Check out the Blog from Brookfield TE Teacher Geoff Bergen. BLOG LINK
Friday, September 11, 2009
Thursday, September 10, 2009
Design a House
Design Studio On this Web site, you can design a house, walk through it in 3D, and then share it with the world. You can also learn more about architecture, past and present, and explore Frank Lloyd Wright's life and work.
Grant Opportunity
$500 mini-grants for Pay it Forward activities The Pay It Forward Foundation administers a mini-grant program for Pay It Forward activities designed by and involving youth in service to their school, neighborhood or the greater community. Mini-grants up to $500 are available to schools, churches and community-based groups of youth for service activities of all types. A Pay It Forward project is defined as one or more service activities that benefit a school, neighborhood, or the greater community and include learning goals for its youth participants.
NAEP Draft on Technological Literacy Unveiled
A discussion draft of the framework for the national assessment of technological literacy, the first to gauge students’ understanding of and skill in using a range of tools, has been presented to the board that oversees the testing program.
The computer-based National Assessment of Educational Progress in technological literacy, scheduled to be administered to a representative sample of the nation’s 4th, 8th, and 12th graders for the first time in 2012, will evaluate students’ understanding of technology tools and their design, the ways they can be used to gather information and communicate ideas, and their impact on society.
The goal of the technological-literacy assessment should be to help students “understand all of the implications of living in a highly technological society,” said Alan Friedman, a physicist who is a member of the National Assessment Governing Board, which sets policy for NAEP. Mr. Friedman is the vice chairman of the board’s assessment-development committee.
Those implications, he said, include not only the advances to society that have been created by technology, but also the drawbacks, such as concerns about privacy, as well as the challenges society will face in the future in energy usage and other areas.
When it is made final, the framework will guide the design of the assessment. The draft defines technological literacy as the “general understanding of technology coupled with a capability to use, manage, and assess the technologies that are most relevant in one’s life, such as the information and communication technologies that are particularly salient in the world today.”
The committee embraced a broad definition of technology that ranges from automobiles to computers, including many of the tools that are used in daily life.
Limits to Measurement
Students may be tested on their knowledge of the kinds of tools that are available and how they are used, along with their ability to apply technological concepts to solve problems. They may be given tasks that demonstrate their ability to use various technology platforms to communicate information or collect and analyze data, evaluate information, and suggest a technology solution to a given problem.
While the assessment is meant to gauge a broad range of skills that are considered essential to technological literacy, the test design may be limited in its ability to measure some areas, the draft states, such as the habits of mind and critical-thinking skills that are considered essential to a deeper understanding and use of technology.
“This is an important development, I can say that without reservations because technological literacy is such a critical element of being a successful 21st - century citizen,” said Valerie Greenhill, the director of strategic initiatives for the Partnership for 21st Century Skills, a Tucson, Ariz.-based advocacy group. “The progression being made in the technology community away from the notion of just technology competence, such as how to use a computer, to … developing that literacy with the use of technology in daily life and in core academic subjects as well is incredibly important. To the extent that the NAEP is developing a framework that guides the development of these competencies is a welcome move.”
A number of states have implemented tests of technology or information literacy, and most have adopted the national K-12 standards in the field produced by the International Society for Technology in Education.
The NAGB committee that has been devising the framework has reviewed state technology standards, studies on assessing technology skills, and the guidelines and recommendations of ISTE and other organizations.
“We want students to understand that technology is not just computers,” said Senta Raizen, the director of the National Center for Improving Science Education, who co-chaired the framework committee. The center is based at WestEd, a research organization in San Francisco.
The goal, Ms. Raizen said at a meeting late last week where the draft was unveiled, is to understand “the human design world, where do things come from, where does our technology come from.”
She and others involved in the project say the material represented in the framework could be covered in science class, but also in subjects across the curriculum, such as mathematics, history, social studies, and language arts.
“We’ve seen movement for reading across the curriculum, writing across the curriculum,” Mr. Friedman said. “Well, technology across the curriculum makes as much sense as those do.”
Vol. 29, Issue 01
© 2009 Editorial Projects in Education
Friday, September 4, 2009
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
Energy Related Lesson Plans for High School
Great Site for Energy Related Lesson Plans for High School
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Report: Teacher shortage undermines career and technical education, potentially economic growth
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: Erin Uy, euy@careertech.org
August 14, 2009 301.588.9630 (office), 301.641.9358 (mobile)
Report: Teacher shortage undermines career and technical education, potentially economic growth
SILVER SPRING, MD – The fastest growing jobs in the nation will be in career and technical education fields such as manufacturing – from aerospace to pharmaceuticals—and health care, however a shortage of qualified teachers may jeopardize the nation’s ability to prepare students for those professions, according to a recent issue brief released by the National Association of State Directors of Career and Technical Education.
However, an opportunity to boost the supply of teachers may be opening, as a growing number of displaced industry workers are making a career shift into the education system. But to capitalize on what may be a silver lining of the nation’s economic downturn, schools, policymakers and accrediting institutions must create pathways to attract, support and retain teachers, according to Teacher Shortage Undermines CTE.
Urging action, the report notes that “in order to cultivate a workforce to fill these jobs, students will require training from quality secondary and postsecondary CTE teachers – resources that are lacking across the nation due to a teacher shortage.”
The issue brief recommends:
· States adopt flexible, but rigorous standards alternative certification programs. Research has shown that there is no statistically significant difference in the academic achievement of students whose teachers took different routes to certification.
· Schools provide professional development through various funding streams – from traditional CTE funding pots through Perkins to Title II of NCLB. Also, all professional development should be comprehensive and continuous.
· Proactively recruiting teachers from industry, particularly in fields where the economy is experiencing the most growth and transformation. Industry perspective can keep the school programs fresh and relevant to economic demands.
The report highlights examples of teacher training programs and standards in Oregon, Alabama and California that may serve as models for other states. Visit http://www.careertech.org/uploaded_files/Teacher_Shortage_Undermines_CTE.pdf
NASDCTEc is the Washington D.C.-area based professional society of the state and territory agency heads responsible for career technical education. The state directors are committed to leadership and results. The association has a growing membership of over 200 members who share the state directors’ commitment to quality education at the secondary, post secondary and adult levels.
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