Jan 06
Thinking about homework again I’ve heard some of the reasons for giving homework and it boils down to trust. It seems, by the way some teachers talk, that they don’t trust that parents are properly preparing their children. Some teachers worry that parents don’t read to their kids or don’t encourage their kids to read …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2013/01/06/hw-and-trust/
May 22
I blog and share posts about my dislike of standardized tests. I especially hate when these tests are made high stakes to determine what kids know and how well teachers are teaching. And yet both my kids take them. Why don’t I opt them out? My son is 15 years old, a freshman in high …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2012/05/22/my-own-children/
Feb 25
It was about this time last year that I wrote a blog on some lessons I was learning from my students with regards to blogging and their blogs. I was getting the clue that assigning blog assignments as homework didn’t work. Merely having a tech component wasn’t enticing enough for kids to do school work …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2012/02/25/lessons-from-student-bloggers/
May 13
I found this video on Mr. Bogush’s blog about the Finland Phenomenon aptly called, “The Finland Phenomenon.” I think that we can learn a lot from Finland. From 2000 to 2009 Finland has scored #1 in the world in Reading, Math, and Science. Yet in Finland students start school later, spend less time in school, …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2011/05/13/finlands-race-leads-somewhere/
May 12
Tuesday night at 6pm Chimacum Middle School hosted a screening of the movie Race to Nowhere. We had 92 people from our community, our schools, Sequim, and Port Townsend attend the screening and afterward many stayed behind to discuss the movie’s content. Speaking for myself, the movie was amazing. At a few points throughout the …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2011/05/12/our-race-to-somewhere/
Jan 21
This is a post that I wrote when Joe Bower, who teaches middle school aged children in Alberta, Canada, asked me if I would write a guest post on his blog (see it here – Joe has an incredible blog where he writes often about changing education for the better). I jumped at the chance …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2011/01/21/lessons-ive-learned-from-my-students-blogs/
Oct 06
[I sent this email yesterday to all the parents on of my current students, well all the parents whose email I have.] Hello Students and Families, You are getting this email because you have a child who has me for either 6th grade Science, 8th grade Science or Eagle Time or a combination of those. …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2010/10/06/1st-email-to-parents/
Sep 06
Can you believe that school has started! Today is our first day back to school and I’m very excited for this brand new school year. I have the great pleasure of getting to work with every 6th grader as they enter middle school for the first time. I’m also very fortunate to get to work …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2010/09/06/welcome-to-mr-gonzalezs-class/
Apr 07
I found this blog post by a teacher who is also trying to find ways to assess students better than traditional grading. This teacher from Alberta, Canada, has been blogging about topics such as grading and student assessment for a while now. Here are a collection of his blogs on these subjects. Etta Kralovec on …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2010/04/07/my-recent-readings/
Feb 15
Thanks to @web20classroom, @ShellTerrell, and @tomwhitby for hosting a great session this morning with Alfie Kohn, @alfiekohn (with backchanneling still going on at #kohnlive), where we got to ask questions about grades, homework, standardized testing, the state of education and reform, and teacher preparation. For those of you who are wondering what the @ symbols …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2010/02/15/how-to-motivate-students/
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I've presented at NCCE
2016, 2017, 2019, 2022,
2023, 2024, and 2025!
I presented at WSTA 2015!
