Questioning Toolkit Essential Questions These are questions which touch our hearts and souls. They are central to our lives. They help to define what it means to be human. Most important thought during our lives will center on such essential questions. What does it mean to be a good friend? If we were to draw a cluster diagram of the Questioning Toolkit, Essential Questions would be at the center of all the other types of questions. All the other questions and questioning skills serve the purpose of "casting light upon" or illuminating Essential Questions. Most Essential Questions are interdisciplinary in nature. Essential Questions probe the deepest issues confronting us . . . complex and baffling matters which elude simple answers: Life - Death - Marriage - Identity - Purpose - Betrayal - Honor - Integrity - Courage - Temptation - Faith - Leadership - Addiction - Invention - Inspiration. Essential Questions are at the heart of the search for Truth. Essential Questions offer the organizing focus for a unit.
30 Magical Photos Of Children Playing Around The World No matter their cultural background, no matter their economic situation, kids will always find imaginative ways to have fun. Their wild imaginations and magical childhood moments, when captured on camera by talented photographers, can make for truly wonderful photos. These 33 images we collected will prove that childhood can be wonderful no matter where you go. Show Full Text Many in the Western world fear that technology is making today’s children lose touch with nature and with their own creativity, and while there are arguments to be made for the intellectual stimulation that apps and programs for children can bring, there’s also something to be said for simply playing with a stick in the mud or chasing dandelion seeds though an open meadow. For better or worse, the children in these photos seem entirely content making their own fun. Indonesia Thanks for sharing! 3x per week 30,000,000+ monthly readers Error sending email Image credits: Ipoenk Graphic Image credits: Agoes Antara Russia Peru
10 Team-Building Games That Promote Collaborative Critical Thinking One of education’s primary goals is to groom the next generation of little humans to succeed in the “real world.” Yes, there are mounds of curricula they must master in a wide breadth of subjects, but education does not begin and end with a textbook or test. Other skills must be honed, too, not the least of which is how to get along with their peers and work well with others. This is not something that can be cultivated through rote memorization or with strategically placed posters. Students must be engaged and cooperation must be practiced, and often. The following team-building games can promote cooperation and communication, help establish a positive classroom environment and — most importantly — provide a fun, much-needed reprieve from routine. 10 Team-Building Games That Promote Collaborative Critical Thinking 1. This team-building game is flexible. You can recycle this activity throughout the year by adapting the challenge or materials to specific content areas. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8.
Two Ways to Explore the News Through Maps When teaching students about current events I have always tried to incorporate maps so that students can make a connection to the places that they are reading about. I do this if the story is about something happening in Africa or something happening twenty miles down the road from our community. Newspaper Map and the Breaking News map are both helpful in showing students the connections between story subjects and their corresponding locations. Newspaper Map is a neat tool for locating and reading newspapers from locations all around the world. Breaking News presents a constant stream of headlines from around the world. Applications for Education A common assignment in social studies courses is to have students find, review, and share current events stories.
Bloom's and the Three Storey Intellect A colleague has given me an excellent poster she has developed on the three storey intellect. As a taxonomy of higher and lower order thinking, it is a clean and simple model. The three storey intellect was inspired Oliver Wendell Holmes. “There are one-storey intellects, two-storey intellects, and three-storey intellects with skylights. All fact collectors who have no aim beyond their facts are one-storeymen. created by A Churches image source:
Around The World with 80 Schools blooms, learning styles and thinking organisers How do thinking/graphical organisers or mind mapping tools fit with Learning styles and Bloom's Revised taxonomy. The key element to a thinking or graphical organiser is, in my opinion, the key or focusing question. No matter how complex or developing the model or organiser you are using, if the focusing question or topic is weak the end result will be poor. Bloom's arranges various activities in terms of increasing complexity going from Low Order Thinking skills to Higher Order Thinking skills. They represent the learning process, to understand one must remember, to apply a concept you must understand it etc Simple mind maps and concept diagrams are a brilliant tool for enabling students to remember and understand. Key Words Interpreting Exemplifying Summarising Inferring Paraphrasing Classifying Comparing ExplainingRecognising Listing Describing Identifying Retrieving Naming Locating/Finding Model Simple Flowchart This is a simple concept linking to next concept. Simple Concept map Models
5 Ways to Inspire Students Through Global Collaboration Culture Teaching Strategies Flickr:rwkvisual The Internet has made the world smaller. Teachers can now collaborate with classrooms around the world to expose different culture to students. Working with students from a different culture motivates students. International pen pals may be the most straightforward global collaboration available. Epals is a free resource that allows educators to easily find other classrooms interested in collaborations. What Are 21st-Century Skills? Learning to collaborate with others and connect through technology are essential skills in a knowledge-based economy. ATC21S started with a group of more than 250 researchers across 60 institutions worldwide who categorized 21st-century skills internationally into four broad categories: Ways of thinking. Creativity, critical thinking, problem-solving, decision-making and learningWays of working. The ATC21S project has now moved from conceptual to practical, working with two skills that span all four categories: Collaborative problem-solving.
21 Images of Where Children Sleep Around the World Paints a Powerful Picture of Inequality "As a child, that's your little space within the house," said James Mollison, a Kenyan-born, England-raised, Venice-based photographer whose 2011 photo book, Where Children Sleep draws attention to a child's "material and cultural circumstances" and offers a remarkable view on class, poverty, and the diversity of children around the world. After spending more than three years traveling the world from Senegal to Tokyo, Mollison's series include portraits of children in front of a white background accompanied by a single snapshot of their bedrooms, leaving the later to speak volumes about their the social and cultural circumstances that contribute to their lifestyle. "I hope the book gives a a glimpse into the lives some children are living in very diverse situations around the world; a chance to reflect on the inequality that exists, and realize just how lucky most of us in the developed world are," said Mollison. Ryuta is a champion sumo wrestler and has been competing for seven years.
edutopia Challenging students to dig in and achieve their potential during instructional hours confronts a mighty obstacle: the principle of least effort, the idea that people apply nominal effort to achieve a basically acceptable result instead of pushing themselves in pursuit of greatness. We might be tempted to conflate low effort with laziness, but that misses an important physiological point: To conserve finite attention funds, our brains are designed to avoid tasks that are cognitively demanding. Daniel Kahneman, author of Thinking, Fast and Slow, describes two modes of thinking. The efficient and fairly unconscious mode is System 1. Involuntarily reading a Wheaties box, scorning new “athleisure” clothes, and opening a combination lock are all System 1 mental events. In contrast, System 2 mental activities are things like solving quadratic equations or summarizing why the Kurdish people don’t occupy a permanent nation-state. How to Intensify In-Class Activities Anticipate bottlenecks.