THIS WEEK IN EDUCATION Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day... The latest news and resources in education since 2007

Collaborate With Colleagues to Make It Through This School Year is the headline of my latest Education Week Teacher column. Wrapping up this series on the do’s and don’ts of teaching during the COVID-19 pandemic, three educators suggest such strategies as creating online and offline content and embracing uncertainty. Here are some excerpts:

Wokandapix / Pixabay I have a number of regular weekly features (see HERE IS A LIST (WITH LINKS) OF ALL MY REGULAR WEEKLY FEATURES ). This is a relatively new addition to that list. Some of these resources will be added to The Best Advice On Teaching K-12 Online (If We Have To Because Of The Coronavirus) – Please Make More Suggestions ! and the best will go to The “Best Of The Best” Resources To

piviso / Pixabay I’m adding this new video from Great Big Story to The Best Sites For Learning About The World’s Different Cultures :

I learned about Gez.la from Google Maps Mania , who wrote: It provides links to virtual content created by museums, galleries, aquariums and zoos around the world. It’s obviously not as exhaustive as Google Arts and Culture , but it seemed to me to have a number of places that you can find at the Google site. I’m adding it to The Best Resources For Finding And Creating Virtual Field Trips .

geralt / Pixabay Here are new additions to THE BEST POSTS PREDICTING WHAT SCHOOLS WILL LOOK LIKE IN THE FALL : Hybrid Schooling May Be the Most Dangerous Option of All is from Wired. Lost Summer: How Schools Missed a Chance to Fix Remote Learning is from The NY Times. Cuomo clears New York schools statewide to open, carefully is from The Associated Press.

Anemone123 / Pixabay As I wrote in my tentative plans for my fall online classes ( HERE ARE DETAILED – & TENTATIVE – DISTANCE LEARNING PLANS FOR ALL MY FALL CLASSES ), I reserved the right to make constant changes as I learned new things and my thinking evolved. Much, if not most, of what wrote there is still holding solid, but I am beginning to make some changes. I’ll write a post next week deta

Now Is the Time to Address Education’s ‘Most Pressing Equity Issues’ is the headline of my latest Education Week Teacher column. Two educators call for schools to use this time of crisis to focus on equity issues like desegregation and community involvement. Here are some excerpts:

I’ve spent several hours this week becoming familiar with Nearpod , and I’m liking what I see. And I’m particularly liking that it looks like our district might purchase a license for its use. It really is sort of an all-in-one tool, and they’ve recently added the ability to create interactive videos like those in EdPuzzle. Teacher Sam Kary has a nice YouTube Channel called New EdTech Classroom ,

Editor’s Note: I think Donna’s activity is a great one to start the first day of school! Using Kahoot can be fun, though the sentence starters and the idea of using them to write an essay about the class can be used with or without the game site. I’m adding this post to Answers To “What Do You Do On The First Day Of School?” Donna DeTommaso – Kleinert Ed.D. is a retired ESL teacher from the North

422737 / Pixabay Many of us are brushing up on tech tools that we might not have tried before the pandemic. I’ve never used Google Classroom for an asynchronous class discussion before, I plan to try it out this year. Here’s a good video explaining it. I’m adding it to A Beginning List Of The Best Resources For Learning About Google Classroom .

kaboompics / Pixabay Here are new additions to THE BEST POSTS PREDICTING WHAT SCHOOLS WILL LOOK LIKE IN THE FALL : How Safe Is Your School’s Reopening Plan? Here’s What To Look For is from NPR. Congress’s Ideological Divide Has Stymied Aid for Pandemic-Stricken Schools is from The NY Times. I’m Tired of Hearing That Teachers Are Only Thinking About Ourselves Right Now is from Slate. What will it

13smok / Pixabay March For Our Lives, the anti-gun violence group begun by Parkland students, are putting this new add on the airwaves (you can read more about it at the Washington Post article, March for Our Lives marches toward November with new campaign ad ). I’m adding it to The Best Resources For Learning About “The March For Our Lives”

OpenClipart-Vectors / Pixabay As we enter a pandemic-shaped school year, one of many questions we teachers will need to deal with is “What are we NOT going to cover this year?” We’re clearly not going to have as much live classroom time with our students, and we need to resist the urge to load-up our students with homework to “make-up” all that lost time. Let’s look at things realistically. Based

Each week, I publish a post or two containing three or four particularly useful resources on classroom instruction, and you can see them all here. Of course, this is a crazy time for “classroom” instruction…. You might also be interested in THE BEST RESOURCES ON INSTRUCTION IN 2020 – PART ONE. Here are this week’s picks: Using Data to Advance Racial Equity is from Edutopia. I’m adding it to a pre

Teachers Should ‘Give Everyone Some Grace’ This Fall is the headline of my latest Education Week Teacher column. Three teachers offer colleagues suggestions for this fall, including showing “grace” to students, parents, and themselves and emphasizing flexibility. Here are some excerpts:

Here are new additions to THE BEST POSTS PREDICTING WHAT SCHOOLS WILL LOOK LIKE IN THE FALL : The Truth Behind A Viral Picture Of A Reopening School Is Worse Than It Looked is from BuzzFeed News. As the Coronavirus Comes to School, a Tough Choice: When to Close is from The NY Times. Special education students are not just falling behind — they’re losing key skills, parents say is from The Washing

Ted Appel, our school’s former – and great – principal, talked about the importance of looking at teacher “input” instead of student “output” when considering if a teacher is doing good work. In other words, if a teacher is practicing instructionally sound pedagogy, then he or she should be considered to be doing good work, even if, due to circumstances beyond the teacher’s control, the student d

Tumisu / Pixabay Instagram just unveiled a competitor to TikTok – it’s called “Reels,” and seems to be pretty much the same as TikTok, except that its videos can only be fifteen seconds. You can read more about it at The Washington Post article, Instagram’s new copycat video tool will have TikTok reeling . Students in both my ELL and Theory of Knowledge classes have used Instagram videos (see T h

President Trump was at it again this morning demanding that schools reopen . How can any teacher support this man?

Simon / Pixabay Google just announced that “Google Assignments” will go live in G Suite For Education on August 11th: Assignments is an add-on application for learning management systems (LMSs) that helps you distribute, analyze, and grade student work with G Suite for Education. Assignments makes Google Docs and Google Drive compatible with your LMS for file submissions. You can use Assignments

Dos & Don’ts of Teaching in a COVID-19 Environment is the headline of my latest Education Week Teacher column. Four educators share instructional recommendations for the pandemic-influenced fall, including setting boundaries and showing patience. Here are some excerpts:

Here are new additions to THE BEST POSTS PREDICTING WHAT SCHOOLS WILL LOOK LIKE IN THE FALL : When Covid Subsided, Israel Reopened Its Schools. It Didn’t Go Well. is from The NY Times. ‘It screams disrespect’: San Jose teachers must return to the classroom despite safety concerns is from The San Jose Mercury News. Closing schools around the world could cause a ‘generational catastrophe,’ U.N. sec

Tumisu / Pixabay Sal Kahn did a good interview with American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten about reopening schools:

BiljaST / Pixabay Six years ago I began this regular feature where I share a few posts and resources from around the Web related to ESL/EFL or to language in general that have caught my attention. You might also be interested in THE BEST RESOURCES, ARTICLES & BLOG POSTS FOR TEACHERS OF ELLS IN 2019 – PART ONE and THE BEST RESOURCES, ARTICLES & BLOG POSTS FOR TEACHERS OF ELLS IN 2019 – PART TWO. A

geralt / Pixabay I’m adding these two new videos to Here are new additions to THE BEST POSTS PREDICTING WHAT SCHOOLS WILL LOOK LIKE IN THE FALL :

Start the Year With a ‘Primary Focus’ on Relationship-Building is the headline of my latest Education Week Teacher column. Four educators share ideas on how to start a pandemic-effect school year, including by organizing scavenger hunts and having students share and write captions for their favorite photos. Here are some excerpts:

Pezibear / Pixabay Our school starts one-month from today. I thought it was a good time to send out email messages on our Infinite Campus system, tell students and parents/guardians how much I was looking forward to seeing them, and invite them to join the Google Classroom for our classes (it’s difficult to send them out directly from Google Classroom because our district has not yet “populated”

CNN’s Brooke Baldwin interviewed me live on CNN today about school reopening in the fall. CNN hasn’t put the video up on its website – I don’t know if they ever will. But Mercedes Pilar was kind enough to tape it off her television and send it to me. If and when CNN publishes it on their website, I’ll add it here. https://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/files/2020/08/Interview-with-CNN-1.mp4

I’m making a change in the content of the regular feature. In addition to sharing the top five posts that have received the most “hits” in the preceding seven days (though they may have originally been published on an earlier date), I will also include the top five posts that have actually appeared in the past week. Often, these are different posts. You might also be interested in IT’S THE THIRTE

Nine years ago, in another somewhat futile attempt to reduce the backlog of resources I want to share, I began this occasional “” post where I share three or four links I think are particularly useful and related to…ed tech, including some Web 2.0 apps. You might also be interested in THE BEST ED TECH RESOURCES OF 2020 – PART ONE , as well as checking out all my edtech resources . Here are this w

Q&A Collections: Math Instruction is the headline of my latest Education Week Teacher column. All Classroom Q&A posts on Math Instruction (from the past nine years!) are described and linked to in this compilation post. Here’s an excerpt from one of them:

geralt / Pixabay Here are new additions to THE BEST POSTS PREDICTING WHAT SCHOOLS WILL LOOK LIKE IN THE FALL : ‘This Push to Open Schools Is Guaranteed to Fail’ is from The Atlantic. What a day at school looks like in a pandemic is from Axios. ‘I’m sorry, but it’s a fantasy’ is from The Washington Post. Does the Covid pandemic spell the end of public schools? is from USA Today.

I’m fairly active on Pinterest and, in fact, have curated 22,000 resources there that I haven’t shared on this blog. I thought readers might find it useful if I began sharing a handful of my most recent “pins” each week (I’m not sure if you can see them through an RSS Reader – you might have to click through to the original post). You might also be interested in MY MOST POPULAR PINS OF 2020 – PAR

James Baldwin would have been ninety-six years today. You might be interested in JAMES BALDWIN WAS BORN ON THIS DAY IN 1924 – HERE ARE RELATED RESOURCES .

Q&A Collections: Differentiating Instruction is the headline of my latest Education Week Teacher column. All Classroom Q&A posts on Differentiating Instruction (from the past nine years!) are described and linked to in this compilation post. Here’s an excerpt from one of them:

geralt / Pixabay Here are new additions to THE BEST POSTS PREDICTING WHAT SCHOOLS WILL LOOK LIKE IN THE FALL : A School Reopens, and the Coronavirus Creeps In is from The NY Times. Equity In Pandemic Schooling N YC Releases Plan For Handling COVID-19 Outbreaks In Schools is from The Gothamist. NEW: Schools in NYC will only reopen IF the city can maintain a test positivity rate below 3 percent, de

Syaibatulhamdi / Pixabay I think this would be a good video to show to students. I’m adding it to A BEGINNING LIST OF THE BEST RESOURCES FOR LEARNING ABOUT THE CORONAVIRUS .

Wokandapix / Pixabay I have a number of regular weekly features (see HERE IS A LIST (WITH LINKS) OF ALL MY REGULAR WEEKLY FEATURES ). This is a relatively new addition to that list. Some of these resources will be added to The Best Advice On Teaching K-12 Online (If We Have To Because Of The Coronavirus) – Please Make More Suggestions ! and the best will go to The “Best Of The Best” Resources To

StartupStockPhotos / Pixabay I have my IB Theory of Knowledge students make lots of presentations, and I plan to continue that plan during this year of online learning. Most of the time in a physical classroom small groups create posters which they then present in front (of course, sometimes they also use Google Slides). During this year, I’d like to try having them create Pecha Kucha presentatio

For more information on the #HeLa100 , check out https://t.co/QbPUWYxDBV . — uché blackstock, md (@uche_blackstock) August 1, 2020 Here are my previous posts about her: VIDEO: “THE IMMORTAL LIFE OF HENRIETTA LACKS: OFFICIAL TRAILER” VIDEO: FILM ON HENRIETTA LACKS COMING OUT IN APRIL HERE’S THE VIDEO TED-ED SHOULD HAVE MADE ABOUT HENRIETTA LACKS DISAPPOINTING NEW TED-ED VIDEO & LESSON ON HENRIETTA

geralt / Pixabay The road to a legislative mandated state of California ethnic studies curriculum has been a bit rocky, with a number of objections made to it’s original proposal. You can read about those issues here at an older article from Ed Source . The state took down their initial proposal, but as that article says: The department took down the draft of the model curriculum after the public

The fabulous #EllChat_BkClub just finished a book study of The Science Teacher’s Toolbox , one of the books Katie Hull and I edited, and is now moving on to The Math Teacher’s Toolbox (another one we edited!) and