The Deputy Head

If any parents/readers have the occasion to travel to Senegal this month on business, you should check out the Biennale of Contemporary African Art. The Dakar festival begins today and runs through June 9, 2008. Todd Lester of freeDimensional sent me a detailed description of the public exhibit that they’re sponsoring. freeDimensional promotes the intersection of art/artists and projects for social justice (in this case, a public exhibit at the festival w/ concurrent events elsewhere on the subject of shifting Senegalese migration). What does this have to do with learning/teaching? Read the event description closely: Oliver Bakewell of the International Migration Institute at Oxford suggests that in order to truly take migration into account, we would have to become committed to . . . developing capacities of people [emphasis added], not places.

How do we prepare kids for a world that hasn’t yet happened? How important is it to inspire imagination in our students (read: future community leaders)?

Here’s an example of an excellent classroom blog (not used explicitly to post hw and remind about field trips, but to reflect on teaching/learning). Read his thinking behind the project, while you’re at it. Ready to take the next step?

Edulicious is working on digital storytelling projects with his students (see his teaching example above). He’s also recently blogged about video and digital storytelling.

For Anatole France, “the whole art of teaching is only the art of awakening the natural curiosity of young minds for the purpose of satisfying it afterwards” (France as cited in Barell, 2003, p. 1).

How about for you? Respond as comments, and I’ll post them.

In a former life I was a 2nd grade teacher in an urban school with an open space floor plan. Kids and teachers loved it. The learning space constantly changed to meet the needs of a given day. But all I heard from teachers outside Walker-Jones was “open space is horrible. What a bad idea.”

Wm. W. Caudill described the modern school design as an “egg crate.” Separate, but equal, learning spaces. A place where kids learn to isolate themselves from each other and from the world.

Check out this presentation from the early days of the open schools movement (warning, some of the images may inspire you to design a new school building). All of the sudden, it doesn’t sound so crazy anymore.

Here’s an outstanding concept from Thomas Jefferson Elementary: kids reading = teachers camping on the roof for a day. Misters Knight and Greiner blogged the event from atop the school. It reminds me a little of Diffendoofer Day at MEH.

We all know and love edulicious in FC/DC, so it shouldn’t be a surprise that Scott McLeod (Iowa St. Prof. and guru of tech education leadership) reads Mr. Sparrgrove, too.

An MEH team took top honors at last weekend’s Virginia National History Day Competition. Bravas! (that’s Portuguese) and best wishes in sharing your re-animation of the Watergate story at the National contest in College Park.

Wha happen? I guess I missed this one: follow FCCPS news on twitter! (twitter id: FCCPSalert).

I’m exploring The George Lucas Educational Foundation’s website/publication, Edutopia. There’s a print magazine…we should ask the principal if there’s $ in the budget of a subscription.