For those of you who missed last week’s Friday 4, fret not. The craziness of Parents Weekend and what seemed like an endless stream of meetings and visitors prevented me from crafting an end-of-week missive last Friday, so you did not really miss anything! The frenetic pace that coincides with the impending end of the term has set in to be certain, but I was determined to publish the Friday 4 this week since it appears from most accounts that people do enjoy the posts. I appreciate the feedback I have received about the Friday 4 and continue to encourage you to send along any thoughts, ideas or comments.
I was encouraged by a valued and trusted colleague to be more deliberate about a theme for each week’s Friday 4. In the past, I have tried to connect the items in each Friday 4 but have not always found four related items in any given week so the thread connecting the items has been tenuous at best at times. So, in response to the suggestion, this week’s Friday 4 will focus on the craft of teaching.
- The first item this week is a piece written by Stacey Roshan (@buddyxo) titled “Promoting Independent Learning and Reducing Student Anxiety in the Advanced Placement Classroom #flipclass #edchat #mathchat.” Stacey is a Twitter friend of mine who teaches AP Calc and uses a flipped classroom model.
- For those History teachers out there, the next piece is “A Roman aqueduct and the teaching of history (thoughtlessness Part 5)” written by Grant Wiggins (@grantwiggins). Grant is a Loomis Chaffee alum and former faculty member who now writes and consults on all things having to do with education.
- Georege Couros (@gcouros) is Division Principal of Innovative Teaching and Learning with Parkland School Division located in Stony Plain, Alberta, Canada. He is the creator of a blog I follow called “Connected Principals.” A recent piece by George “Everyone’s a Teacher, Everyone’s a Learner” got me thinking about how I model lifelong learning for my students.
- Sharon Geyer (@sharongeyer68), a fellow science teacher from Pomfret School visited LC last week for the Flipped Classroom Open House day and sat in on a few classes. Sharon also writes a blog and recently posted a nice piece called “Keeping it Real” that describes a recent project she had her students do in chemistry class. In her post, Sharon describes how she incorporated some new ideas about the 21st century skill of communication.
Enjoy and as always, please send along any ideas or suggestions you may have.