Thoughts and reflections on teaching and learning – Cohort 21 Member Blog
Written by Garth Nichols
What does “Student Voice” look like? What does it sound like? What does it feel like? The answers aren’t always comfortable – sometimes these answer can be downright problematic. And sometimes not. If I’ve learned one thing over the last two weeks, it’s that student voice is the thread that keeps the culture of the […]
Written by Garth Nichols
I’ve done a lot of reading over the last month and few days, and I’ve compiled a healthy catalogue of book reviews. I felt it was time to synthesize them into something more ‘whole’: what is the thread that runs through these books? I’m going to connect this with my new role at Havergal as […]
Written by Garth Nichols
Many educators and parents will ask how they can best prepare our children for the future. Tony Wagner and Ted Dintersmith’s book “Most Likely to Succeed” is a great place to begin to answer this question. Having just read Creating Innovators, and The End of Average, this book was the perfect end to a […]
Written by Garth Nichols
Building on my review of #EdJourney, I sourced this podcast from TeachThought. It is an interview with reknowned author Yong Zhao, who talks about the future of education, and – more importantly – HOW to get there. It’s a 40mins podcast – perfect for driving in traffic! – so here is a quick run-down of […]
Written by Garth Nichols
One of the most provocative things I was told was to “sell your Smartboards, and buy 3D printers!” (Richard Byrne at the ECOO conference keynote address), and I’ve been exploring this idea ever since…big time! Reading, researching, attending the Toronto Maker-Faire, and visiting MakeLab in Toronto. I’ve discovered some incredible things about 3D printing: 1) The […]
Written by Garth Nichols
How did my school go from almost ZERO twitter connections, to being part of a CIS Ontario-wide movement to connect on Twitter with other schools across disciplines and grades? What started as zero twitter chatter within my school, grew quickly to over 15 teachers, either starting new with Twitter or repositioning their Tweets to connect […]
Written by Garth Nichols
After reading the article that Allison Harding pointed us to, I can’t help but think of the invisible refrigerator analogy and subsequent discussion that we had about the role of Edtech in education, schools, and our classroom. The article that Allison posted is entitled “Our tools shape us.” So I wanted to try and square […]
Written by Garth Nichols
I was thrilled to be the keynote speaker at FIRST Lego League‘s Kick off event – hosted by my school at Bayview Glen – this past Saturday. The project mission this year is to: “create something that will help people learn better.” FIRST Lego League is accomplishing this already by its very strucutre – it […]
Written by Garth Nichols
One of my big take-aways from this year’s Cohort 21 experience is the overall momentum and capacity for shifting our practice that was generated within the members this year. When Justin and I first began this journey, we had talked about how important it was to us, personally, that we pursue excellence in our classrooms […]
Written by Garth Nichols
When introducing students, teacher and administration to the concepts of digital literacy and footprinting, there are few insights that I have gleaned from my experiences. Overcoming Digital Natives’ Complacency: This is a concept first created by U.S. author Marc Prensky in 2001 is emerging as the globe’s dominant demographic, while the “digital immigrant,” becomes a relic of […]
