BlogCadre - education

Be A Martian and Help NASA

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 03:21:10 +0000

Help NASA sort through thousands of Mars images and have fun learning about space exploration at the same time! There have been so many images taken of Mars that scientists cannot sort through all of them by themselves. So, they have asked the public to help them sort through the images through their website Be A Martian, which was created with the help of Microsoft.

From BBC News article:

Players at Be A Martian can earn points in one game by helping Nasa examine and organize the images into a more complete map of the planet.

Another game gets users to count impact craters to help scientists understand better the relative age of rocks on Mars' surface.

Nasa hopes the mix of real data and fun will also inspire the planetary scientists of tomorrow.

"We really need the next generation of explorers," says Michelle Viotti, from the agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which oversees Mars missions.

"And we're also accomplishing something important for Nasa. There's so much data coming back from Mars. Having a wider crowd look at the data, classify it and help understand its meaning is very important."

Have fun and make your own discoveries!

[via BBC and Nerd Salad]

Happy 40th Birthday, Sesame Street!

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 16:53:25 +0000

In honor of Sesame Street's 40th birthday, popular characters from the show will be gracing the Google search homepage as the Google doodle.

To help celebrate, I've posted two of my favorite clips from the show: Stevie Wonder performing "Superstition" live and the Pinball Number Count.

Previously on BC:
Sesame Street Memories: Yip-Yips Skits - Link
Ernie Sings "Rubber Duckie" - Link
Galimoto: African handmade "motorcars" - Link

Professor Performs Halloween Video Trick for His Class

Mon, 02 Nov 2009 03:11:04 +0000

Matthew Weathers put together a fun Halloween video trick for his Nature of Math class at Biola University.

Reading Rainbow is going off the air

Fri, 28 Aug 2009 18:59:08 +0000

Beloved PBS children's show "Reading Rainbow" is coming to an end after 26 years of encouraging kids to read and love to read. Link

Related news:
Did Education Dept.'s Shift Help Kill PBS's 'Reading Rainbow'? - Link [The Washington Post]

'The Beatles' Masters Degree

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 21:22:12 +0000

Having a difficult time deciding on a Masters Degree program? Well, if you're a big fan of The Beatles and are interested in the impact they made in their hometown of Liverpool, you may want to consider getting your degree in 'The Beatles'.

Liverpool Hope University is now offering a brand new Masters Degree in The Beatles, Popular Music, and Society, setting a new standard for teaching about pop culture as a whole. It's a statement as well as an initiative, showing just how much Liverpool values the influence The Beatles have had.

Link (Thanks, Colleen!)

Vintage Sesame Street Clips

Thu, 30 Apr 2009 17:35:16 +0000

For days now I've had the Sesame Street pinball countdown song in my head. I thought I would post it today so this catchy tune can play over... and over... and over in your heads too. You can thank me later.

Here's another vintage Sesame Street clip of "The Ladybugs' Picnic" that I thought you would enjoy.

A school that isn't a 'school'

Mon, 05 Jan 2009 03:03:47 +0000

Watercliffe Meadow opened its doors in September. It has 500 students, classrooms, teachers and a playground. Technically, it is a school, but calling it a "school" has been forbidden because of its 'negative connotations'.

'We decided from an early stage we didn't want to use the word "school",' she [Linda Kingdon, headmistress] said yesterday. 'This is Watercliffe Meadow, a place for learning. One reason was many of the parents of the children here had very negative connotations of school.

'Instead we want this to a be a place for family learning, where anyone can come. We were able to start from scratch and create a new type of learning experience. There are no whistles or bells or locked doors.

So would a student get expelled if he or she called it "school"? Seriously, a school is a school.

Link

Peers vote out 5-year-old classmate from class, teacher's idea

Tue, 27 May 2008 03:04:50 +0000

A kindergarten teacher in Florida allowed students to vote out a fellow classmate, who is in the process of being diagnosed with autism, from the class.

After each classmate was allowed to say what they didn't like about Barton's 5-year-old son, Alex, his Morningside Elementary teacher Wendy Portillo said they were going to take a vote, Barton said.

By a 14 to 2 margin, the students voted Alex — who is in the process of being diagnosed with autism — out of the class.

Melissa Barton filed a complaint with Morningside's school resource officer, who investigated the matter, Port St. Lucie Department spokeswoman Michelle Steele said. But the state attorney's office concluded the matter did not meet the criteria for emotional child abuse, so no criminal charges will be filed, Steele said.

Link.

Teacher of 17 years was illiterate until age 48

Wed, 13 Feb 2008 04:08:17 +0000

John Corcoran is a retired teacher who taught high school for 17 years and all that time he couldn't read, write or spell. Until the age of 48, John was illiterate.

By acting up in school, John was labeled as having emotional and behavioral problems so his inability to read went unnoticed. He made it through school by cheating off of friends and managed to graduate from college with a bachelor's degree in education.

Creating an "oral and visual envrionment" in his classroom, John relied on his teacher's assistants to do board work and read necessary documentation. He did a great job teaching, but felt ill deceiving his students. John eventually took a leave of absence to become a real estate developer.

At the age of 48 he decided to learn how to read and write again and began working with a 65-year-old volunteer at the Literacy Center of Carlsbad. After a year he was able to read at a sixth-grade level.

Link to article.

Interactive floors in Denmark schools

Thu, 21 Jun 2007 02:20:04 +0000

Programmers Kasper Neilson and Ole Iverson from Denmark have developed interactive learning floors called "Wisdom Wells". Not meant to replace ordinary classroom teaching, Wisdom Wells not only encourages individual learning, but also collaborative learning where the students can learn from each other. [link]

College student gets 0/100 on a true or false exam

Sun, 13 May 2007 02:26:35 +0000

Michael Benson took a 100 question True/False Communications final last week and scored 0/100. In this case, the saying 'When all else fails, choose "C"', failed him miserably.

What cracks me up most is the email his professor sent him the following day:

Dear Michael,

Every year I attempt to boost my students' final grades by giving them this relatively simple exam consisting of 100 True/False questions from only 3 chapters of material. For the past 20 years that I have taught Intro Communications 101 at this institution I have never once seen someone score below a 65 on this exam. Consequently, your score of a zero is the first in history and ultimately brought the entire class average down a whole 8 points.

There were two possible answer choices: A (True) and B (False). You chose C for all 100 questions in an obvious attempt to get lucky with a least a quarter of the answers. It's as if you didn't look at a single question. Unfortunately, this brings your final grade in this class to failing. See you next year!

May God have mercy on your soul.

Sincerely,
Professor William Turner

P.S. If all else fails, go with B from now on.
B is the new C

Poor schmuck. How he made it into college in the first place is beyond me.

[via reddit]

A Guide to Grading Exams

Sat, 10 Mar 2007 14:47:17 +0000

Here is a method of grading exams that seems fair -- It's called the paper toss. Read the complete guide.

Oklahoma university auctions tuition on eBay

Mon, 05 Feb 2007 19:22:49 +0000

Oklahoma Wesleyan University, a private school, is auctioning off a year of tuition, room and board on eBay. Tuition is typically $23,000 a year and currently the highest bid is $6,700. The auction is open until Feb. 7, 2007.

[via USA Today]

Previously:
Ohio school district paying $100 to students for good performances on state exams

Hong Kong tutors sell sex appeal

Tue, 23 Jan 2007 17:53:14 +0000

Hong Kong tutors seek the help of stylists, fashion designers and photographers to create a hip and sexy image that will sell.

It's just the latest twist in the competition to grab the business of students caught up in Hong Kong's make-or-break exam culture. Youngsters take two college exams during their seven years in secondary school and they have to pass both to get into a university.

So hoards of students trek to after-school lectures at tutoring centers.

The Census and Statistics Department says a third of secondary school youngsters sought private tutoring in the 2004-05 school year, spending a total of $18.9 million a month — 25% more than five years earlier.

With competition growing fierce on that front, the tutorial centers in recent years have increasingly focused on promoting their teachers as trendy icons consumable by students.

Previously:
Ohio school district paying $100 to students for good performances on state exams

Ohio school district paying $100 to students for good performances on state exams

Mon, 22 Jan 2007 23:00:06 +0000

In order to encourage students, an eastern Ohio school district (Coshoctoc City Schools) has been conducting a 3 year experiment where students are paid up to $100 for good performances on state achievement exams.

Coshocton City Schools is in the last year of a three-year experiment run by an economics professor at Case Western Reserve University. Officials of the 2,000-student district will decide after getting Eric Bettinger's final data this summer whether to continue it.

The third- through sixth-graders in the study receive $15 for every score of "proficient" on a state exam and $20 for better results -- so they can collect $100 if they have high scores in all five subjects. The money comes as gift certificates redeemable at a local pizza parlor and Wal-Mart.

Coshocton manufacturer Robert Simpson paid for the project with a $100,000 grant from his family foundation, and says the foundation is ready to take the rewards districtwide if the data and the community support it.

What's the lesson here? Learning can buy you things from Wal-Mart. Genius!

[via digg]