I have three projects that need translations. Please contact me if you are interested... visualandactive@gmail.com Building Bridges
Imagine a "Skype Station" in every school and community center in theUSA. Imagine similar Skype Stations in schools and community centers other countries. Students can walk to the Skype Station and connect with students in other countries.
uilding International Bridges also sponsors educational training sessions, conferences and workshops called "Building International Bridges By Internet" (BIBBI).
Your donation can go into the general fund, where it will be allocated to a variety of projects, or you can specify a particular organization in the list. .
It costs from $3,000 to 5,000 a year to maintain and monitor a not-for-profit fund (depending on the complexity of donations and the required paperwork) -- so that your donation can be tax-deductible, a portion of the donation will be applied to the fees that are used to maintain this fund. On a budget of $50,000, the administrative cost is 10%. As the BIBBI fund grows, the administrative costs will eventually be covered by the interest earned on the funds receipts.
BIB will train people, gather equipment and "texpertise" in the USA
BIB will send money to appropriate organizations in other countries. Why payy for one of us to fly to Frica or Asia to install computers? Why collect computers here and ship them to another country? It's often cheaper to pay an independent contractor in Kenya to knock on doors of embassies and multinational corportations to collect expertise, volunteers and equipment and install the Skype Staions" in communities. BIB'S conduit allows donors in the USA to deduct their contributions, since the donations are supporting the goals of this non-profit organization (application for tax-exempt status is in progress). BIB contracts with other organizations to ensure that workshops and equipment are available to support intercultural communication. Equipment like computers and webcams, training to use the equipment and brochures anD websites to promote events that lead to intercultural communications are the focus of Building International Bridges. Thank you for your interest.
VOLUNTEERS WANTED Write to us with your comments and suggestions. If you wish to serve as a volunteer, call our hotline: +1 954 646 8246 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting +1 954 646 8246 end_of_the_skype_highlighting or write to BuildingInternationalBridges@gmail.com
(1) BIB aims to bring the Internet to homes that have no
computers or internet connection.
BIB aims to develop the TECH-spertise (technology + expertise) to fill the gaps that other organizations do not offer. In particular, BIB aims to provide work
shops to overcome difficulties that arise in diverse communities and thereby promote intercultural communication.
Planting Trees
Carbon Emissions Estimate Sheet (One tree per 2000 miles) (One tree per 1300 miles)
S. McCrea / Global Cooling Center P O Box 30121 Fort Lauderdale, FL 33303 Carbon Estimates
The Problem: The use of fossil fuels is growing fast and increasingly polluting the global atmosphere with “greenhouse gases” that threaten all of us with global warming. The most important of these gases is carbon dioxide (CO2), which our cars emit. The more gas a vehicle uses, the more CO2 it emits. The typical American car is driven 11,000 miles in a year and emits its own weight in carbon as CO2. The Answer: Through photosynthesis, trees take CO2 out of the air, replacing it with life-giving oxygen. Our program helps people plant trees on the world’s most barren, devastated lands. Each of these fast-growing, beneficial, permanent trees takes about 50 lbs. of CO2 from the atmosphere each year. Planting trees is the most cost-effective way to take CO2 out of the atmosphere. Our international tree planting projects plant trees at an average cost of twenty-five cents ($.25) per tree.
Small Schools Visual and Active
We are educational consultants. We offer workshops, seminars, analysis and other training. Contact us and we'll work with you to improve your school. Let's share what we know. Let's learn together.
1. The Situation in 1983 The Carnegie Foundation paid millions of dollars to get a report that made broad recommendations for school reform.
Chairman Boyer looked at the school systems around the country and concluded:
I hope that in the century ahead students will be judged not by their performance on a single test but they the quality of their lives. I hope that students will be encouraged to be creative, not confirming, and learn to cooperate rather than compete. Ernest Boyer, president of Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, 1993.
Nearly 30 years later We have more measurement. Did anything ever grow by measuring it?
Have things really changed? Is Boyer turning over in his grave?
What's needed? A new way of looking at the problem.
2. What happens when you change the mindset?
Before we look at schools, let's look at other times when the mindset was changed.
GALILEO and COPERNICUS Galileo looked at the moon and said, "The moon orbits the earth, but there's no way that the sun circles the earth." He provided a new model for categorizing what everyone saw.
His telescope showed that there were little moons around Jupiter and those moons did not circle the Earth. This data just blew the minds of 16th century italians and they couldn't handle it. Galileo had to recant.
There are have been other shifts in mindsets or paradigms.
Mindsets come from the way we looked at the world scientifically -- ether. scientists used to think that light traveled along the ethers. they used to think that light was a wave, but it also acts as a particle (that's a shift in the mindset) – phlogiston -- this word describes a material's ability to burn... Intellectuals in the Middle Ages thought that wood and paper had more “phlogiston” than metal or stone.
· gasoline: our mindset before 1973 was (hopefully) different than now.
We are talking about cars that run on alternatives to gasoline.
There have been dozens of major changes in humanity's collective mindset and we are in the middle of a mindset change now...
Howard Gardner helped us reset our minds and the way we think about intelligence (multiple intelligences)
Robert Ballard asked us to look at the Black Sea and imagine what might have happened to create the story of Noah's Ark and the Great Flood
Dan Pink told us to think about the other side of the brain
but these mindsets have stalled.
People like Dan Pink are saying, "Hey, design is important, look to the whole brain"while test mavens want to standardize education in a left brained unbalanced manner.
Progress does not have to move forward smoothly. There will be losses, retrenchment before we unloose the bonds that bind us to tradition and then we can surge ahead.
so let's move on...
3. Unintended Consequences
Problem: we depend on foreign oil Remedy: ethanol from corn unintended consequence: (cartoon of starving kid next to fuel pump with ethanol form corn)
(INSERT CARTOON HERE)
There are numerous other examples of unintended consequences.
Who knew that when Congress made it a goal to put more people into housing that the entire structure would start to fall down? Solution: Congress made it easier to lend money Solution: Interest-only loans with a balloon payment and increased interest rate after four or five years. OOPS: people who couldn't afford to borrow were given loans...
4. what are the unintended consequences of measuring and applying standards to schools?
a) teaching to the test "tell us what's on the test, and let us prepare for the test."
b) preparing for a test (instead of teaching as we used to and just letting the test measure what was taught.)
These were NOT what Governor Jeb Bush stated in his plan for "A+" when the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT) was proposed.
5. SOME QUOTES "It seems to me that schools primarily teach kids how to take test, a skill one hardly uses in real life unless one is a contestant on a quiz show). elementary school prepares kids for junior high; junior high prepares them for high school. So the goal (if we can call it that) of schools is to prepare kids for more school." -- Tom Magliozzi, one of the Car Talk guys, writing in his book, In Our Humble Opinion: Car Talk's Click and Clack Rant and Rave (2000).
"I have been a psychologist for 21 years, and I have never had to do in the profession what I needed to do to get an A in many of my courses in college. In particular, I've never had to memorize a book or lecture. If I can't remember something, I just look it up. However, schools set things up to reward with As the students who are good memorizers, not just at the college level but at many other levels as well. -- Robert Sternberg, psychologist. Our education system should be creating mindful learners. (Littky)
Too often we teach people things like "There's a right way and a wrong way to do everything." What we should be teaching them is how to think flexibly, to be mindful of all the different possibilities of every situation an not close themselves off from information that could help them. Ellen Langer, professor of psychology I never let schooling get in the way of my education. -- Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) No matter how far you have gone on a wrong road, turn back. -- Turkish proverb
Think about how people learn best. We learn best when we care about what we are doing, when we have choices. We learn best when the work has meaning to us, when it matters. We learn best when the work is real and relevant.
We want to prepare our children for the world, so let's no isolate them from the world. Many people talk about how difficult it is to integrate a curriculum. How can English teachers work with math, science and history teachers? That is ridiculous: the world is integrated! Every day schools unravel the world and all its vast knowledge and put it into boxes called subjects and separate things that are not separate in the real world. What is science and geography without math? What is English with its history and word origins and other languages? We teach kids about the real world by locking them up in a building that looks, acts and feels nothing like the real world. -- Littky, page 29 The traditional school isolates large groups of young people from adults and the experiences of the real world, then expects them to emerge at age 18 knowing how to be adult, how to work and how to live in the real world. Kids are expected to sit still for long periods of time, to learn primarily by listening to someone talk and never talk to anyone around them. They learn how to please eight different teachers with eight different sets of expectations -- and the teachers base their understanding of the kids on 45 minutes spent in a room with 20 to 30 other kids. Only if they are having trouble do they get an individualized education plan (IEP) or get any feedback on their learning beyond a single letter on their report card. Their education system assume that they are exactly like every other kid in the class and every other kid who was in that class 40 and 50 years ago. The school emphasizes the same "set of knowledge" for everyone and expects them all to demonstrate the exact same skills. The world is changing -- schools are not. -- Littky, The Big Picture, page 32 One-third of the jobs that will be around ten to fifteen years from now haven't been invented yet.
6. BEYOND RANTING AND RAVING What can teachers do today? We could continue complaining, but let's end this training with two questions: 1) how can we personalize our lessons? 2) how can we integrate our lessons with other subjects? 1. how can we bring the world into class or take the class out to the real world?
GROUP ACTIVITY Let's brain storm together -- sit with a group of four teachers and come up with three things you can do to individualize training. How can you integrate your subject with other subjects? Can we use the Internet to create virtual internships? (time to circulate with the audience, put them into groups, someone takes notes, the notes get passed to the front, a big list is made and checked off the list that is given to the audience.)
CONCLUSION This workshop is not over yet... When you are finished working in your small group, we say, “Very good. Each group got at least ten of the items that are on our list.”
BRAVO, thank you for your participation. Some of the groups added some ideas that we didn't have on our list, so we will add them to the lit for our next training.
Don't leave! sit! stay!
NOW COMES THE EXCITING PART> You might think that this seminar is over. We've talked together for 30-40 minutes. This has just begun. We are passing around a sheet of paper with your contact information. You signed this paper, putting your email address and your name on the sheet. Well, most of you did. We want you to sign up for 7, 30, 90 day checkups. Dennis and Steve will make it their job to call you, email you or possibly visit you in your class to see how you use these techniques. If you want none of that follow up, scratch out the numbers. If you want all three visits or emails, 7 30 90, then circle all three numbers. We will contact you or visit you on this basis. Please add your phone number. If we can text your mobile phone, please write the word "TEXT" next to the phone.
Frequently Asked Questions Before the workshop: teachers read the "readings" page on my website
During the workshop 1. Welcome and the reading of "the five questions" 2. Participants stand and paraphrase two of their favorite quotes and describe their feelings about the quote and tell the group "one new procedure that I will bring to my classroom to inject the spirit of the quote" into the classwork. 3. Suggestions about "how to put these quotes into action" are written on a sheet. 4. The compiled sheet is emailed to VisualandActive@gmail.com for follow-up
The workshop can take as little as 30 minutes or as long as 90 minutes, depending on the amount of material the staff has consumed (if they visit the website ahead of time and watch the two 10-minute videos, then they are able to complete the workshop more quickly.)
Followup within 7 days of the course, each participant receives an email message (from VAA) and/or a phone call (according to the wishes of the participant) asking about the implementation of the suggestions. within 30 days of the course, a second call and/or email checks on progress. within 90 days of the course, a third-up follow call and/or email is made to each participant.
Alternative Methods of Assessment Key quotes from Gardner
About Finding a Child's Passion: Until we find the child’s passion, it’s just school. When the child finds his passion, we teach to that passion. We can find internships for high school students: Kids say, “I love this internship!” and teachers can teach to that interest. – Dennis Littky
Excellence versus Perfection A high school principal at a conference spoke about tips on reducing stress at work. "I recognize the difference between excellence and perfection. I believe it is important that my students bus their tables and put their trays away after they have eaten. You may think this is being nitpicky or that it's a minor issue. i believe that teaching kids responsibility is maybe the most important lesson we offer. My students generally come from upper income families and the cafeteria staff is largely lower-income. What's the message when they walk away and leave their trays?
I can get 96 percent of my students to put their trays away. That's good, but it's not perfection. I want 100 percent of the trays put away. But I've come to realize that by striving for 100 percent, I would turn the place into a prison. In doing that, I would crate an incredible amount of stress for my self and everyone around me. So I've learned to be satisfied with excellence." Becoming a Multiple Intelligences School Thomas Hoerr
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We should develop students who know how to: identify problems, use their intelligences to solve problems and create products, demonstrate their understanding in a variety of ways, and work with others.
Educators should: personalize education and work to individualize instruction; enable students to develop and use their areas of strength; view students' parents as partners and educate them, too; offer an environment that supports faculty growth; and demonstrate that students are prepared for the future. Becoming a Multiple Intelligences School Thomas Hoerr
Read the Key Quotes
Instructions: After reading the quotes on the "Readings" pages of VisualandActive.com, take several moments and think how these quotes might alter the way you present information to students. 1. How might you change the way you organize your classroom?
2. What new procedures could you add?
3. What roles could the student take on, transforming you into a facilitator?
4. What is your opinion of alternative methods of assessment (exhibitions, portfolios)?
5. What is your opinion of narratives in addition to letter grades?
Alison Gopnik (The Teacher as Coach) Schools don't teach the same way children learn. ... Children seem to learn best when they can explore the world and interact with expert adults..... They learn by watching adults, trying themselves and receiving detailed corrective feedback about their efforts. ...A good example of such teaching in our culture is the stern but beloved baseball coach. How many school teachers are as good at essay writing, science or mathematics as the average coach is at baseball? And even when teachers are expert, how many children ever get to watch them work through writing an essay or designing a scientific experiment or solving an unfamiliar math problem?
Robert Reich (former Sec. of Labor) “Given the widening array of possibilities, there’s no reason that every child must master the sciences, algebra, geometry, biology, or any of the rest of the standard high school curriculum that has barely changed in half a century.”
Lois Hetland, Steve Seidel, J. Walters (Portfolio Practices, Project Zero) "Many universities allow home-schooled students to submit portfolios of their work to show their progress. Couldn't every student submit a portfolio with their college application? Paul Wagner, former president of Rollins College "Movies, soap operas, TV shows and radio shows are competing for the minds of our young people. If we are going to have a chance at educating them, we need to use the same methods -- audio and visual."
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