Can Video Games Teach Kids?

In our session today, "Play Is Important for Deep Learning" in the Webinar Series "Listening for Understanding," we talked about digital games for learning. 

We asked the broad question, "what if digital gaming IS the curriculum?" And we shared a resource that answers the question.

Check out Quest to Learn (Q2L), the first-ever school we know of that builds its entire curriculum on games-based learning. Located in New York City, the school is "not a school whose curriculum is made up of the play of commercial videogames, but rather a school that uses the underlying design principles of games to create highly immersive, game-like learning experiences. Games and other forms of digital media serve another useful purpose at Quest: they serve to model the complexity and promise of “systems.” Understanding and accounting for this complexity is a fundamental literacy of the 21st century."

You can learn more about this exciting school via its website.  By the way, Quest is recuiting teachers for the next  school year! 

You can tune in to future webinars in the series at http://www.michiganeducatorsplc.com/

MEMSPA 2009 Annual Conference

This Thursday, December 3rd, we will present at the MEMSPA (Michigan Elementary and Middle School Principals Association) State Conference on "Using Tech to Differentiate by Interest in Middle School."

Technology, Differentiated Instruction, and the Middle School Learner

The Michigan Department of Education, in conjunction with MACUL, asked if we would be willing to continue the conversation that we initiated with technology and curriculum directors via our keynote address on differentiating instruction + technology at the Michigan Technology and Curriculum Director Meeting, October 6. Today is the first of two webinars that we will be presenting as follow-ups to our conversation.


"EdTech Specialists is conducting a series of FREE Webinars entitled: “Listening for Understanding." With a “funding cliff” approaching Michigan schools, the time has come to listen to the ideas of others, brainstorm options that will increase the efficiency and effectiveness of student learning, and, as State Superintendent Mike Flanagan has stated: “ReImagine” education in Michigan. To jump start your conversations, EdTech Specialists has lined up an impressive group of individuals who will share their views, programs, strategies, and experiences that have helped to assist their districts and others with innovative options for delivering instruction."

Technology, Differentiated Instruction, and the Middle School Learner
Reserve your Webinar seat now at:
https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/165681217

Description:
Some educators believe that differentiated instruction belongs in the elementary classroom but is not appropriate or effective for middle school students. Dr. Grace Smith and Dr. Stephanie Throne, authors of the forthcoming text, Differentiating Instruction with Technology in Middle School Classrooms (and Differentiating Instruction with Technology in K-5 Classrooms), will share how differentiated instruction, powered by technology, can serve to reach the physical, emotional and social needs unique to the middle school learner. Drs. Smith and Throne will suggest a variety of different tech tools and strategies that educators can use to differentiate instruction in the middle school classroom and personalize learning for today’s diverse students.

Forest Hills School District

Yesterday, we spent some time with teachers from the Forest Hills School District in Ohio. We surprised them by participating in their professional development session in Elluminate entitled, "The Power of Two: Differentiated Instruction + Technology," which is a phrase from our first book!"

Michigan Technology & Curriculum Director Meeting, October 6, 2009

We were honored to be asked to keynote on the topic "Differentiated Instruction + Technology" at the annual Technology & Curriculum Director Meeting Tuesday, October 6, 2009 in Lansing, Michigan. Sponsored by the Michigan Department of Education and MACUL (Michigan Association for Computer Users in Learning), the meeting was attended by 225 curriculum directors and technology coordinators from Michigan school districts.

K-12 Teachers of Writing

If you are a K-12 teacher of writing, please let us know which technology tools you use to teach writing and whether the tools are helping to improve students' writing.

As writers ourselves, we are interested in the strategies teachers use with K-12 students to ignite an interest in writing and to help them learn how to write effectively.

As former teachers of writing at the secondary and college level (pre-Web 2.0) and as online instructors now, we read graduate-level daily discussion postings and weekly papers. We notice that written communication continues to be an area of struggle for many, including teachers. We are not certain why graduate level students who have had at least 16 years of education and practice have not learned to write clearly and concisely.

You may want to take a look at the Bob Costas Grants for the Teaching of Writing to see what your innovative colleagues are doing. This year's competition is over, but you can email to ask about the 2010 competition.

Tiering vs. Tracking

Advocates of differentiated instruction are sometimes asked whether tiering instruction is the same as tracking students.

Answer: tiering is NOT the same as tracking.

Tracking refers to the decades-old practice of splitting students into homogenous groups based on roughly the same intelligence level. The homogeneous groups typically stay together and move from class to class throughout the day.

Tiering refers to the creating of flexible groups within the classroom to match learners' instructional needs with the learning at hand. Tiering can apply to readiness, learning profile, interest, process (activities), and assessment. Flexible grouping is just as it sounds; students are regrouped according to the learning at hand and regrouped again based on the learning at hand. Tiering takes place only in the individual classroom.