February 4, 2013
Local News
WDDE
Delaware Digital Learning Conference offers opportunity to learn about technology and learning
As part of “Digital Learning Day” this week, teachers from across the state can participate in a conference that promotes the use of technology for teaching and learning. The four-day “Delaware Digital Learning Conference” starts Monday, focusing on topics including internet safety, personalized learning with the iPad, digital citizenship, and media literacy. Wendy Modzelewski, an Instructional Technology Specialist with the Delaware Department of Education says today’s technology is being integrated into new standards and teaching curriculum.
National News
Education Week
Pressure mounts in some states against Common Core
Opponents of the Common Core State Standards are ramping up legislative pressure and public relations efforts aimed at getting states to scale back—or even abandon—the high-profile initiative, even as implementation proceeds and tests aligned with the standards loom.
States soon to weigh science-standards adoption
With common standards in science set to be finalized in March, states will soon face the dilemma of embracing them as their own or going their own way, raising the question of how common the Next Generation Science Standards will ultimately prove to be. The 26 “lead state partners” helping to develop the K-12 standards have agreed to “give serious consideration” to adopting them. Recent interviews with officials in a number of those states, such as California, Delaware, Kansas, and Maryland, reveal a generally positive reaction to the second and final public draft, issued this month for comment.
Charters’ path to success or failure set early, study finds
Charter schools’ academic success or failure during their first year is a strong predictor of whether they will excel or struggle in later years, a new, far-reaching study finds.
The study, released Wednesday by Stanford University’s Center for Research on Education Outcomes, which has conducted extensive research on charters across the nation, also concludes that significant improvements in charter school performance over time is rare among middle and high schools, though it occurs more often in elementary schools.
The New York Times
Op-ed by Sara Mosle
Teachers and policy makers: troubling disconnect
Can the school reform movement accept constructive criticism? Gary Rubinstein hopes so. Mr. Rubinstein joined Teach for America in 1991, the program’s second year, and has now been teaching math for 15 years, five of them in some of the nation’s neediest public schools and 10 more at the prestigious Stuyvesant High School in Manhattan. He has a bachelor’s degree in math and a master’s in computer science, has written two books on classroom practice and at one point helped train new corps members for Teach for America. For years, he was a proponent of the program, albeit one with the occasional quibble.
Related Topics: Common Core, digital learning day, Education Technology, next generation technology