-tictech message:
Mark,
I appreciate your willingness to fight "the good fight" for our students and
THEIR reality. When students reply to a school policy (Ex.: turn off the
spellcheck) with a resounding, "Huh?!" we, as teachers, need to reflect on
our rules / mandates.
Secondly, fighting for reform is tiring and lemonade making is necessary to
keep from going crazy in this district.
The quote below sums up my thoughts this school year.
"I get up every morning determined to both change the world and have one
hell of a good time. Sometimes this makes planning my day difficult."
E. B. White (1899 - 1985)
Personally, I'm letting the energy draining act of reform go for this year
and recharging my teacher batteries by (first) having fun with the students.
Kevin Crozier
Gr. 3 - Lowell School
Seattle, WA
kbcrozier@seattleschools.org
http://www.seattleschools.org/schools/lowell/kevin/index.htm
"Understand the conflict with your brain, but solve it in your heart." -
Erin Jones
> ----------
> From: Ahlness, Mark
> Reply To: tictech@learningspace.org
> Subject: tictech: DWA conversation
>
> -tictech message:
>
> Hi all,
> Thanks to all the folks who participated in the furious flurry of a
> discussion over the DWA and the use of spell check last week. Very good
> arguments made from many points of view, I think. I only hope some of
those
> who continue to set the rules for technology in testing actually read and
> think about some of the points made in that conversation.
>
> For me, I was a disappointed (but not surprised) at the reaction of those
> who thought spell check should not be used. However, I was even more
> disappointed there were not more speaking up about the use of word
> processors at all on this test. As far as I have heard, my classroom was
the
> only one in Seattle allowing kids to use word processors. If true, this is
> very disappointing - and surprising. I really, really hope there were
> others...
>
> I continue to believe the DWA word processing restrictions are reactive
and
> punitive. Great to hear about a study about a handful of undergraduates,
but
> my subjective (and thus unreliable and invalid, to many) observations of
> nearly as many third graders contradict those results. There just is no
> research out there. Anecdotal reports carry weight, depending on where
they
> are printed, how they're written, and who reads them. There MUST be more
> research done here, especially with young learners.
>
> Then there is the "if Life gives you lemons, make lemonade" philosophy.
Turn
> a bad educational situation into a learning opportunity. I tell you what,
> folks. If the Life fruit dispensing machine continues to dole out lemons
to
> me and my kids, I will not sit back and improvise. I'll be contacting the
> vendor. - Mark
>
> ps - you can browse the archive of the DWA conversation at the bottom of:
> http://lspace.learningspace.org:88/hypermail/tictech/index.html
>
> Mark Ahlness
> mlahlness@seattleschools.org
> Arbor Heights Elementary
> www.arborheights.com
>
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>
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Tue Mar 18 2003 - 10:51:42 PST