Guest Thinkers
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[from http://tinyurl.com/bkbtk] No one jumps a 20 foot chasm in two 10 foot jumps. – Miguel Guhlin (comment at Remote Access)
Dede, Honan, & Peters (Eds.). (2005). Scaling up success: Lessons from technology-based educational improvement. How do we take successful programs and best practices serving a few classrooms or students and […]
Measure just about anything, and the distribution . . . almost always comes out as a perfect bell curve. . . . [The bell curve] even applies to the energy […]
[from http://tinyurl.com/aofe8] What would school organizations be like if every employee had the opportunity to pursue Option B? As Kathy Sierra notes, ‘What if the price for working on weakness […]
Collins. (2001). Good to great: Why some companies make the leap… and others don’t. Local communities strongly believe that their schools are good. ‘Good is the enemy of great.’ [see […]
[cross-posted at the TechLearning blog] nn Why haven’t schools changed more? Maybe because they can’t. n In their 2005 Phi Delta Kappan article, Can Schools Improve?, Christensen, Aaron, & Clark […]
Pfeffer & Sutton. (2000). The knowing-doing gap: How smart companies turn knowledge into action. Countless leaders know what they should do. But yet desired change fails to happen. Here’s why.
Most educational administration graduate students can tell you about Bolman & Deal’s leadership frameworks . The frames help change agents conceptualize different approaches to an issue. Depending on the circumstances, […]
Here’s a great quote by Dr. Kevin Dettmar , professor of English and cultural studies at Southern Illinois University Carbondale, from his recent article, Earbuds and Mosh Pits , in […]
Change. It’s inevitable. It happens whether we want it to or not. But sometimes we embrace it with open arms and sometimes it drags us kicking and screaming… Many have […]
Many of you are familiar with Rogers’ diffusion of innovation theory, even if you didn’t know its formal name. Dr. Everett Rogers is probably most famous for popularizing the following […]
There are two kinds of organizations. One kind likes to be on the cutting edge . . . to embrace the new. The other kind fears that, and holds back. […]
By anyone’s measure, Mike Pearce appears to be a phenomenal history teacher. His Ellison High School students in Killeen, Texas had a 99% passing rate on the state history assessment […]
As some of you know, the Achievement Through Technology and Innovation (ATTAIN) bill recently was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives. The bill seeks to refine and expand the […]
Random musings. Half-finished (and quite possibly half-baked) thoughts.nThings that have caught my eye… n One of the most interesting articles I’ve read in a longntime n Attractingnthe twentysomething worker. Describes […]
I have had the pleasure of working with the Chicago Public Schools (CPS) on several occasions over the past few years, primarily in conjunction with its Principal Technology Leadership Institute […]
[cartoon made with stripcreator; click on the image to see a larger version] Read more about the case (and see the YouTube video). Then check out the post at BoardBuzz. […]
Internet access in developing countries can be prohibitively expensive and cumbersome (e.g., thousands of dollars per month for speeds that often are less than dial-up). Now imagine if someone identified […]
For those of you who haven’t been following politics in Thailand, apparently today’s an important day. Some of the political parties there have been accused of rigging last year’s election […]
Only the lonely (dum-dum-dum-dumdy-doo-wah)Know the way I feel tonight (ooh-yay-yay-yay-yeah)Only the lonely (dum-dum-dum-dumdy-doo-wah)Know this feelin ain’t right (dum-dum-dum-dumdy-doo-wah) [Roy Orbison, Only the Lonely ] Blogging can be a strange […]
Minnesota’s Teacher of the Year is smart. Not just because of his last name, but because he started a blog to chronicle his adventures. What a great idea. He’s off […]
Kimberly Moritz publicly challenged her superintendent to start a blog. He made a very sensible reply. And yet… I wonder what other superintendents who ARE blogging would say to him. […]
Random musings. Half-finished (and quite possibly half-baked) thoughts. Things that have caught my eye… Interesting perspectives on the infamous software study “We now have educational software that is just as […]
I just ran across this Alan November post on the ‘laptop lashback.’ Here’s a great quote: Teachers have not changed the way they teach. We are using $2,000 pencils. Also, […]
Jim Gates points out that Pennsylvania legislators have introduced a bill to ban cellphones and ‘other portable electronic devices that record or play audio or video material.’ The language of […]
[cross-posted at the TechLearning blog ] There are two primary standards documents for school administrators: ISLLC and ELCC. Together they broadly define the parameters of school leaders’ work. They also […]