The Daily Riff - BE SMARTER. ABOUT EDUCATION.

PISA Test Results are in: Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh My!

"If Pisa measures anything, it is the ability to do Pisa tests. Aligning policy along a single performance indicator can be damaging. We need to look at the whole picture." - David Spieghalter, the Winton professor of the public understanding of risk at the University of Cambridge Read more

Stigliz on Education

VIDEO: "We have an education system that is very dependent on where you live, where you live is very dependent on what you can afford . . . " Read more

A Response to: Is Your Child a "Warrior" or "Worrier"?

Why Some Kids Handle Test Pressure and Others . . . Not. Read more

Am I Preparing Students for My Age or Theirs?

I can never understand how and why we expect students with far more energy, ideas, natural creativity and far more everything, to be more "contained" in their behavior than adults. Read more

How Much Do Early Years Lead to Student Success?

"The idea being that wasn't necessarily to create little engineers everywhere, though that would be great for us. The idea was to take advantage of the natural learning process and curiosity that children have at that age . . ." Tamika Lang, Boeing Read more

The New Resume

A picture is worth a thousand words. A video game-like format is worth . . . Read more

Noam Chomsky: In the news again, this time about Twitter and High Schoolers

Noam Chomsky, Professor Emeritus at MIT, "father of linguistics", political commentator.  From bio: "Besides his work in linguistics, Chomsky is internationally recognized as one of the most critically engaged public intellectuals alive today":               ... Read more

Does your school have a beehive?

"If we want children to be inventors, we have to give them opportunities to invent." - 5:00 mark, Mission Hill video Read more

How the Arts Prepare for a Life's Work in any Discipline

The Arts in STEM learning: "I actually explained my whole theory of immunology to an entire art class at a college JUST through visuals and they GOT it. I have many more problems trying to explain it to my students through words in my immunology classes." -Dr. Robert Root-Bernstein Read more

7 Things I Learned in 7 Years

"The cult of productivity has its place, but worshipping at its altar daily robs us of the very capacity for joy and wonder that makes life worth living . . ." - Maria Popova Read more

Steve Jobs: Liberal Arts Essential for Innovation

"We need to revolutionize education to encourage creativity and need to teach our kids to play, take a chance and create. By not teaching our children liberal arts we will hinder their capacity to innovate." Read more

CEO: Drawing Can Help One Think and Reflect

Great video from pandodaily, my new favorite tech site, about how the CEO of Deviant Art uses his artistic expression and journaling to help him think, reflect, organize or clear his head to work better. Read more

I Forgot My Phone: Viral Video

If you missed this one, do check it out below.26 million views and counting . . . two minute run-time.... Read more

Seven Questions: Is your child a recipe-follower or a real learner?

"It may help to have in our minds a picture of what we mean by understanding . . . "-John Holt, Why Children Fail, p. 177by C.J. WesterbergI recently had a loooong conversation with a parent about whether his child... Read more

Advice to Graduates: Accomplishment is Unreliable

The Best Commencement of 2013 - George Saunders: "But still. It bothers me. So here's something I know to be true, although it's a little corny, and I don't quite know what to do with it: What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness. Those moments when another human being was there, in front of me, suffering, and I responded . . . sensibly. Reservedly. Mildly." Read more

How I Teach Math and Dance at the Same Time

In this video below, dance moves are equated with having "pattern attributes". This connection is very reminiscent of what mathematician Paul Lockhart was referring to in "A Mathematician's Lament" about math being about pattern-making . . . and art.Isn't also... Read more

Financial Literacy: Making Math Relevant

Guest Post By Joe Ganem Ph. D.: Schools Fail Teaching Students "Quantitative Literacy" Read more

Today's WOW Story: Yong Zhao's "Be Careful What You Wish For"

Flipping Standardized Testing on its Ear Read more

10 Things I Learned at (Bard) College Which I Couldn't Possibly Have Picked Up Elsewhere

I've often switched careers - from the arts world to human rights to international relations. "From law to writing and development to events management, Bard has taught me that with the right mindset, flexibility is possible, and versatility allows you to remain calm under pressure . . ." Read more

Homeless Man Developing App for Climate Change - Video

A Mentor-Mentee Story:  $100 or Learn How to CodeCheck out this story:  after being given a choice and after four weeks of learning how to code by someone who took the time, has developed an app that is almost ready... Read more