How is geography different from all other social sciences?

The first chat of #worldgeochat year 3 was this past Tuesday night at 9pm. When I started moderating these chats two and a half years ago I never dreamed that the #worldgeochat crew would grow steadily into a forum that seems to be attracting more voices each week. It’s an unusual chat because it feels […]

Rejuvenation Nation: First #edchat reflection of 2015

For my first major post of the new year I’ve decided to tackle a new reflection. If you’ve been reading the blog you have probably noticed that I have been writing a reflection for each #mschat question from the past three #mschats before the holiday break. I intend to continue the reflections but since the […]

What types of practices “distort” grades?

Well, we’ve made it. This is the 6th and final personal reflection of last week’s #mschat in regards to grading. I have to say it’s the first time that I’ve spent an entire week thinking about one conversation. It has allowed me to reflect about it from a multitude of perspectives. I’m realizing now that I […]

How are students motivated if behavior is not part of the grade?

We are up to the fifth question of last week’s #mschat and this one deals with motivation. The question of motivating students is another one that is near and dear to my heart and I was pretty excited when I found out it was going to be part of the #mschat. Now that I am […]

Should behaviors be included a grade? Why or Why not?

This post is the fourth in a series of reflection posts from last week’s #mschat on Twitter. When the fourth question came up in #mschat, I immediately rushed to the conclusion that the ‘behaviors’ in question were negative ones. Behaviors such as yelling, disruption of other students’ work, falling asleep, defiance, aggression and/or anger towards […]

What is the Role of Summative Assessment with regard to grading?

Before I start with my reflection today I want to begin with a comparison from Carnegie Mellon University Eberly School for Education’s definition of summative assessment. I’m putting this at the top of this post for anyone to refer back to and compare some of my thoughts and Twitter posts by #mschat participants. Why Carnegie […]

What is the role of formative assessment with regard to grading?

My reflection on #MSchat Question 2: So yesterday I started writing about my expanded thoughts and ideas of #mschat on Twitter thursday night. The chat focused on grading and some of the issues that teachers are forced to think about (but might not always). It was my original intention to write about all six questions in […]

Why taking grading home with you is part of a much bigger problem.

Yesterday I was writing about the amount of work that teachers bring home with them and how it is adversely affecting them to the point of causing, or at least contributing to, teacher burnout. I feel compelled today to expand on that conversation and provide some deeper inquiry and insight to my thoughts. You can […]

“You want me to join Twitter”?!?

That was my response to a woman I only vaguely knew at work about three years ago. She was having a meeting in my classroom (it was not being used during that period and just happen to be open) and I walked in as she was concluding. We got to talking about teaching and pedagogy, […]

Connected

As an educator I see lots of ideas come and go. There always seems to be the ‘next-big-thing’ that will revolutionize the way education is done. What the reality is more like is there are solutions to specific types of problems that only work if there is enough buy in from the faculty within the […]