Question for my students

Today I am posting a question for my students in SPE 581:
How are you using technology in your classroom? For the purpose of this blog, technology means specialty software, machines, digital and electronic tools, computers, internet, and so on.

Share with us what you do, so we can learn from it.

To post your part, add a comment.

Thanksgiving: Family, football, and learning new skills

Thanksgiving in Tuscaloosa is about family and football.

Football was undeniably a disaster, since the Alabama football team lost to Auburn for the sixth time running - the longest losing streak in our history. What amazes me is the frenzied reaction to inevitable disappointment after insanely unrealistic expectations. Quite a list of superlatives.

Bama fans started the year with a mild expectation that our new football coach would do something (anything!) to improve the football program. The University pays him an enormous amount of money for which he is expected to bring in even more enormous amounts of money and excellent football players. People were saying then a 7-5 season would be wonderful! After some improvement early on, expectations changed and now this season is being described as one of the worst in the history of the football program. It wasn't great, but we beat Arkansas and Tennessee! (I was there for that one). We also lost to Georgia (ouch), LSU (double ouch) and LA Monroe (words cannot describe that one!)

It made me think of how often we have unrealistic expectations and a desire for immediate graitification of those expectations. We forget that anything worthwhile takes effort, and effort takes time and practice to become automatic.

Any parent knows and any sports coach knows that learning the basic skills of life and the game takes time. It takes modeling from a person who are reasonbaly proficient, and patient instruction until the student gets the idea. Then there has to be ample opportunity for practice before we try out our new skill in public. We forget that when we teach children, they need modeling, and time to practice, and the opportunity to try out their new knowledge and skills in a safe place. There is such a rush to cover whatever the state and the district tells us to cover that we do not have time to allow practice and learning. Even gifted kids need time to practice and apply skills. They don't know everything. People sometimes expect the so-called gifted kids to know everything. They may have the ability to learn more quickly, but they must still learn. If we have unrealistic expectations, we shortchange them.

If you teach high ability kids, don't expect them to know everything. They need instruction. To see a taxonomy of skills you can teach those kids, go to http://www.gifted.uconn.edu/sem/typeiips.html

NAGC national convention 2007

I have just returned from Minneapolis where I attended the annual national convention of the National Association for Gifted Children (www.nagc.org). I want to encourage anyone interested in gifted education to check out their website, and consider joining the organization. It can provide a lot of information and is the premier advocacy organization for gifted children.

The president of the organization is my friend and one of my mentors, Dr. Del Siegle of the University of Connecticut (http://www.gifted.uconn.edu/siegle/). Do look at the website of the National Research Center on the Gifted and Talented at www.gifted.uconn.edu for a lot of information about gifted children and gifted education.

This year the conference had in excess of 3,300 attendees from all over the country and overseas. This includes teachers, parents, and university faculty of all sorts and persuasions. The keynote speakers were Dean Simonton (genius and eminence), Robert Sternberg (Project Rainbow), and the inimitable Garrison Keeler (Prairie Home Companion).

My favorite sessions were:
"Standing on the shoulders of giants" moderated by Joe Renzulli - a session with GT greats like Jim Gallagher and Sandra Kaplan talking about the great people and issues in the field of gifted education.
"Myths is gifted education" moderated by Del Siegle. The participants were well known folks in the field and they addressed what they considered to be erroneous beliefs held by people in gifted education.

Since Minnesota was the place where Dr. E. Paul Torrance started his research on creativity, there was also a large session devoted to his memory that included many of the teachers and students who participated in those first research studies.

Next year's convention is going to be in Florida. Do make an effort to go. It is worth every penny and every hour of sleep lost.