the ultimate productivity app – Blackmailr. Having compiled this humiliating gallery, the program immediately encrypts these pictures and stores them in a secret corner of your hard drive where you can't reach them. You tell it what you want to do, anything from writing the first chapter of a novel to filling out an insurance claim form, and what your deadline is. Idea 2: Super Goodinator™
If students designed their own school… it would look like this Student Peter Boyce(By Charles Tsai) “It’s crazy that in a system that is meant to teach and help the youth there is no voice from the youth at all.” That’s the opening line in a video called “If students designed their own schools,” about The Independent Project, a high school semester designed and implemented entirely by students. What did it look like? No quizzes. No tests. The Independent Project started in 2011 at Monument Mountain Regional High School, a public school in Massachusetts, after a student named Sam Levin advanced an idea about students creating their own learning environment in order to find the engagement and mastery he felt were lacking in many teacher-designed classes. In this model, teachers serve as mentors and coaches, not as direct instructors, while students pose questions and find ways to answer them. After the first semester, an evaluation was undertaken and changes were made to the model. Here’s Tsai’s video:
My collection of funny emails from my inbox. Subject: 5 MINUTE MANAGEMENT COURSE Lesson 1: A man is getting into the shower just as his wife is finishing up her shower, when the doorbell rings. The wife quickly wraps herself in a towel and runs downstairs. When she opens the door, there stands Bob, the next-door neighbor. Before she says a word, Bob says, "I'll give you $800 to drop that towel." After thinking for a moment, the woman drops her towel and stands naked in front of Bob. After a few seconds, Bob hands her $800 and leaves. The woman wraps back up in the towel and goes back upstairs. "Great!" Moral of the story: If you share critical information pertaining to credit and risk with your shareholders in time, you may be in a position to prevent avoidable exposure. Lesson 2: A priest offered a Nun a lift. The priest removed his hand. Arriving at the convent, the nun sighed heavily and went on her way. On his arrival at the church, the priest rushed to look up Psalm 129. Lesson 3: "Me first! "Me next! Lesson 4: Lesson 5: Lesson 6:
How Math Got Its Groove Back 49913Dance by NumbersCarrie Lewis, a STEM specialist in Lynchburg, Virginia, explains the lesson plan that she and fellow teacher Kelly Steele devised to teach their fifth grade students number patterns. 2013-01-16 13:35:00disabledssmB_MtgJ_kfalse This is an edited version of a video produced by Jill Granger. To view the original video, click here. Carrie Lewis and Kelly Steele’s fifth grade students slide and spin across the classroom floor, doing the hustle, the robot and the running man. Lewis, a STEM specialist for Virginia’s Lynchburg city schools, and Steele, who teaches gifted education in Bedford county, Virginia, are both math enthusiasts eager to instill in their students a love of the subject. “Dances are patterns,” Lewis said. Both teachers are part of Sweet Briar College’s STEM teacher education program, where they worked together to design “dance by numbers,” a lesson plan that relies on dance to teach pattern recognition. Identifying a Pattern: Making Their Own Moves:
20 Best Creative Products You Can Actually Buy Creativity refers to a person creates something new that has some kind of value. It can be a product, solution, artwork, etc. What counts as “new” may be in reference to the individual creator, or to the society or domain within which the novelty occurs. What counts as “valuable” is similarly defined in a variety of ways. Today we have showcased 20 Best Creative Products You Can Actually Buy. Why not spice your life up a little and make your friends jealous? Time Warp Shelf Clock Buy $13.49 The Time Warp Shelf Clock is the perfect addition to an art lover’s home creating a great conversation piece. The Avengers USB Sticks Buy $39.99 2012 Avengers Marvel Sticks: Iron man, Thor, America Captain, Hulk. Wooden Camera Iphone Case Buy $41.17 Green LED Faucet Valve Night Light Buy $8 A great attention-getter for guests, and it gives off ample light to use as a night light. USB Power Strip Buy $15.49 Mr P Tape Dispenser Buy $35.00 Tailsman Cherry Chomper Buy $8.71 1st world problem: Solved! iPhone Hoodie Case
Why Creative Teaching is Essential For the Information Age | Education on GOOD There’s a belief in this country that every student should graduate from high school with the same standard set of knowledge. This standard curriculum is lengthy, and states spend many years—and plenty of money—creating fancy bullet-pointed lists of the subjects students are expected to know. Sadly, the list of facts and formulas students need to perform well on a standardized test is freakishly small in comparison. My experience as a classroom teacher has shown me that teenagers are interested in almost anything taught well and with passion. I teach kids how to do their taxes in my calculus class, and they love it. Yet taxes generally are completely ignored by the standard high school math curriculum. I'm continually amazed how teaching an applicable skill piques students' curiosity and prompts them to do more research. Unfortunately, the test-driven push to quickly cover the state-mandated curriculum is growing.
25 Great Quotes to Inspire and Brighten Your Day Here’s a collection of great quotes by some of the most inspirational men and women that ever walked this earth. Hopefully you’ll find them inspirational in some way. If you do like them and find them helpful, check out our similar posts by visiting the links listed below. We have created over 20+ of these galleries, so there is lots more to be seen. More popular quotations: – 25 Inspirational Quotes – Great quotes to ponder upon Check out all of our galleries with nice quotes here: More great quotes:
Researching Lost Children Evidence in my case study continues to mount … strangely. Though the girls exhibit clear signs of a shared delusion — the creation of an imaginary mother figure who protected them during their years of isolation — still, there are still some hard-to-explain details I’ve found, frankly, unsettling. 1. Survival. Most of all: how were these children able to live in isolation for five years? 2. 3. Conclusion: Did the girls have contact with one or more adults during their stay in the Helvetia cabin? I must investigate further.
22 genius ideas we wish we'd thought of Every so often a genius idea comes along and you kick yourself. It could have been you! It was so simple! It's Texts From Dog, or Cats In Stuff, it was there all along just waiting to be discovered. But you missed it didn't you? You're rubbish. Well, here are some more ideas you missed. Maybe next time... We're giving away first class InterRail tickets, lunch at PizzaExpress, tickets to Bestival, and loads more... Get me on Refreshers Wall guest list for early entry and freebies! We don't suggest you try this but it's genius nonetheless. We're giving away first class InterRail tickets, lunch at PizzaExpress, tickets to Bestival, and loads more at Refreshers Wall - the student year planner.
Why A Principal Created His Own Currency : Planet Money David Kestenbaum/NPR Shawn Rux took over as principal of MS 53, a New York City middle school, last year. At the time, 50 or 60 kids were absent every day. You could understand why they stayed away: The school was chaos. Twenty-two teachers had quit, the entire office staff had quit, and hundreds of kids had been suspended. "It was in a bad place," Rux says. Rux decided he needed to create incentives for kids to come to school. He handed out raffle tickets to anyone who showed up to school on time. It worked. "It was ... like, 'Get out of my way, I'm trying to get into school,' " Rux says. Rux also created his own currency. The principal also stands outside school every morning, greeting the students as they show up. "I like this school," Wander Rodriguez says. The school went from an F to a C. The school is in Far Rockaway, Queens — one of the areas hardest hit by the storm. After the storm, after school started up again, Rux's goal was to get attendance back to 90 percent.
14 Stories That Prove Animals Have Souls A free school under a bridge in India Altaf Qadri / AP Founder of a free school for slum children Rajesh Kumar Sharma, second from right, and Laxmi Chandra, right, write on black boards, painted on a building wall, at a free school run under a metro bridge in New Delhi, India. At least 30 children living in the nearby slums have been receiving free education from this school for the last three years. Related content: Rajesh Kumar Sharma, teach Somnath, an underprivileged Indian slum child at the school. Students help to keep the school clean.