MSM 206: Dry Hands, Warm Heart?

Jokes You Can Use:

Auntie Matilta won’t kiss you with that dirty face!

That’s what I’m hoping.

 

Girl: I need a new dress

Dad: Why?

Girl: The girl in my class has the same one.

Dad: Why does that mean you need a new dress.

Girl: It’s cheaper than switching colleges.

 

On Our Mind:

ISTE Noob-ness!

Wrapping up the year yet?

 

Eileen Award:

• Jeffry Prickett – Facebook & Twitter
• Pamela Schneider – Facebook

 

Advisory:

How to Use a Paper Towel:

http://www.ted.com/talks/joe_smith_how_to_use_a_paper_towel.html

and

http://creativewealthprinciples.com/archives/285

 

The Other Side of the World

http://www.antipodemap.com/

 

Olympic Torch Relay Route

http://www.london2012.com/torch-relay/route/ 

Middle School Science Minute

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

 

Drying Hands in the Lab.  

In the March, 2012 issue of Science Scope, a publication of the National Science Teachers Association, the safety question of the month was “Are there any alternatives to paper towels for students to wash and dry their hands with at the end of lab?”

 

Ken Roy, director of environmental health and safety for Glastonbury Public Schools in Glastonbury, Connecticut provides a great answer.  If you would like more information on science safety, you can purchase Ken’s book, “The NSTA Ready-Reference Guide to Safer Science,” through the NSTA bookstore.  Please visit:

http://www.nsta.org/store/product_detail.aspx?id=10.2505/9781933531281

 

 

News:

 

Homeschool Is The Future

Since the 1970s, public school education scores, stats, and student achievements have been steadily decreasing. From a declining graduation rate to slipping ACT scores, American students are slowly ceasing to measure up on a global scale. Incidentally, also since the 1970s, homeschooling has steadily been on the rise in America. It seems that with America’s public school system in a decline, more and more parents are turning to homeschooling as a solution. The surprising part? When it comes time to perform, homeschoolers are blowing everyone else out of the water. Homeschoolers have begun to show steady achievement in their test scores, graduation rates, and collegiate performance. Homeschoolers also test higher in analyses of maturity, communication skills, and general socializatiion. What does this mean? It means that homeschoolers are getting ready to dominate the future of America.

http://www.collegeathome.com/blog/2012/03/09/homeschool-is-the-future/

 

Dartmouth Researchers Are Learning How Exercise Affects the Brain

Exercise clears the mind. It gets the blood pumping and more oxygen is delivered to the brain. This is familiar territory, but Dartmouth’s David Bucci thinks there is much more going on.

From his studies, Bucci and his collaborators have revealed important new findings:

• The effects of exercise are different on memory as well as on the brain, depending on whether the exerciser is an adolescent or an adult.
• A gene has been identified which seems to mediate the degree to which exercise has a beneficial effect. This has implications for the potential use of exercise as an intervention for mental illness.

 

http://now.dartmouth.edu/2012/05/dartmouth-researchers-are-learning-how-exercise-affects-the-brain/

 

 

Are today’s students truly ‘tech savvy’?

It is difficult to prove that the Generation Y and young people today are not more technologically adapted than their older counterparts.

They may sometimes display an unhealthy level of dependence on their mobile phone, become bored easily when taught in school how to use basic commands in Microsoft Word and be called upon often to fix the problem with the printer, but are all members of this age bracket clued-up and comfortable with technology?

According to the research, there was little evidence that today’s students demand modern technology when entering university that the academic institution cannot provide. Technological integration is expanding, however in terms of study, students may not be as reliant on it to learn as we stereotype them to be.

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/igeneration/are-todays-students-truly-tech-savvy/16147

 

Congrats to Mike Muir, AMLE President-Elect!

Resources:

 

iPad Resource Links

http://www.21innovate.com/ipadipod.html

 

Documentaries On-Line

Watch free documentaries online! Full videos are available. Educate yourself with thousands of good documentaries about diverse subjects. The newest, latest, best and greatest top documentaries online can be watched here for free.

http://www.documentaryz.com/

 

 

A Twenty-One Protest Song Salute

[Warning to parents and teachers: Some songs contain profanity. Also, Moyers & Company and Public Affairs Television do not endorse any advertisements or promotional links contained within the embedded videos.]

http://billmoyers.com/content/a-twenty-one-protest-song-salute/

Web Spotlight:

iWitness

IWitness is an online application that gives educators and students access to search, watch, and learn from more than 1,000 video testimonies of Holocaust survivors and other witnesses.

http://iwitness.usc.edu/SFI/Default.aspx

 

Graduation Speeches

 

http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2011/06/10/best-commencement-graduation-speeches/

http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2012/05/18/commencement-speeches-2/

Strategies:

The Graphic Classroom

The Graphic Classroom is a resource for teachers and librarians to help them stock high quality, educational-worthy, graphic novels and comics in their classroom or school library. I read and review every graphic novel or comic on this blog and give it a rating as to appropriateness for the classroom.

http://www.graphicclassroom.org/

 

Events & Happenings:

Calendar of Events:

Ohio Middle Level Association:

• The Ohio Middle Level Association will hold their annual conference.

• OMLA Registration Form
• OMLA Presentation Proposal Form

 

AMLE Affiliate Conferences:

• The Michigan Association of Middle School Educators Annual Conference is coming up March 2012 in Warren Woods, MI.  
• MAMSE Exhibitor Form
• MAMSE Registration Form

• MAMSE Presentation Form
• MAMSE Conference Program Book (2011)
• The North Carolina Middle School Association’s Annual Conference March 13-15, 2012
• Conference Brochure  
• Presenter’s Application
• Who They Are . . .
• This year’s sessions . . .

 

Classroom 2.0’s Live Calendar.

• Classroom 2.0’s Ning Blog: Archived content is available.