EduCenter

  Why should we keep reading aloud to kids even when they can already "read on their own?"  This talk demonstrates the magic of read aloud and reminds us all why reading aloud is so essential- at school and at home. This talk is for parents and teachers who want to teach comprehension and connect with kids in powerful ways.  Key Words: magic of reading aloud reading comprehension connecting with kids reading aloud demonstration powerful  parents  teachers  Rebecca Bellingham is an Instructor in the Literacy Specialist Program at Columbia University Teachers College. She has been teaching in some capacity for 18 years.  Rebecca draws upon her experience and love of theater to help teachers and graduate students connect with their "inner artist" and teach in more effective, powerful, and joyful ways.  This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx

     The Flipped Classroom is a new method of teaching that is turning the traditional classroom on its head. Every day, thousands of teachers deliver the exact same lesson in class to millions of students. Every night, millions of students sit over the exact same homework, trying to figure out how to solve it. The Flipped Classroom is turning this upside down.       Traditionally students listen to lectures and take tests in class and read textbooks and work on problem sets at home. In flip teaching, students first study the topic by themselves, typically using video lessons on YouTube and then apply the knowledge by solving problems and doing practical work in class.       Modern schools who flipped their classroom report many benefits: 1. It allows all students to learn at their own pace as videos can be watched again.  2. Its more efficient, as students enter the classroom prepared to contribute.  3. It enriches the lesson as more time can be spent on group work and projects.  4. D

Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime. - Maimonides (1138-1204)      Independence is a problem when 55% of young adults in the U.S., between ages 18-34, are still financially dependent on their parents. That is more than half! As a teacher and director of child development centers for over a decade, I've encountered children who were about to transition to kindergarten without being able to dress themselves, pour milk into a cup, or even string an intelligible sentence together. It's not because these children aren't capable, but they haven't been given the time and training to develop those skills due to impatience or enabling. This has been called learned helplessness. Before the advent of public education, children would work as farm hands and operate machinery in factories as young as five or six, meanwhile our progressive five-year-olds cannot even tie their own shoes. I'm not advocating for child

  There are two types of mindsets we can cultivate. One that embraces problems as opportunities to learn, and one that avoids them, often out of fear to fail. People that avoid conflicts can be described as having a fixed mindset. Those who see problems as interesting challenges have a growth mindset. Sometimes we like to switch from one to the other.

  A growing number of parents believe in unschooling — the process of learning through life, outside classrooms. Similar to homeschooling it usually happens at home or within the community. But while homeschooling usually follows a formal curriculum, unschooling doesn’t. So how does it work, and why do parents advocate for it?

       In response to the tragedy of World War II, people from the town Reggio Emilia developed a new model of education. War ought to never happen again.      The Reggio Emilia approach is based on the philosophy of “an image of a child”. All children are viewed as full of potential, with an innate sense of curiosity and endless imagination. They are creative, capable of constructing their own learning and they have a natural interest to explore. While they follow their own interests, they always stay connected with others. Adults nurture their learning by providing a rich environment and support.

       Is our personality shaped by the environment, or are we largely programmed genetically? No one can answer whether nature or nurture leads to certain traits in individuals. We do know, however, a bit about the influences of genes and the environment when it comes to groups of specific populations — especially when we talk about us humans. Our understanding of little asexual crayfish seems rather limited.

     Speaking is already in our genes. But reading is not. Until about 100 years ago most people didn't do it all. When we read fiction especially, we create new pathways in our brain. Reading 30 pages of fiction every night, gets the pathways thicker and thicker. Our brain needs a workout just like our body.      Rita Carter is a writer, broadcaster and journalist who specializes in the workings of the human brain. Her books include the first layman’s guide to neuroscience: Mapping the Mind, which has been translated into 14 languages. For seven years she presented London’s nightly news programme, “Thames News” , and has written for magazines and newspapers throughout the world, including the London Times, Telegraph, Guardian and New Scientist. She has a deep interest in bringing art and science together and is a Patron at the influential London-based Foundation “Art and Mind”. Rita Carter is a writer, broadcaster and journalist who specializes in the workings of the human br

Educator: A Calling, not a Job      Educators are leaving schools at a rapid rate and the national academic scores are decreasing just as fast. One of the Universities I had the pleasure of teaching at shut down suddenly because less students are pursuing undergraduate degrees. The government has allocated funds to entice people to pursue a career in teaching, but they are immediately deterred by the state of public education, treatment of teachers in the classroom, and the rise in behavioral disorders. We need to change the way we approach education and reevaluate what it means to be a teacher. What It Means to be An Educator      The term "educator" has changed in recent years from an individual who teaches children skills to become lifelong learners to a person who watches kids learn from a Chromebook. In an attempt to hire more "teachers" public education systems have created a suboptimal and counterproductive way for learning to be automated; therefore,

  Vygotsky’s Theory of Social Development argues that community and language play a central part in learning. Vygotsky believed that children develop independently of specific stages as a result of social interactions.

 The Growth of Knowledge: Crash Course Psychology #18 How does our knowledge grow? It turns out there are some different ideas about that. Schemas, Four-Stage Theory of Cognitive Development, and Vygotsky's Theory of Scaffolding all play different roles, but the basic idea is that children think about things very differently than adults. Hank explains in today's episode of Crash Course Psychology.