Monday, November 18, 2002

Leonid's Meteor Shower

Science@NASA has a couple of good teaching pages for tonight's Leonid meteor shower. Leonid Observing Tips is a general discussion of the shower, while The Leonids TV Show "begins "live coverage of the 2002 Leonid meteor storm" this evening at 11:00 P.M. (CST). The Astronomy Picture of the Day Archive has Tempel Tuttle: The Leonid Comet as its posting for November 16. Both pages are filled with useful links to related pages that are appropriate for classroom use.

Astronomy Training for High School Teachers

The Boston Globe's Marie C. Franklin has an interesting column about two teachers who participated in the MIT Haystack Observatory eight-week summer program. Found in the Haystack, a chance to bring science into the classroom tells of Debbie Berlin and Mary Altenhof's summer experience and how they're bringing astronomy programs to their high school classrooms.

Related links from MIT:

• Haystack Educational Resources
• Resources for High School Teachers

The Sharpest View of the Sun

While researching and writing up the posting about the Leonid meteor shower, I ran across an incredible close-up photo of the sun's surface from the Astronomy Picture of the Day Archive. The Sharpest View of the Sun was taken from the new Swedish 1-m Solar Telescope located on the island of La Palma, Spain. The image at right was taken last July and is one of many that appear in the November 14 issue of Nature. The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences page, Images and movies from the Nature article data set, has links and descriptions of the sunspot photos and some time-lapse movies. Also see Best ever view of sunspots for a quick description of the Nature article. (Photo credit left: Göran Scharmer)

Preschool Columns

The Washington Post column Head Start Teachers Resist New Training tells of some unrest among Head Start personnel about the Bush Administration's new training program.

Veteran Educator to Head County's Preschool Effort tells about efforts in Los Angeles to implement universal full-day preschool.

Children's Books

Today's New York Times contains an interesting Children's Books section, with reviews of twenty or so current titles, along with reviews of the all-time best children's books.

QED Reports

A Scholastic News press release tells of Quality Education Data's release of its "annual reports on the state of technology in U.S. schools and districts: Technology Purchasing Forecast 2002-2003, 8th edition; and Internet Usage in Teaching 2002, 7th edition." Some interesting points from the press release on the reports:

While spending is not increasing, funding for technology continues to be stable. The biggest unknown is the degree to which increasing federal funds for education (especially No Child Left Behind) will be used for technology purchases. We're already seeing that the federal government's push for greater accountability in education seems to be driving greater investment in systems that offer more robust reporting on student academic progress.

 

Computer Brands: Macintosh is the single most common brand of instructional computer in schools today, but Wintel computers (from all makers combined) constitute more than two-thirds of the installed base. Of Wintel computers, Dell Computer is the most common brand with an estimated 18% of the installed base. Dell is also the leading brand in district plans to purchase instructional computers for the 2002-2003 school year, with a 35% share, beating out Apple's Macintosh brand (21%) for the lead.

Quality Education Data, Inc., is a subsidiary of Scholastic.

Another Maine Laptop Column

Los Angeles Times staff writer Elizabeth Mehren describes the uphill struggle of Maine's Governor Angus King in putting through the Maine laptop initiative. In Derided Computer Plan Clicks With Maine Students, Mehren writes:

Undeterred by correspondence and legislative outcries that ran 10 to 1 against him, King proceeded with the "study in perseverance" that became the signature issue of a two-term, independent governor who reasoned that by using technology to raise education levels, Maine could build a better work force and thus strengthen its economy.

Devotion for November 17-23, 2002

Zach Wood's weekly devotional for this week is May He Have Your Undivided Attention? Zach also maintains an archive of previous devotionals.

If you have suggestions, news ideas, etc., please .

Wednesday, November 20, 2002

Pertinent Columns

Laurie Tarkan writes in the New York Times of the need for understanding of asthma by schools in Educating Schools About Life With Asthma.

In Proponents of vouchers see opening, Boston Globe staffer Mary Leonard writes about "Advocates for school vouchers...pumping time and money into a new legal assault to strip state constitutions of barriers to public funding for religious schools."

The Washington Post's Valerie Strauss writes about teachers' never-ending battle to keep kids attention in Short Attention Span Theater.

New from SchwabLearning.org

This week from the SchwabLearning.org, Dr. Raskind discusses How kids can develop the personal attributes needed to become successful. As always, links to all of the new and updated SchwabLearning.org articles are available in the Schwab Learning Online Newsletter (link expires 11-24-02).

Friday, November 22, 2002

Hey, It's Friday!

It's been a long week at my school, so I'll make this update short and sweet.

Jeff Adkins has put together an incredible list of ideas in Advice for Apple Education: Let's Get to It. This one is a "must read" for teachers who prefer Macs in the classroom.

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