Totally 3rd Grade Blog

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It’s nice to hear a candidate admit that a plan that they are partially responsible for is failing and needs an overhaul.  It’s equally pleasing to hear that the focus this time around will be placed where it should have been all along.

This video captures a  rare, closed performance by Taylor Mali.  In it, he performs his slam-poetry piece, “What Teachers Make.”  Watch it any time you can’t remember why you still bother teaching.

This video makes a good case for fostering “learning communities” as a means of harnessing the talents and “connectedness” of modern kids. 

As Steven Heppell points out, it’s time for the “death of education and the dawn of learning.”

What kind of community experience are you fostering in your classroom?  Are you creating an environment that capitalizes on the natural abundance that the kids in your classroom are ready to share? 

I’m pleased to be able to post this Paul Harvey audio clip, which was recorded off-the-air over ten years ago.  Like all of his work, it is incredibly insightful, heartfelt and makes me cry every time I hear it.

Take a few minutes to listen and see if you feel, as I do, that the eloquent classroom teacher who Paul gave voice to well over a decade ago has yet to be heard.  It’s time for the powers-that-be to listen up.

Paul Harvey tells it like it is.