Number 2 on the current Google Trends list is “Donald Driver”. As a long time Packer fan, that surprised me. Driver is one of the great Packer wide receivers (all time leading receiver for the Packers), winning Super Bowls with both Favre and Rodgers.
He’s generally considered a great and tough receiver. And a general good guy. Not usually the criteria that gets you trending on Google.
Oh I see, he’s doing the next season of Dancing With the Stars…
I don’t know if I’m an Angela Merkel fan, but I have to commend how calmly she handles beer being dumped on her. That dude is so fired…
I’m currently reading Stop Stealing Dreams, by Seth Godin. So far, I would recommend it to everyone, just because it will get you thinking about what schools should be. Plus it’s free.
An amusing example:
43. How not to teach someone to be a baseball fan
Teach the history of baseball, beginning with Abner Doubleday and the impact of cricket and imperialism. Have a test.
Starting with the Negro leagues and the early barnstorming teams, assign students to memorize facts and figures about each player. Have a test.
Rank the class on who did well on the first two tests, and allow these students to memorize even more statistics about baseball players. Make sure to give equal time to players in Japan and the Dominican Republic. Send the students who didn’t do as well to spend time with a lesser teacher, but assign them similar work, just over a longer time frame. Have a test.
Sometime in the future, do a field trip and go to a baseball game. Make sure no one has a good time.
If there’s time, let kids throw a baseball around during recess.
Obviously, there are plenty of kids (and adults) who know far more about baseball than anyone could imagine knowing. And none of them learned it this way.
The industrialized, scalable, testable solution is almost never the best way to generate exceptional learning.
I’m not totally sure why, but me and my daughters think this is cool.
For the international economic policy wonks (both of you), here’s an amusing look at possible approaches to the current economic problems in Greece.
Interesting analogy today from Seth Godin…
Here’s a very nice visualization of the scale of the universe, from the Planck Length to the entire universe. Click on things to learn more about them.
It takes a while to load so be patient.
I have no comment on this article other than that it is important. The system is way broken…
In 2003, that bastion of socialism, the FDA, mandated that food manufacturers list the amount of trans-fatty acids (TFA) in foods. The regulation didn’t actually take effect until 2006. A few locations (New York City being one) in a flagrant example of rampant nanny-state-ism (ok, not really a word) actually banned the use of synthetic TFAs.
So another bastion of socialism, the CDC, studied trans fats in white adults from 2000 to 2008.
In case you are living under a rock, TFAs are strongly linked to cardiovascular disease. In layman’s terms, eat bad stuff, get heart attack.
So in that eight year span, was there any effect?
A 58 percent reduction in TFAs. As we say in the tech biz, that’s non-trivial.
One of the reasons I went with the Kindle Fire over the Nook was the overall Amazon content network. That decision was recently rewarded with a big enhancement to the Fire. Not a new app or software upgrade.
It got a ton of free content.
My daughters can now watch entire seasons of Dora, Yo Gabba Gabba, Phineas and Ferb, and iCarly. Free, on demand.
Nice one, Amazon…
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