Help my students remember these confusing terms! If you want students to memorize, you can't aim for memorize. You have to aim higher – and then memorization comes along for free.
Phrases to Open Up a Discussion (Lunar Survival Skills Part 2) One of my favorite open-ended, creative activities becomes even better with careful phrasing on my part. These three questions will help you be the facilitator of a discussion, rather than the authority.
From “Summarize” to “Synthesize” Even what seems like a low-level "summarize" task can become beautifully high-level when we climb Bloom's Taxonomy.
Beware “Real World Problems” Why I stopped looking for “real world” problems and started aiming for “interesting.” The real world is often tedious and annoying. Interesting never is!
The Original Puzzlement: A Zoetrope As teachers, I spend a ton of time searching for inspiration to enliven my lessons. But sometimes, inspiration hits as soon as you leave the desk and books behind. Friday my wife and I took a trip to Disneyland and saw this unbelievable (literally, it seems like magic) intersection of art & technology.
Get Students Out Of Creative Ruts Sometimes students need a little structure to force them into a more creative state of mind. Here are a few ideas for interesting writing prompts
Create A Holiday Take students beyond the decorations and ask them to identify what a holiday reveals about a culture's values. Then, push them further as they develop their own holidays.
Curiosity Skill: Encouraging Students to Ask Other Students If you want to make a massive change in the culture of your classroom, move from teachers asking students all of the questions to students asking each other questions!
Evaluate with Academic Tournaments The bracketed tournament isn't just for college basketball. Set up a tournament to determine best president, state, element, or literary character and challenge your students to make interesting judgements.
Create A Civilization: The River Most humans want to live near fresh water, which means that most civilizations settled near a river! Let's add a river to your students' civilizations.
