Friday Four, January 27, 2012

I am a tad tardy in posting this week’s Friday Four as a result of a busy end of the week. Between helping a couple of colleagues prepare a presentation for the Board of Trustees, facilitating a discussion in the English department about the topic of homework, teaching a couple of classes and showing a colleague how to use clickers in her classroom; my Friday evaporated before my very eyes. Anyways…..on to my finds for the week.

1. For those of you looking to try something new in your classes, how about connecting with a few classrooms from around the globe using blogging? David Mitchell, an educator from New Zealand, started a project a few years ago to connect teachers and classrooms from around the globe using blogging. Here is a link to a post on one of the educational technology blogs I follow that introduces the project. Here is the link to Quadblogging.net and Blog the Leap Year, both of which are mentioned in the interview with David.
2. Wondering what all the flap is about SOPA and PIPA? Not even sure what SOPA and PIPA are? Check out this nice infographic about the two proposed laws that will impact the free flow of information on the internet.
3. Here is a link to a YouTube video of one of my favorite bloggers, Dan Meyer, a math teacher who makes math incredibly fun and exciting. You can follow Dan here.
4. I ran across this post on one of the blogs I follow that described a visit to the school in Philly that is run by Chris Lehmann. Chris is a well known educator who is an inspiring speaker and advocate for education. I was struck by the description of the culture/ethos that exists at the school and wondered how a visitor would describe my school if he/she visited.