Jokes:

Coders:

“Every day, the feuding codebreakers had cryptic cross words.”

****

“How much does it cost to buy a large singing group?”

“A choir?”

“Okay, fine… how much does it cost to ‘acquire’ a large singing group?”

****

“A courthouse is where you can play indoor tennis.”

****

“Only a nickel for an embroidered pinwheel? 

Good buy, crewel whirled!”

****

My doctor was giving me a hard time about my health. To get back on his good side I bought a puppy and named him ‘Five Miles’.

That way, when I went to see my doctor I could tell him, “I walk five miles every morning!”

****

Advisory:

55 times people had no idea what they were looking at

55 times people had no idea what they were looking at until the internet stepped in to help

Middle School Science Minute  

by Dave Bydlowski (k12science or davidbydlowski@mac.com)

Middle School Science Minute: Making Science Come Alive with Clouds – Part 2

I was recently reading the November/December, 2019 issue of “Science Scope,” a magazine written for middle school science teachers, published by the National Science Teachers Association. 

In this issue, I read the “Integrating Technology” section. The title of the article, within the section was “Making Science Come Alive with Clouds,” written by Marile’ Colo’n Robles, Jeffrey Bouwman, and Caryn Smith-Long.  This is the second podcast in a two part series. Part 1 focused on the GLOBE Observer app and the second part will focus in on Investigations with the GLOBE Observer app taking place at Shumate Middle School in Gibraltar, Michigan.

The new GLOBE Observer app allows the general public to make observations of clouds, map out habitats of disease-causing mosquitoes, measuring tree height, and identify land cover from any mobile device.

From the Twitterverse:  

Typical EduCelebrity@EduCelebrity

Administrators must give ample time to their special education teachers to write IEPs. A single “IEP Day” is insufficient for all they need to do. It’s like giving them a five dollar gift card to Saks Fifth Avenue or a coupon for 10% off at Hammacher Schlemmer.

Dave Burgess Consulting, Inc.@dbc_inc

FREE Pajama PD! #DitchSummit = NOW! Read Dave’s latest blog w/a guest appearance from #DitchBook #DitchHW author, @jmattmiller (And #TechLAP in 2020!) https://daveburgess.com/the-return-of-pajama-pd/ Sign up info inside. #tlap #LeadLAP #dbcincbooks Dave Burgess @burgess_shelley @burgessdave

Massimo@Rainmaker1973

This giant elephant toothpaste experiment has been conducted by Nick Uhas and David Dobrik and it’s possibly one of the biggest reproduction of the rapid decomposition of hydrogen peroxide [full video: http://ow.ly/vX8o30q3Etc] [more about the experiment: http://ow.ly/D87r30q3Eth]

J.C. Derrick@jcderrick1

The new #EffectiveCompassion feed is now live! You can listen to the trailer and subscribe here:

Kristina A. Holzweiss #HackingSchoolLibraries

My grandmother passed away from Alzheimer’s. Years ago, she left home and was lost for hours before a policeman found her. She didn’t understand English. Please record a video about your loved one using @Flipgrid and create a #qrcode bracelet for them. It could make a difference.

Simon Henderson@simjhenderson

The education system in #HongKong continues to be viewed as a threat. Whether its liberal studies or teachers not being sufficiently patriotic. In the end, children will likely be affected, limiting their personal development & potential. Art 29, Convention Rights of the Child.

Xinqi Su 蘇昕琪 @XinqiSu

#THREAD HK Education Minister said the authority will adopt harsher measures on teachers arrested and complained in protest-related incidents to “correct mistakes”. Around 80 teachers were arrested in #HKProtests and 123 complaints on teachers were filed to the Buro.

Fixing Education@FixingEducation

Educators, enjoy your much deserved break. For the next couple weeks, you will be able to… •Use the bathroom when you want •Wake up at a reasonable time •Drink coffee when it’s hot •Go out to lunch •Sit down occasionally

Don’t forget #mschat every Thursday at 8:00 pm EST.  Look for your host Todd Bloch to have a middle school topic all ready to go!  Make it a strategic part of your personal professional development.

Strategies:  

Resources:

Students’ Civic Online Reasoning: A National Portrait

The results—if they can be summarized in a word—are troubling

Question 1 How do students across the United States perform on assessments of civic online reasoning? 

Overall, students struggled on all of the tasks. 

The Website Evaluation task had the highest proportion of Beginning scores, with 96.8% of students earning no points.

Nearly all students floundered. Ninety percent received no credit on four of six tasks.

Education moves slowly. Technology doesn’t. If we don’t act with urgency, our students’ ability to engage in civic life will be the casualty.

Our results are sobering.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License

https://stacks.stanford.edu/file/gf151tb4868/Civic%20Online%20Reasoning%20National%20Portrait.pdf

Planets to Scale

https://xkcd.com/1071/large/

Mind Missions – Language Arts & Social Studies 

Home

Social Studies instruction is enriched when students are given opportunities to experience the people and challenges of the past. In our lessons, students develop a deep understanding about historical people and events by constructing solutions to solve their problems. Mind Missions encourage students to interact with history as they learn it.

At the same time, Mind Missions develop skills critical for the future – encouraging creativity, developing problem-solving ability, and strengthening teamwork skills.

Sample:  https://mindmissions.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Forge-Feet-Sample-Lesson-1.pdf  

Web Spotlight:

Native, But Not Adept

https://one-to-oneinstitute.org/one-to-one-institute/native-but-not-adept

I became part of the alt-right at age 13, thanks to Reddit and Google

https://www.fastcompany.com/90438818/i-became-part-of-the-alt-right-at-age-13-thanks-to-reddit-and-google?utm_source=nextdraft&utm_medium=email#annotations:XEdhuh-ZEeqm_tdozkPKmg

New Data: Students Who Read On Tablets Score Poorly In Reading

https://www.forbes.com/sites/helenleebouygues/2019/12/12/new-data-students-who-read-on-tablets-score-poorly-in-reading/#7336cde74d08

Click the Play button below to listen to the show!

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Jokes:

Shop assistant: How about this one?

Psychic: That shirt is too small.

Shop assistant: You didn’t even try it on?

Psychic: I’m a medium.

***

Teacher: “How much is half of 8?”

Little Johnny: “Up and down or across?”

Teacher: “What do you mean?”

Little Johnny: “Well, up and down makes a 3 or across the middle leaves a 0!”

***

Me: “I just burned 2000 calories in 20 minutes.”

Friend: “How?”

Me: “I forgot to take my brownies out of the oven.”

***

Two guys went to a local pancake house that served real Vermont maple syrup but charged extra for it.

So the guys went to a supermarket, bought their own Vermont maple syrup, and brought it to the pancake house.

They didn’t want to get caught, so they were forced to pass the bottle between them… syrupticiously.

***

A guy gets shipwrecked and washes up on a beach.

The sand is dark red. He can’t believe it. The sky is dark red. He walks around a bit and sees there is dark red grass, dark red birds and dark red fruit on the dark red trees. He’s shocked when he finds that his skin is starting to turn dark red, too.

“Oh no!” he says. “I’ve been marooned!”

Advisory:

Fact or Fiction?

Use some of the useful tips to share with the students. Have the students create alternative, fictional purposes for those items. Then have them present to the class and let the class vote. 

For example:

Soda Can tabs:

• They’re designed to swing around so you can keep your straw in place. 
• They’re are designed to replace the tabs on a zipper. 
• They’re designed to be pulled off and used as a fishing hook.

https://living.alot.com/home/40-common-household-items-with-a-surprisingly-useful-purpose–17180?s=4

9-Year-Old Kid Who Kept Getting In Trouble For Doodling In Class Gets A Job Decorating A Restaurant With His Drawings

https://www.boredpanda.com/doodle-boy-decorates-restaurant-joe-whale/?utm_source=hyp&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=organic#annotations:XvJL6B0SEeqd2ie33Mm4IQ

Middle School Science Minute  

by Dave Bydlowski (k12science or davidbydlowski@mac.com)

Middle School Science Minute: Making Science Come Alive with Clouds – Part 1

I was recently reading the November/December 2019 issue of “Science Scope,” a magazine written for middle school science teachers, published by the National Science Teachers Association. 

In this issue, I read the “Integrating Technology” section. The title of the article, within the section was “Making Science Come Alive with Clouds,” written by Marile’ Colo’n Robles, Jeffrey Bouwman, and Caryn Smith-Long.  This is the first podcast in a two-part series. Part 1 focuses on the GLOBE Observer app and the second part will focus on Investigations with the GLOBE Observer app taking place at Shumate Middle School in Gibraltar, Michigan.

The new GLOBE Observer app allows the general public to make observations of clouds, map out habitats of disease-causing mosquitoes, measuring tree height, and identify land cover from any mobile device.

From the Twitterverse:  

Richard Byrne@rmbyrne

Proof that nothing good comes from comments on YouTube videos.

Typical EduCelebrity@EduCelebrity

Explicit instruction is simply bad teaching. It stifles the student’s imagination and encourages the pompous teacher to show off what they know. Explicit instruction is ineffective. No one learns from explicit instruction. I am not sure how I can make myself any clearer.

Dennis Dill@DennisDill

Want to check your teacher-student relationship … stand in the hall during class change and say nothing. Will the kids initiate the “Hi” … do kids that are not in your class say anything to you? How many kids are late to your class? Reflect often. #CrazyPLN

Apple Education@AppleEDU

If it rains, open your umbrella . If it’s sunny, put on sunglasses. To plan for the unexpected in code, use an if statement.⁰⁰ Get your students coding with our free #HourOfCode Facilitator Guide! #EveryoneCanCode⁰⁰ #CSedWeek https://apple.com/education/docs

Typical EduCelebrity@EduCelebrity

While we are at it, what [in the world] does it mean when teachers are told to “take a risk”? Unless there is a chance of doing something that leads to a bad evaluation, you’re not exactly taking a risk.  

Typical EduCelebrity@EduCelebrity

Good morning class! Let’s recite our daily class self-affirmations: I have grit. I have a growth mindset. I am 6’8”. I am an NBA All-Star. I am going to Harvard on a full scholarship. I am immune to the limitations of the laws of physics. I am like Chuck Norris. Only better.

Dave Burgess@burgessdave

Have you allowed “groupthink” to limit your ability to create transformational change? Are you sure that door of opportunity is locked? Maybe you just need to Try the Door:   

https://daveburgess.com/try-the-door-overcoming-groupthink/ #tlap #LeadLAP  

Don’t forget #mschat every Thursday at 8:00 pm EST.  Look for your host Todd Bloch to have a middle school topic all ready to go!  Make it a strategic part of your personal professional development.

Strategies:  

Google Earth Creation Tools

http://ditchthattextbook.com/google-earth-creation-tools/#annotations:b1K49hkREeqkaXfVOiHKVA

How to Find Historical Comics and Create Lessons With Them

https://www.freetech4teachers.com/2019/12/how-to-find-historical-comics-and.html#annotations:Offl8hkPEeq8hZOq0GeyTg

Resources:

Understanding Comics

This is a wonderful comic on understanding comics. 

http://mm12.johncaserta.info/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/Understanding%20Comics%20(The%20Invisible%20Art)%20By%20Scott%20McCloud.pdf

How Learning Happens

Ton of resources about, well, how learning happens. 

https://www.edutopia.org/how-learning-happens#annotations:VxD7vBkXEeq3188R7zbKzg

Web Spotlight:

Texting really is ruining personal relationships

Our increasing preference for texting over email and phone calls creates a higher quantity of interactions, but it decreases their quality, harming our relationships.

…missing the human contact and learning that comes from true dialogue.

…encourages passive — or more often passive-aggressive — behavior, what I call “hit and runs.” Typing on a screen invites impulsive responses. 

…Written words can hide a great deal of emotion,

…texting enables more frequent contact, it also can be used to curtail conversation. The best example of this is the egregious way texts are used as preemptive apologies, as in the reflexive “sorrys” that accompany notes one is running late

https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/texting-really-ruining-personal-relationships-ncna1097461#annotations:uHERghlHEeqxlHPqefzT_w

Deep Learning and the Curriculum Disconnect

I see school learning in 3 buckets. 

• Introductory Learning directed and chosen by the adult…Taking advantage of the skills and interests of teachers
• Mandated Learning (basic reading, math which could be embedded into other learning) ….the curriculum
• Deep Learning and deep learning tasks chosen by students. 

http://ideasandthoughts.org/2019/11/29/deep-learning-and-the-curriculum-disconnect/#annotations:TidUFhkREeqReztKyLIbCQ

Click the Play button below to listen to the show!

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Jokes

I just started a new job at a factory making chess pieces.

• This week I’m on knights!

***

***

I entered my first marathon and finished first!

• Two steps into it I stubbed my toe and finished, first.

***

A Washington reporter was awakened by her husband in the middle of the night. “I think there’s a thief in the house,” he said.

• “No doubt,” she said sleepily. “And there are a handful in the Senate, too.”

***

What do you call someone who can’t stick with a diet?

• A desserter.

***

I had a crazy dream that I weighed less than a thousandth of a gram…

• I was like 0mg!

Advisory:

Pinterest Fails

Pinterest provides the model. Sometimes, they even give you the recipe. What happens if you don’t follow the recipe? What happens if you are missing out on some background or details.

https://static.boredpanda.com/blog/wp-content/uuuploads/pinterest-craft-fails/pinterest-craft-fails-15.jpg

https://www.boredpanda.com/funny-pinterest-fails/

Middle School Science Minute  

by Dave Bydlowski (k12science or davidbydlowski@mac.com)

I was recently reading the November/December, 2019 issue of “Science Scope,” a magazine written for middle school science teachers, published by the National Science Teachers Association.  

In this issue, I read the “From the Editor’s Desk” section, written by Patti McGinnis, the editor of Science Scope.  The title of the article was “Moving Up the SAMR Model.” In this article, we learn about the SAMR Model for the use of technology.  SAMR is an acronym for:

Substitution, Augmentation, Modification and Redefinition.

From the Twitterverse:  

Marvin Olasky @MarvinOlasky

At holiday gatherings, go ahead and tell those funny, wild or inspiring family stories. Their lessons can be beneficial over time for children. “If I had to leave the children with one or two stories, what are the ones I would want them to know?” https://wsj.com/articles/the-secret-benefits-of-retelling-family-stories-11573468201?shareToken=st4eff87ff22544c958b32b782d0d586c5 via  @WSJ

Nick LaFave @NFLaFave

40 teacher recommended math apps http://buff.ly/2tJb2Bb #EdTech #mathchat

Tony Vlachakis @tvlachak

Using Dystopian Novels to Teach Bill of Rights One teacher offers a guide to help students compare the freedoms lost in dystopian novels with the freedoms secured by the Bill of Rights. https://buff.ly/33zzLFI by

@edutopia

Gen (Ret) Rob Spalding @robert_spalding

The beginning of the end of freedom is the banning of speech.

Watch till the end. Angela Merkel says: we have to take away your freedom of speech, or else society won’t be free. pic.twitter.com/Y3qROvDQXg

— Ezra Levant 🍁🚛 (@ezralevant) November 28, 2019

Fixing Education@FixingEducation

I am tired of people telling teachers: “You knew what you were getting into” (I didn’t know my salary would be stagnant for the last 8 years) “If you really love being a teacher, your pay shouldn’t matter”

“Must be nice to leave your job at 3 and have summers off” (I do?!)

⁩The Modest Teacher@ModestTeacher

The Black Friday deals teachers really want: A substitute teacher when they’re gone A pass to go pee whenever needed A copy machine that doesn’t jam at the most inopportune times A 1000 pack of dry erase markers A renewable Jean day ticket Happy shopping!

MiddleWeb@middleweb

NEW: Design Your Tests with English Learners in Mind.

@TanELLclassroom#ell #ellchat #scichat #mathchat #sschat #engchat #educoach@Larryferlazzo @Seidlitz_Ed

Expert Tan Huynh on how to support ELs on summative tests AND accurately assess content knowledge https://middleweb.com/41698/design-y

Charles Mok 莫乃光@charlesmok

Almost 9:1 ratio of victory for “opposition” vs pro-Beijing. Stunning! Hong Kong Democracy Backers Win Big as Voters Flock to Polls A surge in voting, especially by young people, allowed democracy advocates to win many more seats on local councils.

https://t.co/WaugKy36Gg?amp=1

Hong Kong Free Press @HongKongFP

In Sai Kung’s Sheung Tak constituency, a particularly long queue of voters outside the polling station zigzagged multiple times on Sunday morning. Photo: Apple Daily. #hongkong

Don’t forget #mschat every Thursday at 8:00 pm EST.  Look for your host Todd Bloch to have a middle school topic all ready to go!  Make it a strategic part of your personal professional development.

Strategies:  

7 Things People Think or Say that Reinforce Mediocrity

http://www.davidgeurin.com/2019/12/7-things-people-think-or-say-that.html

Resources:

How to Recognize a Toxic School Culture Before You Get the Job

How To Recognize a Toxic School Culture Before You Get the Job

Cook Something Up In Social Studies

Chefs cook up Ancient Babylonian recipes.  You could too, or rather, your students could?  

https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2019/11/16/779930201/eat-like-the-ancient-babylonians-researchers-cook-up-nearly-4-000-year-old-recip?utm_campaign=storyshare&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_medium=social

Web Spotlight:

 Congratulations Nick Peruski Miliken Award Winner!

SANTA MONICA, Calif., (Dec. 6, 2019) – When it comes to the world of work, business and technology teacher Nick Peruski is really working it for his students at Lakeland High School in White Lake, Michigan.

Science Says the Most Successful Kids Have Parents Who Do These 5 Things

A handful of recent studies indicate the important things which parents should focus on.

https://www.inc.com/christina-desmarais/science-says-most-successful-kids-have-parents-who-do-these-5-things_4.html

Wondering What Happened to Your Class Valedictorian? Not Much, Research Shows

…followed 81 high school valedictorians and salutatorians from graduation onward to see what becomes of those who lead the academic pack. Of the 95 percent who went on to graduate college, their average GPA was 3.6, and by 1994, 60 percent had received a graduate degree.

Nearly 90 percent are now in professional careers with 40 percent in the highest tier jobs. They are reliable, consistent, and well-adjusted, and by all measures, the majority have good lives.

But how many of these number-one high school performers go on to change the world, run the world, or impress the world? The answer seems to be clear: zero.

Research shows that what makes students likely to be impressive in the classroom is the same thing that makes them less likely to be home-run hitters outside the classroom.

Many of the valedictorians admitted to not being the smartest kid in class, just the hardest worker. Others said that it was more an issue of giving teachers what they wanted than actually knowing the material better.

…schools reward being a generalist. There is little recognition of student passion or expertise. The real world, however, does the reverse.

https://money.com/money/4779223/valedictorian-success-research-barking-up-wrong/#annotations:uI2t6gigEeqGNXfAgwgVjg

Random Thoughts . . .  

Click the Play button below to listen to the show!

Podcast: Play in new window | Download