Is classical music dead? Or does everyone love classical music? Does it matter what we say? What does it mean to play the piano with one buttock? Is anyone actually tone deaf? What is success? Can your life be transformed? Here is a master teacher – conductor Benjamin Zander – and his TEDtalks answers to all that and more. Like…
Marc Prensky is a New Yorker but here he is in Auckland, New Zealand giving a keynote address at the 2007 Leading Edge Conference for educators. Marc has lots to say about 21st century students and how it might be a good idea to figure out how to educate for this century before its over. He asks three questions: Who…
The morning glories and lilies are in bloom in the courtyard garden. The thistles bloom at the edge of the woods where the blackberries are ripening. The soccer pitch is silent and no-one is cheering from the bench. The flag droops in the heat and the car park behind Kenyon is empty. It is summer at school. But the owl…
Do you like eating nuts? You do? And so do squirrels, but even squirrels can eat too many. Tippety Nippet was a squirrel and he was VERY fond of nuts; but once he ate far too many, as you shall see. (Uh oh! Moral lesson about to be delivered.) And he had to admit to himself that the awkward feeling…
You may have seen this article in this week’s New York Times: Colleges Join Forces on a Web Presence to Let Prospective Students Research and Compare This is good news. It’s encouraging to see colleges taking the initiative to do something about the ranking obsession aspect of ACD. (Acquired College Disorder – a pernicious disease that is highly contagious and…
Here’s a link to today’s Poughkeepsie Journal about the grants awarded to upper school history teacher Bernadette Condessa. Congratulations Bernadette.
The view from Huckleberry Point in the Platte Clove Preserve just before the rainstorm. Saturday June 17th …and along the Harlem Valley Rail Trail Sunday June 18th.
In their zeal to raise test scores, too many policymakers wrongly assume that students who are laughing, interacting in groups, or being creative with art, music, or dance are not doing real academic work. The result is that some teachers feel pressure to preside over more sedate classrooms with students on the same page in the same book, sitting in…
When you have an idea don’t keep it inside you. Speak up and say what you have to say. Even if you don’t think it’s a good idea, it might be to others once they hear it – Clare If you eat your veggies at dinnertime you get dessert – Mark While you’re working you get more done when the…
There was no fanfare of trumpets or marching band but the PDS Strategic Plan arrived on Monday. Victoria accepted delivery of the bound copies for distribution to the Board of Trustees. The Board unanimously approved the plan at its meeting on Monday. This plan represents months of community-wide discussion and data gathering and an intensive period of hard work by…
I take my title from Gary Stager. Read his commentary and research to answer the question for yourself. (To read about Gary’s visit to PDS: click here)
Learning is all about making meaning; seeking and making meaning are what human beings do. Schools have the opportunity to enhance, enrich and accelerate that process, or merely get in the way of it with meaningless busy work, endless testing and relationships that go sour. All the target-setting and achievement measures and all the fancy technology will achieve little if…
You see, there are all those early memories; one cannot get another set; one has but those. Willa Cather, Shadows on the Rock I sometimes think of Cather’s words when I visit the classrooms or the playground or attend the performances and events at PDS. It is there that our teachers are helping students build their storehouse of memories. And…
First there was an intensive and interdisciplinary study of Ghana and West Africa including geography, science, history, literature and art. Then there was the division-wide theater presentation based on folktales. The trip to the Bronx Zoo was the end point of a close animal and ecology study where each student became an expert. And then there was the African drumming…