Can you afford to take 3 lessons on a project-based inquiry in an IB Diploma class when you could lecture it in one?
Not only can you afford it, but it’s also the best investment you can make.

COETAIL course 3 started with a review of the look and feel this blog in light of visual literacy principles that enhance readability and engagement. This post is a reflection on the changes I’ve made to this page as a response to this challenge.

Inspired by Stanford dSchool‘s (retired?) Virtual Crash Course in Design Thinking, our group decided to recreate the experience using the Citizen Standard of the ISTE Standards for Educators. The goal was to create a 4x 30-minute professional development experience in which teachers refined, in their school context, processes and educational activities that improved the ability…

As a new Mamil, I have joined yet another social media platform, called Strava, to keep track of my activities, find routes and give/receive kudos for completing rides, runs and different challenges. Unsurprisingly, I had to agree to Strava’s Terms of Service to sign up. This is a 14-page legally-binding document that outlines a bunch…

The Student Affairs department at Butler University put out this page to ask faculty members to consider what they share online. No doubt, the idea, also shown above in a face-to-face environment, should apply to all messages regardless of their mode of transmission. If that’s true, should we be teaching students to THINK all the…

The good news is that the participation gap is narrowing, in some sense, with projects targeting the digital divide being backed by giants like Alphabet (Google’s parent company). Project Loon, which deploys balloons extending connectivity worldwide, and Project Link, a more down-to-earth (pun intended) and fast-acting project deploy optic fiber connections across Africa. The bad…

Mary K. Choi’s (@choitotheworld) 2016 account of how 4 teens in different parts of the United States use social media was quite the read. In it, she captures insights on how teens (I love the term ‘screenagers’, hinting at the amount of screen time) use social media. The language teens use in the digital world…

Yes, attribution is important. Yes, teachers have to model the appropriate use of digital media. Silvia Rosenthal’s work at Graded, together with Meryl Zeidenberg helps address this perceived lack of time in two ways. Firstly, by providing a sweet flowchart that lets designers know what type of attribution is necessary when borrowing work. Secondly, by…

At the moment, Grade 11 Theory of Knowledge students wrapped up their study of Ethics and started looking at how knowledge is constructed in History. Why did you choose this topic? These standards? My Theory of Knowledge class is one of my larger classes, with 16 students. During this period of Online Learning, it is…