shmuly

Today's post was written by Jim Kaufman , as he reflects on the issue of educating the creativity out of young learners. I recently started reading and listening to a well known international creativity author & expert Sir Ken Robinson . And,...( read more ) Read Full Story

From the Chicago Tribune Transformation of Chicago schools could be model for US Being from the Chicago area I have read a lot of stories over the years about Arnie Duncan. I think this one sums him up pretty well. Basically, Arnie is a chief executive type. He believes in cutting costs, merit pay, and teaching to the test. On the other hand he also believes in strong local schools, mentors, and high quality teachers. Will he transform schools the way I want? I doubt it. Will he make... Read Full Story

Today's blog was written by GlobalScholar's own Jim Kaufman. Perhaps after reading it you will add a new item to your new year's to-do list. I was reading an article recently about the all time 10 most popular New Year’s resolutions...( read more ) Read Full Story

The neighbor kids came around to visit today. (A boy age 5, two girls ages 7 and 9 and my oldest boy age 3. They all seem to like to teach him stuff, and he likes to learn.) The seven year old wanted to play teacher. Can you guess what happened then?   Yep, the other three had to sit in their desks and face the wall with the chalkboard. (Yes, we have chalkboards painted on the walls) Usually, they the neighbors love to teach him stuff, but never before did they use a school setting. I... Read Full Story

If you are not a Chicago Bears fan I will let you know a little secret, we cannot find a decent quarterback. Sid Luckman is our claim to fame. He played quarterback in the 1940’s and won 3 championships.  Since then we won the championship in 1963, won the super bowl in 1985, and lost the super bowl in 2006. Billy Wade the quarterback in 1963 had a passer rating of 74 that year 2 points above his career stats of 72.2. He went 2-8 the next year was benched the second year and retired three... Read Full Story

As of this past Friday, the Labor Department reported that 533,000 jobs were lost in November, amounting to a grand total of 1.9 million layoffs so far this year. National unemployment is now at 6.7%, up more than 2% from just one year ago. With our receding...( read more ) Read Full Story

The rise of the Internet has lead to a rise in a lot of services that are free. It was a while ago, (I can’t remember the article) that I read an article about how these companies can offer products for free. It basically boiled down to the fact that in the electronic world making copies is so cheap that it might as well be free. So giving away a copy for free is fine and you make your money back on volume somewhere else. Now I’m not an economist, but even I can see that could work fine if... Read Full Story

I have talked before about ways to fix education. It isn’t easy. Usually as far as I’m concerned it will consist of raising teacher pay , making it easier to fire teachers with cause, and probably some sort of virtual schooling to allow students to take charge of their education ( Florida virtual schools ). Here is a thought on the future of higher education with a long follow up for K-12 education by Will Richardson. Of course I shouldn’t be surprised the Dean Shareski also wrote a post on... Read Full Story

It has been a while since my last post. Some days it is just difficult to find the time to write and lately it has been like that most days. I haven’t stopped learning though. The great thing about being in education is that people expect you to spend part of time learning.Over the last few weeks I have done most of my learning through listening. I listen to the edtechtalk.com podcasts on a fairly regular basis. I listened and almost watched just about every presentation at k12online.com... Read Full Story

Growing up as a child I willingly opted for a chemistry set over a doll or a trip to the Pacific Science Center over a day at the movies. I know this probably sounds strange to most kids and I wouldn’t be offended if someone went as far as to say...( read more ) Read Full Story