Tom Daccord @ edtechteacher.org

EdTechTeacher blog 05/26/2018

AP Course deeper knowing

tags: history assessment

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

May 25, 2018 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

EdTechTeacher blog 05/25/2018

Episode 50: PBL in the High School English Classroom – Shifting Our Schools Podcast

tags: pbl podcast
How to manage Apple devices in K-12 schools: 5 tips - TechRepublic

tags: apple ipads daccord
Jobs and the Economy of the Future - The Atlantic

tags: future labor economy
From Educational Innovation to Inspired Learning - EdTech Researcher - Education Week

tags: innovation

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

May 24, 2018 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

EdTechTeacher blog 05/24/2018

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

May 23, 2018 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

EdTechTeacher blog 05/03/2018

How Effective Is Your School District? A New Measure Shows Where Students Learn the Most - The New York Times

tags: assessment growth
- , based on some 300 million elementary-school test scores across more than 11,000 school districts, tweaks conventional wisdom in many ways. Some urban and Southern districts are doing better than data typically suggests. Some wealthy ones don’t look that effective. Many poor school systems do.
- It’s true that children in prosperous districts tend to test well, while children in poorer districts on average score lower.
- argues that it’s possible to separate some of the advantages of socioeconomics from what’s actually happening in schools.
- Do urban public school systems simply reflect the poverty of the kids in the schools, or do they overcome those effects to any degree?”
- This new data shows that many do overcome them.
- reward or shutter based on average test scores are using the wrong metric
- some places like the state of Massachusetts have tried to include measures of growth in evaluating teachers and schools because of the limitations
- can’t detect when changes occur because students leave or enter a district between third and eighth grade.
- Educators have long debated whether it’s better to evaluate students and schools on proficiency levels or growth rates
- Districts with high growth are scattered across the country, in contrast with sharp geographic divisions on proficiency that show Northern schools ahead of those in the Deep South
- Even the fastest growth rates Mr. Reardon measures couldn’t completely close the proficiency gap that exists early on between typical poor and wealthy districts.
- can’t overcome all the disadvantages of poverty
- data shows that every demographic group within the district is growing at rates well above the national average, with Hispanic students outpacing whites
- black-white achievement gaps aren’t narrowing much even in the districts with the strongest growth.
- the district has emphasized the role of more autonomous principals in improving instruction, an element of reform that Mr. Emanuel said is underappreciated nationally in debates
- “It’s much more collaborative among teachers and data-focused, and focused on students.”
Bates College has designed a liberal arts education fit for the future of work — Quartz
- nternships for students who can’t afford to work for free,
- helping students find meaningful work should be an integral part of a liberal-arts education.
- dea of “purposeful work”—broadly defined as work that both has personal meaning and societal relevance
- explain why the information in the class is relevant
- offers practitioner-taught courses:
- Students can also shadow workers in various fields for a day
- teaches students to apply design thinking to the “wicked problem” of creating fulfilling lives and careers
- “I think students are looking for meaning,” Peter Salovey, president of Yale,
- “You find meaning by thinking and acting in the world in a way that aligns with your talents and interests and brings you joy, and makes a social contribution of some kind.”
- “You don’t figure out your passion until you are out there doing the work,”
- (“If the path before you is clear, you’re probably on someone else’s.”)
- Automation and globalization are radically altering employment. Technology is reshaping information and learning,
- “know-how, habits, and—crucially—self-knowledge that will help them make the best marriage of profession and personal fulfillmen
- Students overwhelmingly report they would recommend a purposeful work infused class (94%), and agree that practitioner-taught courses are a good addition to the syllabus (96%). Ninety-seven percent of employers agreed the purposeful work interns “added value,
- liberal arts colleges put “the making of a better person ahead of the making of a brighter person, or a better mousetrap.”
Europe is determined to break the US and Chinas artificial intelligence duopoly — Quartz
- The United States and China currently dominate the world of artificial intelligence,
- explosion of government-backed projects announced all over the world.
- China is investing at least $7 billion through 2030, including $2 billion for a research park in Beijing. The Chinese government foresees a $150 billion AI industry by that time
- The US has no central AI policy, but individual projects are funded by military and paramilitary departments
- led by academia and private industry in the United States.
- Vladimir Putin has made some grandiose comments on artificial intelligence, saying that the leader in AI will “rule the world.”
Divisions of Labor - The New York Times

"Steel mills went quiet, the mines where my father and grandfather had worked shut down, factories fled south of the border. Much more was lost in the process than just the jobs; an entire way of life, central to the American mythos, was coming to an end. The available jobs, in fields like retail sales and health care, were ill paid, making it harder for a man without a college education to support a family on his own. I could see this in my own extended family, where the grandsons of miners and railroad workers were taking jobs as delivery-truck drivers and fast-food restaurant managers or even competing with their wives to become retail workers or practical nurses. "

tags: labor work economy
- Much more was lost in the process than just the jobs; an entire way of life, central to the American mythos, was coming to an end. The available jobs, in fields like retail sales and health care, were ill paid, making it harder for a man without a college education to support a family on his own.
- grandsons of miners and railroad workers were taking jobs as delivery-truck drivers and fast-food restaurant managers
- n the new economic landscape of low-paid service jobs, some of the old nostrums of the left have stopped making sense. “Full employment,”
- But when I went out as an undercover journalist in the late 1990s to test the viability of entry-level jobs, I found my co-workers — waitstaff, nursing-home workers, maids with a cleaning service, Walmart “associates” — living for the most part in poverty.
- They were full-time workers, and this was a time, like the present, of nearly full employment.
- If ours is a “knowledge economy” — which sounds so much better than a “low-wage economy” — unemployed workers would just have to get their game on and upgrade to more useful skills.
- no one was sure what to train people in; computer skills were in vogue in the ’90s, welding has gone in and out of style and careers in the still-growing health sector are supposed to be the best bets now. Nor is there any clear measure of the effectiveness of existing retraining programs.
- the idea that people should be endlessly malleable and ready to recreate themselves to accommodate every change in the job market is probably not realistic and certainly not respectful of existing skills.
- bringing their old jobs back, as proposed by Trump, they went for the latter.
- “the working class,” they are likely to gesture, anachronistically, to an abandoned factory. They might more accurately use a hospital or a fast-food restaurant
- are more likely to wield mops than hammers, and bedpans rather than trowels.
- the new one is better represented as a woman chanting, “El pueblo unido jamás será vencido!
- Pay all workers better
- labor innovation of the 21st century has been campaigns seeking to raise local or state minimum wages.
- it’s not enough to organize people with jobs; you have to organize the unemployed
The End of Middle Class Growth: What It Means for the Future of Work, Family, and the Economy - The Atlantic

"The economy no longer reliably and consistently transmits productivity gains to workers. The result is that many millions of Americans, in particular less-skilled men, are leaving the workforce, a phenomenon the country has never seen before on the present scale."

tags: future work atlantic economy
- The economy no longer reliably and consistently transmits productivity gains to workers.
- in particular less-skilled men, are leaving the workforce,
- The median family income fell as much during the first two years of the recovery as it did during the two years of the recession itself,
- Its ability to deliver rising living standards across the income spectrum is in decline, and perhaps also in question. "This is a fundamental problem,
- People can no longer depend on rising wages and salaries when the economy expands
- disruptions in long-established connections between productivity and earnings, between labor and capital, between top earners and everyone else, between men and work, between men and marriage.
- whole communities--are isolated from work, marriage, and higher education.
- Productivity measures the value of the output (brake pads, stock transactions) a worker produces in, say, a day; compensation is a measure of earnings that includes the value of benefits such as health insurance.
- But in the past few decades, and especially during the past 10 years or so, the lines have diverged. This is slippage No. 1: Productivity is rising handsomely, but compensation of workers isn't keeping up.
- Production and nonsupervisory workers--factory, retail, and clerical workers, for example--saw productivity gains disappear from their paychecks
- The problem isn't a lack of the economy producing sufficient income to make everybody's living standards improve--it's that the economy is structured so that the majority don't benefit."
- The higher you stood on the income ladder, the better you did; the highest-paid 1 percent of earners soared above and away from everyone else
- By contrast, the bottom 90 percent of earners--which is to say, almost everyone
- So, productivity is rising, but it isn't being evenly allocated; the top is effectively disconnected from the rest of the spectrum
- more are flowing to investors
- World War II through about 1980, almost two-thirds of every dollar of income generated by the economy flowed to workers
- Beginning around 1980, workers' share began to slide and, in the past decade or so, has nose-dived, to about 58 percent.
- went to shareholders and other investors--who provide capital rather than labor
- globalization has reduced American companies' ability to raise prices, and thus to increase their workers' pay, without losing competitiveness against companies in, say, China and India.
- a larger share comes from ideas and intangible innovations that people like software designers and marketers develop.
- idea-based economy
- Only a minority of Americans obtain four-year college degrees, and yet the economy offers ever-fewer well-paying jobs for men with nothing more than a high school diploma.
- Since 1969, the weekly earnings of the median full-time male worker have stagnated,
- given that the per capita gross domestic product has more than doubled
- high school diplomas have faced worse than stagnation:
- Forty years ago, virtually all men with at least a high school degree held jobs.
- But a fifth of men with only a high school degree weren't working in 2008, before the recession struck; today, a fourth of them don't hold a job
- the decoupling of less-skilled men from jobs.
- Less-skilled workers are falling so far behind that they are going to place a huge strain on the social safety net in the coming decades."
- That measure, however, overlooks the large and growing population of men who don't work
- The median man in America, by this measure, is almost 20 percent worse off than he was four decades ago.
- high school degree but no college; their median earnings have fallen 40 percent.
- social consequences
- "Women have been up-skilling very rapidly," said MIT's Autor, "whereas men have been much, much less successful in adapting."
- brains over brawn
- out-of-wedlock childbirth have risen to hitherto unimaginable heights among the less educated.
- Marriage is an institution that makes men more responsible in their pursuit of work and in their work-related duties,
- Low-earning men are decreasingly able to form stable families.
- self-perpetuating class divide
- marriage and earnings correlate strongly
- Today, nearly half of the low-earning men are single, versus only a seventh of highly paid men.
- At the top are families with two married earners, two college degrees, and kids who never question that their future includes a college degree
- Liberals emphasize economic forces that are eroding less-skilled workers' ability to make a decent living; conservatives emphasize cultural changes and government programs that make it easier to get by without working.
- Get more people, especially men, through high school and college.
- Expand federal support for job training
- Expand and improve vocational education for those not suited to college
- Change Social Security disability benefits so that the program helps people keep working
- Liberals talk about increasing wage subsidies for low-skill jobs,
- "There's pretty much no precedent" for today's double detachment from work and marriage among low-earning men
The Future of Work for High School Grads - The Atlantic

"In the coming years, the economy will add millions of jobs for Americans with only a high school diploma. But the pay will be pretty abysmal."

tags: future atlantic work labor
- In the coming years, the economy will add millions of jobs for Americans with only a high school diploma. But the pay will be pretty abysmal.
- With an unemployment rate of 8.4 percent, someone with only a high school diploma is twice as likely to be without a job as someone who has a bachelor's degree.
- The jobs that are opening for them them tend to be in very low-skill, very low-pay fields.
- the government expects that 63% of all new jobs will require a high school degree or less. That's the good news. The bad news: the pay
- According to the BLS, there will be 20.4 million more jobs in 2020 than there were in 2010. About 12.8 million of those jobs will require a high school degree or less. Many of those will be clustered in services.
- There will be more work in food preparation, retail, and office administration.
- The top 14 jobs for have typical wages under $40,000.
- There are a few solidly middle-class jobs tucked in here -- a good salesperson for a wholesaler averages $62,000 a year. An administrative support supervisor takes home more than $50,000 a year. A carpenter makes $43,000. But most of these jobs offer between $18,000 and $30,000 a year.
- It's easy to imagine computers taking over more tasks handled now by low-level office workers or receptionists. Online shopping could take a bite out of retail.
The Next Industrial Revolution Could Put Millions Out of Work - The Atlantic

" The Wealth of Humans, a new book by the Economist columnist Ryan Avent about how technology is changing the nature of work. In the next few years, self-driving cars, health-care robots, machine learning, and other technology will complement many workers in the office. Counting both humans and machines, the world’s labor force will be able to do more work than ever before. But this abundance of workers—both those made of cells and those made of bits—could create a glut of labor. The machines may render many humans as redundant as so many vintage washing machines."

tags: future labor work
- some economists have said that the oversupply of consumer goods like washing machines may have been one of the causes of the Great Depression.
- Counting both humans and machines, the world’s labor force will be able to do more work than ever before. But this abundance of workers—both those made of cells and those made of bits—could create a glut of labor.
- The machines may render many humans as redundant as so many vintage washing machines.
- There is an ongoing debate about whether technological growth is accelerating, as economists like Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee (the authors of The Second Machine Age) insist, or slowing down, as the national productivity numbers indicate.
- I come down squarely in the Brynjolfsson and McAfee camp
- I think the digital revolution is probably going to be as important and transformative as the industrial revolution. The main reason is machine intelligence, a general-purpose technology that can be used anywhere
- I think this transformative revolution will create an abundance of labor.
- In the bigger picture, for a lot of middle-skilled workers, especially men, you have stagnating wages for several decades. Apart from the top 1 percent, a lot of people are having a lousy time.
- main way that employers are using people in countries like the U.K. is to use them to do low-productivity work.
- Driving is certainly an area where we’ve seen more rapid progress than I would have guessed.
- Today, if you have a problem with a car company, you might end up conversing with a bot over the phone.
- you also predict that high wages for easily automated jobs will be a big fat target for automation
- as these workers become more expensive, you’ll see more interest in the technology that could displace them.
- labor-saving technology is most tantalizing where wages for low-skill work is highest
- The very rich will still want people, their own personal shoppers and assistants. Being able to retain human labor would be a sign that you’re wealthy.
- redistribution creates political pressure to exclude those who don’t belong, who aren’t like the majority.

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

May 02, 2018 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

EdTechTeacher blog 04/27/2018

Infographic: Ten Things You Probably Didn't Know About Immigrants | The National Academies Press

tags: infographic immigrants ushistory
Millennials destroyed the rules of written English – and created something better

tags: language ela millennials mashable
Don’t Forget, Instructional Design Is About Problem Solving | EDUCAUSE

pbl

tags: problembasedlearning pbl
6 Rules: From Great Ideas to Successful Execution

review of book by Anthony Kim

tags: leadership management kim 6Rules
- This is what makes Anthony Kim and Alexis Gonzales-Black’s new book, The NEW School Rules: 6 Vital Practices for Thriving and Responsive Schools, such a refreshing read and vital contribution. The book focuses on how to help district and school leaders improve their organizational practices to create environments “of growth, excitement, and passion” that ultimately produce breakthrough gains for students.
From Thought to Action - Taking Control of Innovation - EdTech Researcher - Education Week

innovation holland

tags: innovation holland
- In his 2005 Scientific American Mind article, Unleashing Creativity, Ulrich Kraft explained that creativity can, in fact, be nurtured.
- the most important skill for students to gain is the ability to learn how to learn. We can think that every student not only has this capacity but also a unique talent just waiting to be fostered.
- Recent U.S. demographic projections indicate that by the year 2020 over 50% of public school students will be children of various ethnicities.