Tag: Learning
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Just ask the students…
For the past several months we have been working on hacking our curriculum for 2017. Our Upper School faculty has been collaborating on new courses for next year. The discussions have been driven by three questions from our Manifesto. How might we make school more reflective of real life? How might we empower all learners to be…
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#ILoveMySchool
Last year we adopted a Manifesto which describes our purpose and will soon guide our strategic plan. As an educator who strives to transform education, I find it to be inspirational. The Mount Vernon Presbyterian School Manifesto states: Education is changing. We live amidst a fundamental reordering of how we think about school: from the…
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#ATL’s Urban City Studio: An concept for engaging with your community
The City of Atlanta has big plans for the future especially since they are projecting 2.5 million new residents over the next 25 years. The city has created a comprehensive development plan and one of the ways that they are increasing awareness and gathering information from Atlanta residents is through their new Atlanta City Studio. The…
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Amazing Summer of Learning
This summer I have had three amazing learning experiences that were each very different, yet they connect to our mission at Mount Vernon Presbyterian School. Here is my first pass at a brief overview of the takeaways. Traverse Conference at the Watershed School in Boulder, CO Storify from Traverse Using the local environment for learning –…
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Searching for Flexible Learning Spaces to Study
In my last post New Learning Spaces = New Flow of Learning, I shared the plans for a new Upper School building at Mount Vernon Presbyterian School. I have been fascinated by what this new campus will mean for learning at our school and am fixated on finding comparable spaces. Earlier in the year, I…
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People Get Emotional When you Talk about Changing Grading Practices
Over the years I have followed newspaper articles from communities where grading and reporting changes have taken place and quite often the conversations lead to heated arguments, animosity, teachers getting suspended and/or fired, principals getting losing their jobs and court cases. Possibly the most controversial change that really gets tempers flaring is when schools decide to…
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What’s it like to change grading and reporting practices that have been around for over 100 years?
At Graded, In 2012 we started working on plans to redesign our assessment practices to better meet the needs of our students. The most difficult work happened during the 2014 – 15 school year and everyone in our community was on a steep learning journey.I am so proud of our faculty for taking the risks…
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Jumping Right into Design Thinking – Part 1
I have always been someone who likes using defined processes groups. Probably the most useful workshop that I ever attended was David Langford’s Quality Learning seminar. I have used his tools for problem solving as an individually and with groups for years. For several years now I have been wanting to learn more about design…
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1:1 in the Classroom: Learning to become mindful
While our middle school has been 1:1 for 3 1/2 years last year was our first in the high school. The roll-out went smoothly and students and teachers settled into the new environment with very few issues. I will admit that I would occasionally hear teachers complain about students being distracted and off task while…
Creative Tension 