Ed Tech Jen

Review of The Best of L&L

Jennifer Roland — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 19:56:18 +0000

Stuart Nachbar, of the Educated Quest, has posted a review of The Best of L&L from the perspective of policy makers. It was interesting to look back at the book and view it through this lens.

Visit the review and let Stuart know if you agree with his thoughts.

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The Gulf Oil Spill: A Teachable Moment

Jennifer Roland — Mon, 10 May 2010 13:24:36 +0000

The continuing oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico lends itself to teachable moments all over the curriculum.

Math teachers could help students calculate the short- and long-term costs of the spill.
Civics, social studies, and journalism teachers could ask students to analyze the media coverage and try to ascertain the biases of the reporters and the publications.
English teachers could assign students to write argumentative essays arguing for and against federal funding for cleanup, newspaper op-ed pieces, or research papers on oil spills.
Science teachers have a wealth of options, including a study on the short- and long-term environmental effects, a comparison with past oil spills (students could view the film Black Wave: The Legacy of the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill, for example), and lab experiments showing oil’s effects on plants or simple cell structures.

Finally, teachers looking for service learning activities have options, too. Students could raise money to help nonprofit organizations clean up the spill. Or they could do a hair drive. Matter of Trust uses human hair and pet fur to make mats to soak up oil spills and to help clean animals coated with oil. Students could partner with a local salon to offer a discount on hair cuts on a special donation day, when all hair clippings will be gathered and sent to Matter of Trust. Or they could do a dog grooming day at a local pet salon and gather all dog hair for donation.

Find out more about the program (and see the teacher and student handouts provided) here. And come back and let us know if any of your classes get involved with the clean up efforts. I’d love to hear about kids helping collect hair or fur!

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A Call for Financial Education

Jennifer Roland — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 14:59:56 +0000

When I was in high school, the honors students were offered the option of testing out of the required year-long personal finance class. The assumption was that we should not waste our valuable college prep time learning such banal tasks as managing household finances.

But, how many college graduates bounce checks, get into overwhelming credit card debt, or purchase homes and cars they really can’t afford?

According to mortgageloan.com, the average college graduate has $2,000 in credit card debt and $20,000 in student debt. When you add in all of the other societal pressures for nice cars and big houses, that can add up to poor choices be even the most well educated person.

How can we ensure that all of our students, rich or poor and at all levels of academic achievement, enter the working world with the skills to manage their earnings?

We can start by not thinking of personal finance as a throw-away subject that students can just test out of unless they want the easy A. And we need to provide consistent, developmentally appropriate finance education thought both public and private education.

The standards released by the Jump $tart Coalition provide a good roadmap to ensure that students learn good financial skills.

How do we ensure that financial literacy is included in education? And what technology tools are best suited to providing this education?

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My Twitter Followers

Jennifer Roland — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 14:19:21 +0000

Get your twitter mosaic here.

Are you in there? If not, follow me.

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Background on the Book

Jennifer Roland — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 16:00:38 +0000

AKG Mag just posted an interview where I talk a little bit about The Best of Learning & Leading with Technology. Read it here.

I also did an interview with ISTE over the summer for their author podcast series. Listen here. The podcast series has some great stuff, so check out the other interviews here.

Enjoy, and check back later for more chances to win a copy and for some notes about some cool resources I’ve found.

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Winners + One Drawing Still Open

Jennifer Roland — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 05:26:29 +0000

There is still one chance to win a copy of The Best of L&L from the blog tour: the Ed Buzz blog. Read my post here, and then enter here. Ed Buzz will announce the winner Oct. 2.

Here are the other winners:

Dr. Christophy (from Free Technology for Teachers)
David Ligon (from Educator’s Royal Treatment)
Kristine (from the Blue Skunk Blog)
Marcel Kielkucki (from Virtual High School Meanderings)
Craig Seasholes (from Dangerously Irrelevant)
Milton Ramirez (from Around the Corner)
Barb (from NCS Tech)
Johnathan Wylie (from NCS Tech)
Curby Alexander (from edfoc.us, posts 1 and 2)

If you haven’t yet sent me your mailing address, please email it to jennifer AT jennifer-roland DOT com. Congratulations, and thanks for all of your great comments.

And a final thank you to all of my wonderful hosts for this tour. If you haven’t yet added their blogs to your readers or subscriptions, please consider doing so. All of these bloggers offer interesting insight into educational technology.

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How Are You Celebrating Banned Books Week?

Jennifer Roland — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 23:25:02 +0000

This week, educators have the luxury of awakening a love of reading and a respect for the written word in their students. Short activities, such as asking students to write a one-page essay about the importance of books, freedom of speech, or the dangers of censorship, and longer activities, including a showcase of student-created printed and electronic reports on commonly banned books, can achieve curricular goals while helping develop students’ critical-thinking skills and judgment.

What are you doing in your classroom?

A Call for Financial Education

Friday’s Blog Tour Stops

Jennifer Roland — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 17:00:22 +0000

I’m doing double-duty today, stopping at Teach Web 2.0 to discuss Wendy Drexler’s article “Kids Galore Helping Kids in Darfur and at Edfoc.us to talk about Doug Johnson’s column “A Proposal for Banning Pencils”.

Tomorrow is the last day of the blog tour. I have enjoyed it. Have you? Did you find anything you could apply to your workday? Was there a topic you wished I had touched on?

If you missed any of my previous tour stops, here is where you can find me:

NCS-Tech: The National Gallery of Writing
Around the Corner: Teaching Creativity Comment to enter the drawing.
Dangerously Irrelevant: Technology Mentoring: A Timeless Idea Winner Craig Seasholes
Footnotes of a Retired “Teckie” Teacher: Background on The Best of L&L collection Comment to enter the drawing.
Virtual High School Meanderings: Virtual Classrooms and Pandemic Prevention (winner Marcel Kielkucki)
ISTE Connects: Crowdsourcing The Best of L&L Comment to enter the drawing.
Doug Johnson’s Blue Skunk Blog: Getting into Print (winner Kristine)
Educator’s Royal Treatment: Netbooks and One-to-One Computing (winner David Ligon)
Free Technology for Teachers: Share Your Best Technology Advice

See you tomorrow at another great education blog!

I’ll be back tomorrow and Sunday to let you know where I’ve landed.

Wednesday’s Blog Tour Stop: NCS-Tech

Jennifer Roland — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 17:00:56 +0000

Today, my blog host is Kevin Jarrett. I’m talking about the National Gallery of Writing and the different educational opportunities it can offer your classroom.

The National Gallery of Writing is a great resource to read and to post your own writing. It is part of the celebration of the National Day of Writing on October 20. Are you planning to participate? I’m hoping to post some writing there.

If you missed any of my previous tour stops, here is where you can find me:

Around the Corner: Teaching Creativity Comment to enter the drawing by Sept. 24.
Dangerously Irrelevant: Technology Mentoring: A Timeless Idea Comment to enter the drawing by Sept. 24.
Footnotes of a Retired “Teckie” Teacher: Background on The Best of L&L collection Comments close at 9pm Pacific today.
Virtual High School Meanderings: Virtual Classrooms and Pandemic Prevention (winner Marcel Kielkucki)
ISTE Connects: Crowdsourcing The Best of L&L Comments close at 9pm Pacific today.
Doug Johnson’s Blue Skunk Blog: Getting into Print (winner Kristine)
Educator’s Royal Treatment: Netbooks and One-to-One Computing (winner David Ligon)
Free Technology for Teachers: Share Your Best Technology Advice (Vote for the winner here. Voting is open until Sept. 23.)

See you tomorrow at another great education blog!

Tuesday’s Tour Stop: Around the Corner

Jennifer Roland — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 19:03:08 +0000

Today, my blog host is Miguel Guhlin, who loyal L&L readers will recognize from the Point/Counterpoint debates in volume 33 on open source and loaning technology.

I’m talking about creativity. I discuss one of the feature articles in the collection, “Sowing the Seeds of Creativity” by Mitchel Resnick, and discuss why Resnick’s ideas continue to be relevant.

If you missed any of my previous tour stops, here is where you can find me:

Dangerously Irrelevant: Technology Mentoring: A Timeless Idea Comment to enter the drawing by Sept. 24.
Footnotes of a Retired “Teckie” Teacher: Background on The Best of L&L collection Comment to enter the drawing by Sept. 23.
Virtual High School Meanderings: Virtual Classrooms and Pandemic Prevention (winner Marcel Kielkucki)
ISTE Connects: Crowdsourcing The Best of L&L Comment to enter the drawing by Sept. 23.
Doug Johnson’s Blue Skunk Blog: Getting into Print (winner Kristine)
Educator’s Royal Treatment: Netbooks and One-to-One Computing (winner David Ligon)
Free Technology for Teachers: Share Your Best Technology Advice (Vote for the winner here. Voting is open until Sept. 23.)

See you tomorrow at another great education blog!