kitchen table math, the sequel

here

I'm spending an inordinate amount of time wielding my Staples premium hole punch these days.


The myndology cards are calling to me.

I see a huge difference in my ESL students who use electronic dictionaries versus traditional dictionaries. The electronic ones are fast, but they don’t see as many words. They don’t see variations on a root word.

With a paper dictionary, students browse. Sometimes, instead of reading their novel during silent reading, they want to read the dictionary.

E-books and computers have a place in education and daily living, but they cannot replace paper books.

— Carol

Democratic Group's Proposal: Give Each Student a Kindle

If I had to bet, I would bet this teacher is right. I do lots of reading on screen (which produces eye strain, a problem Kindle technology is intended to solve), I do some reading on an iTouch, and I expect to do lots of reading on my factory-refurbished Kindle.

But I don't expect to see books disappear -- especially not textbooks.

from the Comments section:

I have a kindle on which I read articles, fiction and light non-fiction all the time. I would not want to use it for text books. It simple doesn’t display tables well. And when you have to go back and forth, as is often the case in math and science textbooks to understand formulas etc, it is cumbersome and one can get easily lost.

Whoever recommended that should actually spend time with a Kindle.

— Octavian

Democratic Group’s Proposal: Give Each Student a Kindle

I've escaped the black hole of hospital-land (my mom's been in and out of the hospital since August 12) just long enough to:

a) discover that Amazon is selling refurbished Kindles for $219

b) put up a post telling you so

The Agitator loves his Kindle.....

I ordered a refurbished Kindle yesterday, apparently because $219 is my 'price point' for a reading toy. I'd been wanting a Kindle since they first came out, but since Kindles don't have things I need (folders to sort pdf files into) and do have things I don't want (can't transfer Kindle books to your computer), and since they cost $359, I'd been waiting for something better to come along. At $219, Kindle is something better.

Of course, maybe that's because I read somebody somewhere saying $200 is the price point that turns a Kindle into an iPhone.

I don't have an iPhone, but come Monday I will have a Kindle.


I suppose this was inevitable

A proposal to put a Kindle into the hands of every K-12 student in the country, which will cost $9 billion more than the country currently spends putting textbooks in the hands of every student in the country:

Of course, such an upfront government outlay in these economic times seems unlikely. Mr. Freedman acknowledges that, but believes the federal government should act, particularly since e-books will inevitably migrate into students’ hands anyway.

“There are two crucial questions. Will this improve the educational experience for children, and is this budget neutral, does it cost money or save money?” he said.

answers: no and no.

e.g., see: The Computer Delusion by Todd Oppenheimer

If I were going to launch a program to put Kindles in the hands of every member of a dependent group, I'd put them in hospitals and nursing homes. Assuming they're as easy to use as I hope, that is.

Speaking of user-friendly, the flat-screen TVs in Evanston Hospital aren't getting much use in the CCC unit, I fear. Any TV that requires a person hospitalized with advanced heart failure to navigate a menu needs to be rethought.

Same deal with whole classrooms of high school kids negotiating portals.


we are doomed, part 2

Here we go: a 175-page report on "Technology in Schools" from the National Center for Education Statistics (pdf file) that has nothing whatsoever to say on the subject of student achievement:

The guide’s indicators of technology availability and use can be paired with locally determined measures of student achievement, operational efficiency, or other outcomes, so as to assess the relation between technology inputs and desired results.* This handbook does not directly address student or management outcomes, beyond evidence of deployment and utilization of technology in the K–12 setting. Outcome measurements (not themselves technology indicators) are beyond the scope of this document.

This handbook also does not directly address measurement issues, such as the reliability and validity of the data elements listed. Measurements are, to varying degrees, reproducible over time and across inquirers and forms of inquiry; and they are, to varying degrees, also accurate reflections of the concepts they purport to measure (as determined by a consensus of stakeholders, or other means). These issues matter, and much is written about them, but their proper consideration exceeds both the space available and the competence of our panel. The purpose of this document is to allow decision makers to make choices about the various kinds of information they need, to select some questions that are truly “key,” and to focus and organize data collection and information management to produce useful information, so as to make better decisions.

"Better decisions" begin and end with the student.

Period.

Teach Them All to Read by Elaine McEwan
High Tech Heretic by Clifford Stoll

Just saw this comment on David Allen's blog:

I have used and even written about Personal Brain. It is intriguing, but at least for my kind of work (text heavy, lots of reference material) I find that it doesn't scale very well. But it is so distinctive and interesting that it's certainly worth a look. I find MindManager better/easier for graphically-oriented organizing, and a normal outliner, including the not-quite-normal but useful BrainStorm, to work better with straight text. And, of course, Zoot to keep track of large-volume reference material.

I use Inspiration for thinking and outlining and I love Scrivener's for writing (and for keeping everything in one place).

I'm going to check out Zoot.

What I need is ONE piece of software that keeps everything in the same 'document': notes, to-dos, research, factoids, and whatever it is I'm writing.

Scrivener's comes very close.


mind mapping templates available for download

Back from vacation & entering vacation from the vacation mode, or trying to. (Not Andrew. Andrew is desperate to get back to school. Has been insistently typing "bus" and "school" on his AlphaSmart.)

Don't know whether I've mentioned that I have a thing for templates.

Good templates are few and far between, I find. Yes, there are a gazillion free templates on the web, but most of them look like he**.

That situation has now changed, thanks to Google's new template gallery.

They've got everything:

decent letterhead
personal monthly budget
road trip budget
my wedding checklist
wedding vendor payment list
monthly household budget
recipes
baby feeding diary
lost pet flier
resume
resume
resume
resume
resume
classic resume
elegant resume
interview preparation (includes "Examples of leadership" AND "Examples of teamwork")
Avery business cards
Avery business cards
business plan with social impact statement
meeting notes
meeting notes
fax
Black Scholes option pricing model
loan amortization schedule
S.W.O.T. analysis
WACC calculation
net worth
stock portfolio tracker
fantasy football draft


And then there's the stuff for school:

• "Springtime theme for happy, educational presentations."
  

• "Cute template featuring paws in the background. Perfect for school presentations or other happy subjects."
  

• "A fishy theme for fun, educational presentations."
  

• "A sunny day in watercolor. Perfect for school presentations or other happy subjects."
  

• "Black and white circle graph indicating reasons why school failed to make AYP."^*

And, most importantly, templates that will enable your child to turn in projects equal in "creativity" to the ones handed in by kids whose mothers own Quark:

• "School-oriented design with an index card background. Can be used to present a book report or other school report."

• "Science Fair project."

and:

restaurant menu


complete Student and Teacher list here

bonus points:
in case you happen to be a research scientist in need of research science templates--

correlative statistics
hypothesis testing (includes two-tailed z test and chi-square test)
scientific article


^* courtesy of The Aspen Institute

1. Writing research papers is not perceived to be fun.
2. Writing note cards is tedious.
3. Writing research papers requires organizational skills students often lack or do not apply to research assignments.
4. The value of documenting the source of information does not make sense to students.
5. Students often think they put information in their own words, but they don’t.
6. Beginning an outline or draft from a blank screen is intimidating.
7. MLA, APA, Chicago Style…Students don’t understand it is important to format documentation accurately.


I'd say that about covers it.


I didn't mean it

I shouldn't be making sport of PaperToolsPro, which looks like it may be a terrific program for students -- (here's the description on the Scrivener web site).

The pitfalls list reminded me of my all-time favorite National Enquirer headline: "Do You Know the 1,110 Reasons Why Marriage Makes Women Sick?" So I had to post.

But if PaperToolsPro has actually done something about all of these pitfalls, a copy of it may be in my future, too, along with SuperMemo.

I've launched my anti-procrastination project this summer, and have just this afternoon made a major discovery: Scrivener has a progress bar! (source: Wine on the Keyboard)

This isn't a great photo of it, meaning you may not be able to see, from this image, how reinforcing this thing is.

I'm trying to get a revision of my book proposal started, which means I'm in Writer Hell, so I set 500 words as my "Session target" (a reasonable goal) which meant that I could see progress at once.

The reason I haven't posted a Screen Grab of my own highly reinforcing "Project Target" icon is that it disappears the minute I open Screen Grab.

Also in the category of riveting computer problems: I can't log onto flickr anymore, although I can still upload photos from my Desktop for some unknown reason.

These are the kinds of distractions the "Project Targets" progress bar was designed to defeat.

I love Scrivener. Love it, love it, love it. I wrote all of Temple's (2nd) book on it, and I have everything in ONE Scrivener Project: all the drafts, all the research, all the interviews --- plus all my ktm stuff, which is a whole lot of stuff.

I love Scrivener so much I'm going to try to see if I can get C. to use it. Thus far, he's been resistant.

Oh, well. He may have to wait until school life gets a whole lot more painful to see the beauty of this thing.


bonus points

I just noticed this comment under the "writer's paradise" post:
Scrivener
Scrivener - A Writer's Paradise
help for the afflicted, part 1
procrastinating chickens (the perils of long-duration behavior)
Piers Steel's meta-theory of procrastination
"Structured Procrastination" by John Perry

best snow shovel on the planet

You can use it as a hand snowplough. Amazing!

Lynn got me going on novel 3-M offerings. (It's Lynn's fault! It is!)


"Turn any room into a meeting room."


oh, wow

I'm sure I need this product.

Post-it 1/2" Assorted Arrow Flags 100/pack

We're buying them in bulk. The small flags (scroll down) are great, too. I've just used the small flags to mark lessons in Saxon Algebra 1/2 I want Christopher to do; I used the arrow flags to mark specific problems in the problem sets.

Today I'm ordering the Page Markers.

Now that I have small flags, arrow flags, and (soon) page markers, I may be able to find the passages I'm looking for in Stereotypic Animal Behaviour, a book in which the word "stereotypies" appears on each and every page, making each and every page seem like the exact same page you looked at moments before. World's worst index, too.

If I can find passages I'm looking for, I may be able to complete Chapter One of Temple's & my sequel to AIT.

That would be good.

Never let it be said there isn't a technological solution to a problem that is ruining your life.