Nothing is more political than education. The Texas State Board of Education reminded us of the phenomenon this month, rewriting textbook guidelines to match their conservative, theological worldviews. Not since the Kansas Board of Education voted to restrict the teaching of evolution has an entire state backlashed so strongly against science and reason. In an [...]

Here’s another look at accelerating change. On Friday, the New York Times published an excellent review of Dalton Conley’s book, Elsewhere U.S.A.: “A new breed of American has arrived on the scene,” Conley, a professor at New York University, declares in “Elsewhere, U.S.A.,” his compact guidebook to our nervous new world. Instead of individuals searching [...]

I’m in Mexico until late this election night. I voted absentee, and I hope you’re voting, too. (Sí, se puede!)

Our third item this week on the United States’ unstable orbit around mediocrity is a repost of our top ten list of how U.S. education is failing to create students that will succeed in creative, knowledge- and innovation-based economies (first published last June). We apologize for beating a dead horse, but No Child Left Behind [...]

Twenty years ago, playing games over a distance might have meant that you played turn-taking games like chess over email, and you were cutting edge. I remember people playing chess through snail mail! You would make your move and wait for a reply. What is happening now is taking place in real-time in virtual environments [...]

To do is to be To be is to do So Do We? It is just good teaching Games taught me that modeling environments and taking on the roles are powerful ways to teach and learn. Piaget talked about roles as assimilation. You try on the role and see what part of the character is [...]

Today’s list discusses how U.S. education is failing to create students that will succeed in creative, knowledge- and innovation-based economies. Not surprisingly, No Child Left Behind heads-off this list as failure #1: No Child Left Behind. NCLB is producing exactly the wrong products for the 21st Century, but is right on for the 1850′s through [...]