December 21, 2011
by Larry Ferlazzo
1 Comment
This video might be a little “over-the-top” in sentimentality, but it’s very well done. I’ll certainly use it in my ESL class to have students both describe what they see happen in the video and the message it is trying to send:
December 21, 2011
by Larry Ferlazzo
1 Comment
I’ve previously posted about my classroom practice of having students share three good things that have happened to them during the week, and shared studies that demonstrate its value in enhancing a positive classroom environment. At the same time, I ask students to share about something that was “not so good” and what they could have done to make it better.
It’s always gone very well.
Today, though, I read about an exercise that I think can make it even better.
Tom Peters wrote about an idea called the “Three Good Things Exercise” from Martin Seligman, founder of the Positive Psychology Movement. Here is how Peters described it:
Each night before you go to sleep:
1. Think of three good things that happened today.
Anything from the most mundane to the most exalted works, as long as it seems to you like a good, positive, happy thing.
2. Write them down.
3. Reflect on why they happened.
Determining the “why” of the event is the most important part of the exercise, and can open up your mind to ways you can increase the positive experiences you have.
As I read this, I realized that though I have asked my students to reflect on why an event didn’t go very well, I’ve never asked them to think about why their three positive experiences were so positive.
Duh! In retrospect, I’ve clearly missed a great opportunity for reflection and metacognition.
But it’s never too late to learn. I’ll start trying this out and blog about the results.
I’m adding this post to My Best Posts On Why It’s Important To Be Positive In Class.
December 21, 2011
by Larry Ferlazzo
2 Comments
LearnZillion has tons of free video math lessons that end with a quiz. Those in themselves are not that big of a deal, but three nice things about them are that they are designed by teachers, are free, and that teachers can create “virtual” classes and monitor student progress on them.
As a non-math teacher and as someone who detests anything to do with math, I cannot vouch for the quality of these lessons. However, I’m still adding it to The Best MATH Sites That Students Can Use Independently And Let Teachers Check On Progress.
I heard about LearnZillion on NPR’s Market Watch program, and you can read/hear it here.
December 21, 2011
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
I’ve just made a number of revisions and additions to The Best Websites For Students Exploring Jobs & Careers.
Feel free to offer additions suggestions.
December 21, 2011
by Larry Ferlazzo
3 Comments
Though I’ll still be publishing daily posts, I’ll be taking a bit of a break over the next couple of weeks.
School’s out this Friday, and I have some book projects and articles to finish, not to mention taking a little family time.
I hope your holiday break is restful and fun!
December 20, 2011
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
Here’s my monthly round-up of new “The Best…” lists I posted in December (you can see all 835 of them categorized here):
The Best Resources, Articles & Blog Posts For Teachers Of ELL’s In 2011 — Part Two
The Best Websites For English Language Learner Students In 2011
The Best “Fun” Sites You Can Use For Learning, Too — 2011
The Best Art & Music Sites Of 2011
The Best Resources For Learning About Higgs Boson, The “God Particle” — December,2011
The Best Science Sites Of 2011
The Best Sites For Learning About The Mars Rover Curiosity — December, 2011
The Best Social Studies Sites Of 2011
The Best Year-End Collections Of Images — 2011
The Best Articles & Posts On Education Policy In 2011 — Part Two
A Collection Of “The Best…” Lists On School Reform Issues — 2011
The Best “Words Of The Year” Features For 2011
The Best Comic Strips For Students & Teachers In 2011
The Best Videos For Educators In 2011
A Collection Of “The Best…” Lists On Parent Engagement — 2011
The Best Theory Of Knowledge Resources In 2011
The Best Reflective Posts I’ve Written About My Teaching Practice In 2011
The Best Articles (And Blog Posts) Offering Practical Advice To Teachers In 2011
The Best Resources For Showing Students That They Make Their Brain Stronger By Learning — December, 2011
My Best Posts On New Research Studies In 2011
The Best (and Worst) Education News of 2011
The Best Places To Find The Most Popular (& Useful) Resources For Educators –2011
A Collection Of “The Best…” Lists On Technology — 2011
The Best Good, Inexpensive & Simple Classroom Technology Tools — December, 2011
The Best Ways For Students To Create Online Holiday Content Quickly & Easily — December, 2011
December 20, 2011
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
I regularly highlight my picks for the most useful posts for each month — not including “The Best…” lists. I also use some of them in a more extensive monthly newsletter I send-out. You can see my previous Best Posts of the Month at Websites Of The Month.
These posts are different from the ones I list under the monthly “Most Popular Blog Posts.” Those are the posts the largest numbers of readers “clicked-on” to read. I have to admit, I’ve been a bit lax about writing those posts, though.
Here are some of the posts I personally think are the best, and most helpful, ones I’ve written during this past month (not in any order of preference):
December 20, 2011
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
As regular readers know, I’ve got a “beef” with most of the quotation sites on the Web because they don’t include the source of the quotes. I included a longer discussion on that issue, along with a variety of links, in The Best Places To Find Quotations On The Web.
That said, a new site called QuoteCoil now appears to be just about the largest site on the Web to find quotations. Though the quotes don’t include sources, it still might be worth starting there just because it’s so easy. In the Best list I mentioned I share simple ways to track down if quotations are accurate…
December 20, 2011
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
I just posted the fourth and final installment in my four-part Education Week series on classroom management.
You might want to take a look…
December 20, 2011
by Larry Ferlazzo
4 Comments
I’ve got a huge The Best Places To Learn About Christmas, Hanukkah, & Kwanzaa list.
In fact, it may be a bit too big….
I’ve created a shorter list on my ESL class blog that only includes sites where students can create online holiday-related content quickly and easily =- without having to register anywhere.
I thought readers might find it useful.
December 20, 2011
by Larry Ferlazzo
1 Comment
Google Maps Mania has found another great Web 2.0 Christmas tool — Christmas and Hoffman lets you upload your own photos and, without registration, you end up with a movie you can share showing Santa visiting your own home.
I’ll be adding it to The Best Places To Learn About Christmas, Hanukkah, & Kwanzaa.
December 20, 2011
by Larry Ferlazzo
9 Comments
Only seven more days left to contribute!
As I do every year, I’m asking that readers leave a comment with the title and author of their favorite education-related that they read this calendar year. In addition, I ask that they leave a sentence or two describing why they liked it.
Please get your comments to me by December 27th.
As usual, I’ll publish people’s recommendations (along with their names and links to their blog if they have one) on January 1st.
It’s always a great list. You can see previous editions at:
The Best Education-Related Books Visitors To This Blog Read In 2010
The Best Education-Related Books Visitors To This Blog Read In 2009
The Best Education-Related Books Visitors To This Blog Read In 2008
December 20, 2011
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
Obviously, photos can be great educational tools with English Language Learners and with any students (see The Best Ways To Use Photos In Lessons). I post about many photo galleries, also called slideshows. To do it in a little more organized way, though, I recently began this weekly feature called “Photo Galleries Of The Week.” This post is a “round-up” of online slideshows I’m adding to various “The Best…” lists:
These first four are additions to The Best Year-End Collections Of Images — 2011:
2011 defining moments is from The Washington Post.
Photos Of The Year comes from The Wall Street Journal.
The Year In Pictures Part 1 comes from The Boston Globe.
TIME’s Best Photojournalism of 2011
Penguins Round the World is a photo gallery from LIFE. I’m adding it to The Best Sites For Learning About Penguins.
The Ashaninka, A Threatened Way of Life is a slideshow from The Atlantic. I’m adding it to The Best Sites For International Day Of The World’s Indigenous People.
Best Photos From Space 2011 comes from TIME. I’m adding it to The Best Images Taken In Space.
50 best photos from The Natural World comes from The Boston Globe.
December 19, 2011
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
Vicki Davis, high up there on just about anybody’s list of favorite — and nicest — education bloggers, is suggesting that bloggers take a variety of actions this holiday season to help end human slavery.
You can read all of her suggestions here.
One of her ideas is for education bloggers to write a related post. That’s what this piece is and, in addition, I’ve made some new additions to The Best Resources For Learning About Human Trafficking Today.
I hope you’ll take a look at Vicki’s list of suggestions and act on one or all of them….
December 19, 2011
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
It’s time for the annual list of my most popular blog posts of the year — determined by the number of times they’ve been visited.
You might also be interested in these previous lists:
My Most Popular Posts Of The Year — 2010
Most Popular Posts Over The First Three Years Of This Blog
The Most Popular Posts Of The Year — 2009
The Most Popular Posts Of 2008
As usual, I’m dividing the list into two sections — “The Best….” lists and other posts.
Here are My Most Popular Blog Posts Of The Year – 2010:
MOST POPULAR “THE BEST…” LISTS:
1. The Best Resources For Helping Teachers Use Bloom’s Taxonomy In The Classroom
2. The Best Web 2.0 Applications For Education In 2011
3. The Best Teacher Resources For “Foldables”
4. The Best Popular Movies/TV Shows For ESL/EFL
5. The Best Sites For Cooperative Learning Ideas
6. The Best Sites To Help Teach About 9/11
7. Not “The Best,” But “A List” Of Music Sites
8. The Best Sites For Online Photo-Editing & Photo Effects
9. The Best Websites To Help Beginning Readers
10. The Best Online Sources For Images
THE TOP POSTS THAT WERE NOT “THE BEST…” LISTS:
1. Helping Students Motivate Themselves: Practical Answers To Classroom Challenges
2. Excerpt From My Book On Teaching English Language Learners
3. Neat! Create A Fake iPhone Text Conversation
4. Jon Stewart & Diane Ravitch Knock It Out Of The Park!
5. Answers To “What Do You Do On The First Day Of School?”
6. First Chapter of My Book, Hand-Outs & Links Are Now Online For Free
7. Two More Video Sites Like TED Talks
8. “Draw A Stickman” & Make Him Come To Life
9. Yale Makes 260,000 Images Available Online — With No Limitations On Their Usage
10. Why Is It Important For Students To Learn About Bloom’s Taxonomy?
December 19, 2011
by Larry Ferlazzo
1 Comment
The British Council has just unveiled a new feature on their site called Speak And Spell. It has lots of interactives.
I’m adding it to The Best Spelling Sites.
December 19, 2011
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
Here are two fun online holiday cards that can be sent without any required registration:
Share A Carol lets you type in an address, lets you decorate the location, and then allows you choose a carol to be sung with it. You can write a message and then share it via Facebook, Twitter or email. Students can post a link to their creation on a student/teacher blog or website.
House Bling is a similar site minus the music.
I’ll be adding both to The Best Places To Learn About Christmas, Hanukkah, & Kwanzaa.
Thanks to Google Maps Mania for the tip.
December 19, 2011
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
There have been so many excellent posts and articles about school reform (and videos, too!) this year that it’s been extraordinarily difficult to narrow them down.
So, I gave up. I’m keeping The Best Articles & Posts On Education Policy In 2011 — So Far, which covers the first six months of this year, and making this “Part Two” post so that it only covers the last six months.
In addition to Part One, you might also be interested in these previous editions:
The Best Articles & Posts On Education Policy — 2010
The “Best” Articles (And Blog Posts) About Education Policy — 2009
The “Best” Articles About Education — 2008
The “Best” Articles About Education — 2007
Here are my choices for The Best Articles & Posts On Education Policy In 2011 — Part Two (not listed in order of preference):
How Online Learning Companies Bought America’s Schools is from The Nation.
Roxanna Elden has hit another home run with her post “Five School Reform Sound Bites That Hurt Teacher Buy-In.”
I’m going to humbly include Why schools should not grade character traits, a piece I wrote for The Washington Post.
Paradoxes of the Finland Phenomenon is by Joe Bower.
Atul Gawande’s feature article The New Yorker, Personal Best: Top athletes and singers have coaches. Should you?, sure sparked a lot of discussion on instructional coaches. I did an interview with Pam Moran, the Superintendent of the District featured in Gawande’s article. It is, be far, the most important piece on instructional coaching I’ve seen.
Linda Darling-Hammond’s Getting teacher evaluation right at The Answer Sheet may be THE piece on teacher evaluation.
The Grass Is Greener: Learning from Other Countries is by Yong Zhao.
Bias toward Numbers in Judging Teaching is by Larry Cuban.
School ‘Reform’: A Failing Grade is by Diane Ravitch.
What Americans Think About Teachers Versus What They’re Hearing is from The Shanker Blog.
Why Are Finland’s Schools Successful? is from The Smithsonian Magazine.
Scapegoating is by Richard Kahlenberg.
When an adult took standardized tests forced on kids is from Valerie Strauss’ blog at The Washington Post.
Feedback is welcome.
If you found this post useful, you might want to look at the 800 other “The Best…” lists and consider subscribing to this blog for free.
December 18, 2011
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
I have a huge backlog of resources that I’ve been planning to post about in this blog but, just because of time constraints, have not gotten around to doing. Instead of letting that backlog grow bigger, I regularly grab a few and list them here with a minimal description. It forces me to look through these older links, and help me organize them for my own use. I hope others will find them helpful, too. These are resources that I didn’t include in my “Best Tweets” feature because I had planned to post about them, or because I didn’t even get around to sending a tweet sharing them.
Here are This Week’s “Links I Should Have Posted About, But Didn’t”:
What Is Higgs Boson? is a pretty good infographic. I’m adding it to The Best Resources For Learning About Higgs Boson, The “God Particle.”
The Top 20 iPhone And iPad Apps of 2011 comes from TechCrunch. I’m adding it to The Best Sites For Beginning iPhone Users Like Me.
Google+ Expands ’On Air’ Hangouts is from TechCrunch. I’m adding it to The Best Resources For Learning What Google+ Is All About.
Alexander Graham Bell: Early recordings played is a neat interactive from The Associated Press. I’m adding it to The Best Sites Where Students Can Learn About Inventions.
US-Mexico immigration: Even oceans have borders is from The BBC. I’m adding it to The Best Sites To Learn About Walls That Separate Us.
Predicting the Future of Computing is a really neat New York Times timeline. I’m adding it to The Best Sites For Learning About The History Of Technology.
Ten tech items you won’t be needing anymore is a slideshow from The Los Angeles Times. I’m adding it to the same list.
Tech Has Saved the Postal Service for 200 Years—Today, It Won’t is an intriguing slideshow. I’m adding it, too, to that same list.
Inconvenient Income Inequality is from The New York Times. I’m adding it to The Best Resources About Wealth & Income Inequality.
On fairy tales about inequality is from The Economic Policy Institute. I’m adding it to the same list.
Here are some other regular features I post in this blog:
“The Best…” series (which now number 691)
The most popular posts on this blog each month
My monthly choices for the best posts on this blog each month
Each month I do an “Interview Of The Month” with a leader in education
Periodically, I post “A Look Back” highlighting older posts that I think are particularly useful
Resources that share various “most popular” lists useful to teachers
Interviews with ESL/EFL teachers in “hot spots” around the world.
Articles I’ve written for other publications.
Regular “round-ups” of good posts and articles about school reform
December 18, 2011
by Larry Ferlazzo
0 comments
In yet another attempt to get at the enormous backlog I have of sites worth sharing, I’ve recently begin a regular feature called “The Week In Web 2.0.” It’ll be a short compilation of new decent sites that are worth noting, but not necessarily worth a separate post:
Ana Survey is yet another online survey tool. The free option is limited, but useful. It’s hard for me to understand, though, why the world needs another survey tool. There are plenty out there, and you can find many at The Best Sites For Creating Online Polls & Surveys.
Picozu is an online tool to edit images. It’s nice, but how many online image editing tools does the world need? You can find a ton at The Best Sites For Online Photo-Editing & Photo Effects.
QikPad is a nice online collaborative writing tool that has an embedding feature. I’m adding it to The Best Online Tools For Real-Time Collaboration. Thanks to Richard Byrne for the tip.
