Mathetude » Comments posted by Skinner

Comments posted by Skinner

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The exclusive definition has been the norm in our common ed textbooks. And I believe we can adapt ... my concern ... is this going to be a 'secret?' How do we get the inclusive definition out to educators?

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Proclus (also Heron and Posidonius) divided quadrilaterals into parallelograms and non-parallelograms. For the latter, Proclus assigned trapezium to "two sides parallel," and trapezoid to "no sides parallel." Archimedes also defined a trapezium as having precisely two parallel sides (Heath 1956, pp. 188-190).

http://www.mathetude.com/story/view/18861.html

Re: The real problem in education: the ‘opportunity gap’

Money Cuts Both Ways in Education
Power spending on children of the elite may illustrate the dangers of rising inequality. But it may be that the less-lavishly educated children aren't the only losers.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/10/us/10iht-letter10.html

Re: The Common Core Standards: a Defense

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With national standards comes an explosion of common resources, from both commercial and non-commercial sources. While lots of the anti-common-core talk bemoans the influence of behemoth companies, the fact is that Common Core permits small organizations like mine to create materials and find an audience – something we could not do when there were 50 different sets of standards. And all one has to do is look at the Teaching Channel, EngageNY, and shared lesson sites to realize that teachers now have an extraordinary trove of materials to choose from, across all the states – and those resources will only grow. -- Grant Wiggins

Re: The Common Core Standards: a Defense

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There is no Nebraska algebra or Virginia reading. There is little disagreement about what constitute good outcomes in reading writing and math, yet by allowing the states to define those outcomes, place them willy-nilly in different grades, and test for them idiosyncratically we put students in a mobile society at a great disadvantage. (We also invite politically-correct science standards). To have everyone in the country studying the same subject at the same time makes it easier for families to cope with school changes and makes it far easier for teachers to find colleagues and gain expertise. -- Grant Wiggins

Re: Computer Crashes Cause Testing Anxiety in Oklahoma, Minnesota

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The headlines may make state education departments examine their own backup plans for test administration if computer crashes occur. Of course, once the common core tests are fully online in the 2014-15 school year, a few computer crashes could, in theory, affect tens of thousands of students across dozens of states.

Re: Computer Crashes Cause Testing Anxiety in Oklahoma, Minnesota

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FairTest, a Jamaica Plain, Mass.-based group opposed to making high-stakes decisions based on standardized exams, sums up concerns based on these incidents this way: "The same old firms, including Pearson, Educational Testing Service and CTB/McGraw-Hill, will produce the [common core] tests. These corporations have long histories of mistakes and incompetence. The multi-national conglomerate Pearson, for example, has been responsible for poor-quality items, scoring errors, computer system crashes and missed deadlines."

Re: 'Willful defiance' in L.A. schools

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Monica Garcia, the president of the Los Angeles Unified school board, gets it mostly right with a proposal to prevent schools from suspending students for the relatively minor infraction of "willful defiance," which includes mouthing off in class and such infractions as refusing to take off a hat after being told to do so by teachers or other school staff. Her proposal deserves the approval of the school board, after minor amendment.

Re: Young Adults With Autism Can Thrive In High-Tech Jobs

Patricia Evans,a neurologist at Children's Medical Center in Dallas, says people on the high-functioning end of the autism spectrum often have an amazing ability to hyper-focus on a task.

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They may really flourish at engineering-type tasks or computer design, where their interaction with people is somewhat limited. -- Patricia Evans

Re: Common Core Standards Are a 'Heavy Lift' for Districts, Educators

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It's going to change what we teach, ... how we teach and what materials we use to teach, ... how we decide who's ready to graduate from high school and ... who gets into college, and how we prepare teachers. It's a very heavy lift, and it's well worth lifting. -- Chester Finn,Thomas B. Fordham Institute

Re: Beta Testing Ed. Products Can Get Tricky for Schools

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Encouraging more schools to take part in beta testing would have the side benefit of creating a new, more sophisticated class of consumers of educational products. It would be a way to get school leaders to buy into the importance of using evidence to make decisions. -- Grover J. "Russ" Whitehurst, a former director of the Institute of Education Sciences, the main research arm of the U.S. Department of Education