Technology Adoption in Schools: What is the Purpose?

On August 24, 2010, in Education Industry, Teaching, Technology in Education, ed tech, by Edward Davey
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The following is a guest post by Edward Davey, a History Teacher and Instructional Technology Specialist in Suburban Boston. As schools prepare to open for the 2010-2011 school year, discussions inevitably turn to the new technologies available to educators. Teachers preparing for opening day, often learn of new equipment and software available for implementation. Too [...]

 

High Scores for Brooklyn School Students Despite Poverty

On April 30, 2010, in Assessment, Education, Teaching, Tutoring, by Prashant Kaw
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Earlier this week the New York Times ran an eye-opening article about students from the Beacon School of Excellence in Brooklyn. Despite their poverty these young fourth graders scored higher on their standardized tests than students in neighboring schools with more resources and affluent backgrounds. This is not a story about underdogs and rich versus [...]

 

Can one teacher’s or tutor’s hardwork benefit others? Leveraging our “Follow” feature for educational content.

On August 10, 2009, in Announcements, Content, Education, Homepage, Socrato, Teaching, Tutoring, by Raju Gupta
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One of the interesting features of Twitter is the ability to “follow” anyone and then listen to their tweets. Effectively the person you are following becomes the “filter” for you for certain types of content and information.  You receive immediate updates on what’s going on. While working with a number of teachers and tutors, we [...]

 

According to Dept. of Edu. Study – Blended courses (online and face-to-face instruction) are the best.

On July 8, 2009, in Education, Teaching, Tutoring, by Raju Gupta
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According to US Department of Education study students who took “blended” courses — those that combine elements of online learning and face-to-face instruction — appeared to do best of all. The study finds this after detailed review of 51 high quality research reports out of over 1000 research studies. Looking at one of the reviews [...]

 

End of “Cut and Paste” to create custom assessments and worksheets for state standardized tests

On June 29, 2009, in Assessment, Content, Teaching, by Raju Gupta
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A good article by Bailey on how to leverage MCAS material to supplement classroom or home instruction. Teachers and tutors can leverage any state standardized test material, or even National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) material. After each assessment, NAEP releases dozens of sample questions to the public—more than 2,000 questions are currently available to [...]

 

Interesting articles on Educational data analysis, usage and access

On June 19, 2009, in Assessment, Education, Intelligence, Teaching, by Raju Gupta
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How Data analysis is helping raise performance – story covers both good and the bad Data-Driven Schools See Rising Scores – WSJ.com Educational data is in abundance – but not in very useful state. Education Week: Data, Data Everywhere, But Not a Drop to Use  Impact of providing detailed and real time access to student [...]

 

Teachers earning $125,000 a year – Can every school afford to get the best?

On June 6, 2009, in Teaching, by Raju Gupta
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NYtimes posted a story on new charter school. It’s inspiring to see that Mr. Zeke M. Vanderhoek founder of a test preparation company Manhattan GMAT is assembling a dream team of teachers to kick start a charter school. I agree with the approach that excellent and passionate teachers / tutors are the key ingredients to [...]