How Will We Read? – The Book Given.
On November 26, 1864, Lewis Carroll gave my relative, Alice Pleasance Liddell, a book he had written for her. He called the book Alice’s Adventures Underground after considering titles such as Alice’s Golden House, Alice Among the Elves, Alice Among the Goblins, and Alice’s Doings In Wonderland. Carroll had spent over two years writing and illustrating the book for Alice. It consisted of ninety-two pages covered with his print like writing as well as thirty-seven of his own pen and ink drawings. The book given to Alice Liddell would change her life forever.
It all began (as Carroll reminded his followers on a number of occasions) because of a 10 year-old girl who had encouraged Carroll’s storytelling for years, and in particular a story he told about Alice in Wonderland during a summer day’s picnic on July 4, 1862. Alice was continuously insistent that Carroll write the story down for her, which he eventually did and ultimately presented to her as an early Christmas gift. The book would also change Carroll’s life forever, but it might never have happened if a young girl had not inspired the previously unpublished children’s book author to write the greatest children’s book of all time.
There are over 20,000 books, films, operas, plays and video games based on Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There. It is estimated that over 8 billion people have read or seen presentations of the “Alice” books. Lewis Carroll is behind only the Bible and Shakespeare in the number of quotations from the “Alice” books that appear in published discourse. In addition to the new adaptations of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Carroll’s and Liddell’s lives continue to inspire numerous new books, works of art, and film projects. And all because of “a book given.”
If the book given to Alice in 1864 was given today, just imagine the variety of different ways a creative chap like Lewis Carroll might have presented it to his Alice. Quantum leaps in technology have completely changed the way we write, illustrate, publish, market, promote and consume books. I find myself (like Alice) constantly curious and excited about discovering all the new products in the digital books wonderland, while at the same time overwhelmed by all the new found freedoms the technology revolution promises to offer me. Is the device simple stupid enough for me to connect with quickly in my already complicated life? Is it time to buy this tablet or this e-reader? Will I look out of date to my bridge pals when the new updated version is released in 6 months time? I also wonder whether any of us will recognize the content of yesterday’s “book” once the revolution settles down. Will writing for Google become such an integral part of the book marketing culture that creative processes are dramatically changed?
Between you and me, I yearn for some form of consolidation in all the craziness that would enable me to feel I can comment intelligently on what appears to be the longer term trends in the publishing model. One thing I know for sure: an entertainment business career which kept me moving through the theatrical, television, video, DVD, pay on demand and pay television formats taught me that we don’t stop watching great movies. As a passionate movie lover, I would argue that the changing technology enabled me to watch more great and even not so great movies than ever before, since I was able to do it more often thanks to a variety of formats that accommodated my ever-changing hectic lifestyle. In addition, those great movies that made that unforgettable connection and changed my life forever, I not only watched again and again, but I insisted on owning them in every possible format I could fit onto the living room shelf.
And so I don’t believe that passionate readers, like passionate movie lovers, will ever disappear. The way readers read will of course continue to evolve and change, but certain things about the cultural experience will not. For example, everything will still begin with the written word, and if that written word is to survive the test of time and change lives forever (like the book given to my relative in 1864), it will happen because of rare talent and creativity and innovative thinking in an age that is redefining how we shall read.
Read more at http://www.educationnews.org/technology/how-will-we-read-the-book-given/
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Showing posts with label How To. Show all posts
Showing posts with label How To. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 5, 2012
Sunday, June 17, 2012
How Can Teachers Create a Learner Centered Environment?
How Can Teachers Create a Learner Centered Environment?
As a classroom teacher, does the idea of a learner centered environment sound new to you?
The Alliance for Excellent Education recently released Culture Shift: Teaching in a Learner-Centered Environment Powered By Digital Learning.
The report advocates that a culture shift to a learner centered classroom environment is needed to prepare students to meet the challenges and demands of a global economy, that:
1) Learning needs to be rigorous and based on college and career-ready expectations.
2) Learning is personalized.
3) Learning is collaborative, relevant, and applied.
4) Learning is flexible, taking place anytime, anywhere.
This insightful report confirms and expands on what many teachers know are challenges in classrooms. I was fortunate to be part of an Alliance for Excellent Education panel that discussed the transformations needed in teaching in order to create this culture shift.
Then, a few days later at the Content in Context conference, presented by the Association of Educational Publishers and Association of American Publishers School Division, I had the opportunity to join a panel of publishers as an educator representative to discuss Organizing for the Future: Making the Learner the Focus of Your Business where we talked about the importance and challenges of creating products to support a learner-centered future.
From an educator perspective, we all welcome the emerging discussions on how publishers can support teachers in creating learner-centered classrooms.
And, if it involves meaningful integration of technology, so much the better!
Here are my take-aways from both events:
1) Effective teachers have always created a learner centered environment.
How do you survive teaching a group of students with learning disabilities and others with emotional disabilities? Hint: Know them as individuals, understand their strengths, needs, and learning styles, and be able to differentiate the ways they learn grade level content.
Create this learner-centered environment, one builds a learning community and manages behaviors of the class.
Fail to do so......watch the chaos unfold!!!
In other words, effective teachers with students with diverse socio-cultural and learning needs have always been learner centered.
Perhaps, the concept of learner centered environment actually originated in the one-room school house- where the teachers had students of different ages learning different content.
On the other hand, when discussing a culture shift, more is needed to scale this philosophy....
2) We need meaningful publisher and teacher collaboration
With the wide availability of multimedia and other resources on the Internet, the focus on the textbook as the sole source for information is decreasing. Many teachers supplement the textbook with additional resources to meet the needs of students.
In the emerging era of flipped classrooms, Khan Academy, iTunes U, You Tube, and other on-demand Internet resources that empower students to learn outside of the classroom, publishers will need to collaborate more with teachers to be able to create more relevant and meaningful products to support teachers.
This collaboration is essential in meeting the needs of an ever-increasing student diversity within the context of classrooms with higher and more rigorous standards.
At the same time, publishers have also experienced challenges with providing resources for teachers due to differences in state standards and the thousands of school districts, each with their own procurement timelines and adoption cycles.
Hopefully, the adoption of the Common Core Standards will facilitate the development of closer publisher and teacher collaboration to create more meaningful and relevant resources for students.
3) Learner centered environments will require technology.
How can a paper based textbook compete with dynamic, interactive, and on-demand digital resources?
It can't.
When I taught high school English literature at an elite private high school, the (general education) students did fine with the grade level textbook. But, in my 8th grade public school (special education) classroom where the reading levels of students ranged from 3rd to 6th grade, trying to learn 8th grade content with a textbook that had a reading level ranging from 8th to 9th grade was challenging.
My students needed, what the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards describes as, multiple paths to knowledge- being able to have a variety of resources that meets the learning needs of each student in order to access the grade level content.
As I shared at the panel, what we need is a "device" that can present the grade level content, but has features that can change the reading level of the text as appropriate for the student, integrate video and other appropriate multimedia content, and interactive simulations. The content should be updated regularly and have assessment features.
Soon, there will be Apps for that.
Paper doesn't cut it. A learner centered environment requires technology.
4) New roles are needed for the teacher profession.
The Alliance for Excellent Education report highlighted new professional responsibilities and roles for teachers:
a) Teachers as Facilitator of Learning
b) User of Data and Assessments
c) Collaborator, Contributor, and Coach with Peers
d) Curriculum Adapter and Designer
The teaching profession will also need to adapt in order to sustain these transformations. Since these roles require additional skills and knowledge, the teaching profession will need to better understand how to develop and support these differentiated roles to establish a professional culture with multiple levels of expertise and skill sets.
5) Transparency in classrooms will drive the change.
Will the public demand this cultural shift in teaching and learning?
During the Alliance panel discussion, Peggy Brookins, a National Board Certified Teacher and Director of the Engineering and Management Institute of Technology of Forest High School in Florida, and Erin Frew, Principal of New Tech West High School in Ohio showed videos of student activities that exemplify the potential of a learner centered environment.
Videos of student activities and projects in learner centered classrooms need to become viral. The public should demand that their children do similar activities at their school.
Schools should feature the types of learning that goes on in classrooms. Transparency can restore a healthy balance of relevant instruction and meaningful assessment, to "turn around" the narrowing of curriculum and learning associated with the test prep era.
Then ALL teachers, publishers, and other stakeholders can make that culture wide shift to create that learner centered environment that prepares All students for the future.
Read more at http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/leading_from_the_classroom/2012/06/how_can_teachers_create_a_learner_centered_environment.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+LeadingFromTheClassroom+%28Leading+From+the+Classroom%29
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
As a classroom teacher, does the idea of a learner centered environment sound new to you?
The Alliance for Excellent Education recently released Culture Shift: Teaching in a Learner-Centered Environment Powered By Digital Learning.
The report advocates that a culture shift to a learner centered classroom environment is needed to prepare students to meet the challenges and demands of a global economy, that:
1) Learning needs to be rigorous and based on college and career-ready expectations.
2) Learning is personalized.
3) Learning is collaborative, relevant, and applied.
4) Learning is flexible, taking place anytime, anywhere.
This insightful report confirms and expands on what many teachers know are challenges in classrooms. I was fortunate to be part of an Alliance for Excellent Education panel that discussed the transformations needed in teaching in order to create this culture shift.
Then, a few days later at the Content in Context conference, presented by the Association of Educational Publishers and Association of American Publishers School Division, I had the opportunity to join a panel of publishers as an educator representative to discuss Organizing for the Future: Making the Learner the Focus of Your Business where we talked about the importance and challenges of creating products to support a learner-centered future.
From an educator perspective, we all welcome the emerging discussions on how publishers can support teachers in creating learner-centered classrooms.
And, if it involves meaningful integration of technology, so much the better!
Here are my take-aways from both events:
1) Effective teachers have always created a learner centered environment.
How do you survive teaching a group of students with learning disabilities and others with emotional disabilities? Hint: Know them as individuals, understand their strengths, needs, and learning styles, and be able to differentiate the ways they learn grade level content.
Create this learner-centered environment, one builds a learning community and manages behaviors of the class.
Fail to do so......watch the chaos unfold!!!
In other words, effective teachers with students with diverse socio-cultural and learning needs have always been learner centered.
Perhaps, the concept of learner centered environment actually originated in the one-room school house- where the teachers had students of different ages learning different content.
On the other hand, when discussing a culture shift, more is needed to scale this philosophy....
2) We need meaningful publisher and teacher collaboration
With the wide availability of multimedia and other resources on the Internet, the focus on the textbook as the sole source for information is decreasing. Many teachers supplement the textbook with additional resources to meet the needs of students.
In the emerging era of flipped classrooms, Khan Academy, iTunes U, You Tube, and other on-demand Internet resources that empower students to learn outside of the classroom, publishers will need to collaborate more with teachers to be able to create more relevant and meaningful products to support teachers.
This collaboration is essential in meeting the needs of an ever-increasing student diversity within the context of classrooms with higher and more rigorous standards.
At the same time, publishers have also experienced challenges with providing resources for teachers due to differences in state standards and the thousands of school districts, each with their own procurement timelines and adoption cycles.
Hopefully, the adoption of the Common Core Standards will facilitate the development of closer publisher and teacher collaboration to create more meaningful and relevant resources for students.
3) Learner centered environments will require technology.
How can a paper based textbook compete with dynamic, interactive, and on-demand digital resources?
It can't.
When I taught high school English literature at an elite private high school, the (general education) students did fine with the grade level textbook. But, in my 8th grade public school (special education) classroom where the reading levels of students ranged from 3rd to 6th grade, trying to learn 8th grade content with a textbook that had a reading level ranging from 8th to 9th grade was challenging.
My students needed, what the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards describes as, multiple paths to knowledge- being able to have a variety of resources that meets the learning needs of each student in order to access the grade level content.
As I shared at the panel, what we need is a "device" that can present the grade level content, but has features that can change the reading level of the text as appropriate for the student, integrate video and other appropriate multimedia content, and interactive simulations. The content should be updated regularly and have assessment features.
Soon, there will be Apps for that.
Paper doesn't cut it. A learner centered environment requires technology.
4) New roles are needed for the teacher profession.
The Alliance for Excellent Education report highlighted new professional responsibilities and roles for teachers:
a) Teachers as Facilitator of Learning
b) User of Data and Assessments
c) Collaborator, Contributor, and Coach with Peers
d) Curriculum Adapter and Designer
The teaching profession will also need to adapt in order to sustain these transformations. Since these roles require additional skills and knowledge, the teaching profession will need to better understand how to develop and support these differentiated roles to establish a professional culture with multiple levels of expertise and skill sets.
5) Transparency in classrooms will drive the change.
Will the public demand this cultural shift in teaching and learning?
During the Alliance panel discussion, Peggy Brookins, a National Board Certified Teacher and Director of the Engineering and Management Institute of Technology of Forest High School in Florida, and Erin Frew, Principal of New Tech West High School in Ohio showed videos of student activities that exemplify the potential of a learner centered environment.
Videos of student activities and projects in learner centered classrooms need to become viral. The public should demand that their children do similar activities at their school.
Schools should feature the types of learning that goes on in classrooms. Transparency can restore a healthy balance of relevant instruction and meaningful assessment, to "turn around" the narrowing of curriculum and learning associated with the test prep era.
Then ALL teachers, publishers, and other stakeholders can make that culture wide shift to create that learner centered environment that prepares All students for the future.
Read more at http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/leading_from_the_classroom/2012/06/how_can_teachers_create_a_learner_centered_environment.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+LeadingFromTheClassroom+%28Leading+From+the+Classroom%29
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Wednesday, December 21, 2011
Discover How To Teach English Abroad TEFL / TESOL
Discover How To Teach English Abroad TEFL / TESOL By Joel Gray.
Have you ever thought about an opportunity to teach the English language abroad but are unsure how you can get involved? If so, than this article can help. If you have ever wondered how to teach English internationally then a TEFL / TESOL certification course could be the answer for you. Throughout this article we will explain what TEFL / TESOL is, as well as what it involves, and how a TEFL / TESOL course can advance your opportunities if you are looking to teach people from other countries how to speak English. By the end of the next few paragraphs, you will have a much deeper understanding as to how to begin your dream career and become one-step closer in your goal of teaching abroad.
Let’s begin by discussing what TEFL / TESOL actually is and who is qualified to take TEFL / TESOL training courses.
Read more at http://languagecorps.bizbuzzweekly.com/2010/12/20/discover-how-to-teach-english-abroad-by-joel-gray/
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Have you ever thought about an opportunity to teach the English language abroad but are unsure how you can get involved? If so, than this article can help. If you have ever wondered how to teach English internationally then a TEFL / TESOL certification course could be the answer for you. Throughout this article we will explain what TEFL / TESOL is, as well as what it involves, and how a TEFL / TESOL course can advance your opportunities if you are looking to teach people from other countries how to speak English. By the end of the next few paragraphs, you will have a much deeper understanding as to how to begin your dream career and become one-step closer in your goal of teaching abroad.
Let’s begin by discussing what TEFL / TESOL actually is and who is qualified to take TEFL / TESOL training courses.
Read more at http://languagecorps.bizbuzzweekly.com/2010/12/20/discover-how-to-teach-english-abroad-by-joel-gray/
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Sunday, October 23, 2011
Why Great Teachers Quit & How to stop the Teacher Exodus.
Why Great Teachers Quit & How to stop the Teacher Exodus.
How much time have you spent on interview committees? Time when you could have been grading papers, contacting parents, or preparing for your next class? If you have been teaching for more than a few years, you’ve undoubtedly sat in on countless interview committees. That’s because too many of your most talented colleagues have quit teaching — some suddenly — many for preventable reasons. It’s likely that many of them were outstanding teachers, and our schools spend tens of thousands of dollars hiring new ones, only to repeat this cycle in a few short years. It’s a waste of money, time, and resources (all which we know are increasingly scarce).
Read more at http://www.seenmagazine.us/articles/article-detail/articleid/1646/why-great-teachers-quit-how-to-stop-the-teacher-exodus.aspx
By Katy Farber
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
How much time have you spent on interview committees? Time when you could have been grading papers, contacting parents, or preparing for your next class? If you have been teaching for more than a few years, you’ve undoubtedly sat in on countless interview committees. That’s because too many of your most talented colleagues have quit teaching — some suddenly — many for preventable reasons. It’s likely that many of them were outstanding teachers, and our schools spend tens of thousands of dollars hiring new ones, only to repeat this cycle in a few short years. It’s a waste of money, time, and resources (all which we know are increasingly scarce).
Read more at http://www.seenmagazine.us/articles/article-detail/articleid/1646/why-great-teachers-quit-how-to-stop-the-teacher-exodus.aspx
By Katy Farber
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
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