Do you care?
Poll
If You Don’t Mind Me Asking
Can we get a “show of hands,” to see who’s here? We’re getting around 400 visits a day now, but I know that some, at least, are from other schools. I’m just wondering what the ratio is.
(Just as a reminder, there’s no tracking of this and no info required, so you won’t identify yourself in any way by participating. It’s literally just a mouse click.)
Poll and Survey Reminders
UPDATE: Ummm….sorry. I misread what Chris wanted in the post from CAST. We’re supposed to LOOK at the survey and give him comments. Not take it. A revised version will be posted/distributed in the next day or two. You should complete THAT one. Sorry. Reading is FUN-damental!!
Just in case you haven’t had the chance yet, please be sure to visit the post from CAST and complete review and make any comments/revisions on the survey on the District Wide Faculty Development Week. The survey takes anywhere from 5 to 15 minutes to fill out, but will be really valuable for planning next year’s events.
Also, there’s a poll on last Saturday’s “Think, Know, Prove” post about the Lounge that will affect how we organize posts related to the Reinvention process. Check it out here, and please vote your conscience. It takes about 4 seconds.
Thanks in advance for your participation.
Educational Reading Possibilities
I was checking out Crooked Timber last week, when I found this post about a poll being held on another site called Education Next, aimed at identifying “the most important books on education in the past decade.” The poll can be found here, but I was particularly appreciative of the commentary on Crooked Timber, along with the fact that I hadn’t seen or heard of most of the books mentioned in either place.
Check it out; and if you read any of them (or already have), let us know which one and what you think of it.
Reminder: Please Vote in the Poll about the Chancellor’s Presentation
If you haven’t already, please scroll down to the bottom of this post and vote your conscience. We have met our initial goal already (25 votes; currently 33 have voted), though it’s possible that a few of those represent the positions of faculty from Truman (Hi, Truman faculty, and welcome!). Still, there are more votes to be heard, I’m sure. The voting currently stands as follows:
Very Convinced by Chancellor’s Argument= 5
In Between about Chancellor’s Argument= 15
Unconvinced by Chancellor’s Argument= 13
Happy about the proposed process = 1
Reservations about the proposed process = 13
Grave concerns about the proposed process = 19
Also, stay tuned for more information about the next steps we will take locally regarding this Reinvention Process. The Faculty Council is discussing plans and possibilities with President Metoyer and among each other to try to make sure that HWC voices get heard, whether they are on the Task Forces or not.
More info soon. Thanks for playing to all.
Blogs as PD
When I read this piece about Blogs, Wikis, and Professional Development for teachers off the ASCD website this summer, I was rolling along, feeling comfortable enough but not really moved in any significant way, and then I hit this paragraph:
With the investment of a bit of time and effort, I’ve found a group of writers to follow who expose me to more interesting ideas in one day than I’ve been exposed to in the past 10 years of costly professional development. Professional growth for me starts with 20 minutes of blog browsing each morning, sifting through the thoughts of practitioners whom I might never have been able to learn from otherwise and considering how their work translates into what I do with students.
This learning has been uniquely authentic, driven by personal interests and connected to classroom realities. Blogs have introduced a measure of differentiation and challenge to my professional learning plan that had long been missing…
What’s more, the readers of my own blog challenge my thinking in provocative comments day after day.
By far, the most frequent comment I hear about the Lounge is, “I don’t know where you find the time.” Admittedly it takes some time, but probably not as much as it seems. I do most of the week’s postings in a handful (three or four) of sittings, and then use the scheduler to post them. Plus, it’s all stuff I’m reading anyway.
Still, I know that there is more that I’d like to see become a regular part of the show. There are many things that I’d like to have be a part of my “professional development” that this has become. The question is whether anyone else is interested in those things, too. So, here’s a little poll to get at what any of youse would like to see show up in The Lounge on occasion. No promises, but I’ll do what I can.
UPDATE: This poll is set up so you can choose multiple answers. If you choose “Other” please slap it up in the comments!
The Harold Lounge 