Reflections of an Educator

Two researchers from Northern Kentucky University , Christopher Cook and Shawn Faulkner, conducted a study of two middle schools in Kentucky that had effective teaming at the middle grades level.  This study clearly listed the benefits of having common planning and meeting time at the middle school level, a crucial time for students in their educational career.  In order to support students at the middle school level, it is important for common planning time and meetings to occur.  Although this model can be costly, when properly implemented with tight-loose leadership from the administration, the benefit to student learning and support is nearly endless. Cook and Faulkner make the argument for three types of meetings at the middle school level: Interdisciplinary Teams : these teams, made up of adults that teach different subjects but the same students, should meet regularly, to address: Scheduling changes Student concerns Students receiving services Behavior ...

I've decided that it is time to be regularly updating my blog, and not just with summer learning expeditions, but current ones as well.  This evening I spent some time with Steve Hargadon and others on Elluminate via LearnCentral.org, an incredible website that has the potential to create PLCs (professional learning communities) around the world in a virtual capacity.   LearnCentral hosts a sort of social network (i.e. Facebook) for educators, allowing them to connect on a professional level to discuss a topic that needs discussing...for example, middle school Social Studies.   Elluminate has hooked up with LearnCentral to allow members to host virtual sessions based on the topic of choice (it must be open to the public and recorded for archiving).  The potential for leveraging collective knowledge, expertise, and best practices in an easy-to-use forum is amazing.  Now, the mission is just to get the word out.  The idea has gotten me very excited; I've never before seen such...