Click here if you have trouble viewing this email.
 

Events & Activities | News & Notes | Web Sites | Articles | Past Issues


Coming Events and Activities

Workshops & Events for Students, Teachers, Alumni & SOE Faculty

Investigations in the Early Childhood Classroom
Wonderplay Conference- 92nd Street Y- November 16th

Professor Beverly Falk
Professor Beverly Falk
Professor Megan Blumenreich
Professor Megan Blumenreich

Professors Beverly Falk and Megan Blumenreich will be presenting a workshop on "Investigations in the Early Childhood Classroom" at the 92nd St. Y's Wonderplay Conference on November 16th. Joining them will be graduates/friends of the Graduate Program in Early Childhood Education - Mercedes Orozco, Emma Markarian, VJ Brijmohan, and Travis Sloan. For more information about this workshop, the conference and fees see http://www.92y.org/WonderplayConference.


Using SmartBoards in the Classroom

Doris Grasserbauer
Doris Grasserbauer

This hands-on workshop is for School of Education students, faculty, alumni and cooperating teachers. The workshops are structured around the experience level and the specific subject matter taught by the participants. For entry level, we will start with the basics and then dive into the interactive classroom possibilities depending on the needs and interests of the participants. During the advanced workshop you will work with the instructor to create your own classroom material. No matter what your level of experience, you will get a chance to use the SmartBoard.

You are welcome to attend more than one workshop.

Dates:

  • November 27, 2012 - 4 to 5pm - NA 4/221 - Entry Level
  • December 18, 2012 - 4 to 5pm - NA 4/221 - Advanced

Click here to register for one of the workshops:

If a workshop has to be canceled you will be contacted via email. Assume your registration is confirmed unless you hear otherwise. Please note the session(s) you sign up for as reminders will not be sent out.


MasterClass in Ed Theatre with Jonothan Neelands
Saturday January 19th

Jonothan Neelands
Jonothan Neelands

The Educational Theatre graduate program will host a MasterClass with Jonothan Neelands, Drama Practitioner. He will be using Process Drama Techniques to work with students. Professor Neelands is the Chair of Drama and Theatre Education at the Institute of Education and Chair of Creative Education in the Warwick Business School (WBS) at the University of Warwick, England. In addition to his academic profile, he is an experienced workshop leader and drama practitioner, with a national and international reputation for high quality professional training. This MasterClass will be open to students and alumni. For further information including time and place contact the Educational Theatre website at educationaltheatre@ccny.cuny.edu


Some of the Events Coming This Spring:


Save the Date: Monday, March 4, 2013
School, Family, Community Partnerships
Professor Joyce Epstein

Professor Joyce Epstein
Professor Joyce L. Epstein

Professor Joyce L. Epstein will be the featured speaker at this year's Doyle and Alma Bortner Distinguished Speaker Series. She is currently the Director of the Center on School, Family, and Community Partnerships and the National Network of Partnership Schools (NNPS).She is also the Principal Research Scientist, and Research Professor of Sociology at Johns Hopkins University. In 1995, she established the National Network of Partnership Schools (NNPS), which provides professional development to enable school, district, and state leaders to develop research-based programs of family and community involvement. Further details to be announced in the February/March Issue of CONNECTED.


Book Talk on: Teaching Matters: Stories from Inside City Schools by Professors Beverly Falk and Megan Blumenreich. Presented by the authors and some of the teachers whose stories were told. (Coming in March. See the February/March issue of CONNECTED for details).


For Other Events At CCNY See: http://www1.ccny.cuny.edu/current/events/index.cfm

For Directions to the Campus See: http://www1.ccny.cuny.edu/prospective/about/directions.cfm


News & Notes


Student News & Notes


Professor Tatyana Kleyn
Professor Tatyana Kleyn

Professor Tatyana Kleyn is the advisor of CCNY Dream Team, a new student club for undocumented immigrants and their supporters to assist one another and work for legislative changes at the local and national levels. Contact tkleyn@ccny.cuny.edu for more information.


Faculty News & Notes


City College & the School of Education Receive $1.98 Million NSF Grant

EinsteinCity College and the School of Education were recently awarded $1.98 million by the National Science Foundation as part of the NOYCE program. The new project, The Robert Noyce Teacher Academy Scholars Program at The City College of New York, aims to attract talented students from a range of STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) disciplines into STEM teaching careers in urban secondary schools. Ultimately, the goal is to build a model program for training STEM teachers for urban schools.

Program components include recruiting strong STEM majors from the City College campus and the Community Colleges in the CUNY system; and preparing these Noyce Scholars for teaching through a program that emphasizes preparation for teaching in urban high-need schools via clinical immersion in schools. Finally, Noyce Scholars will be supported in their early career (up to two years of teaching) as practicing professionals in this urban high-need district through professional development and a support network.

Principal Investigators for this program are Professors Despina Stylianou, Issa Salame, Richard Steinberg and Yael Wyner. Professors Gregory Borman, Marty Roseman, Beverly Smith and Lynn Tarlow will be contributing to the work, while the overall project will be directed by Dr. Bruce Billig.


Dr. Terri Watson
Dr. Terri Watson

Professor Teri Watson had an amazing first six weeks since she arrived at City College. She received CCNY's Public Scholarship Award and was selected to be a 2012–2013 fellow in the Colin Powell Center's Public Scholarship Program. That program encourages CCNY faculty to make their scholarship and academic work accessible to a range of public audiences and policymakers. Her focus on the lack of college preparation among New York City's graduating seniors and the impact of the City's educational policies, particularly with regard to school closures, is especially relevant and under-reported. She participated in a series of workshops on identifying and framing aspects of your research for specific audiences, tuning your message to policy and news cycles, and developing strategies for dissemination. She also has the opportunity to receive funds to co-sponsor a public event that brings together policymakers, practitioners, and other audience members to address these issues further.

In addition to being asked to serve on CCNY's City SEEDs review panel for 2012-2013, Professor Watson and CCNY's Program in Educational Leadership have become affiliated with the International Successful School Principals' Project: a consortium of experienced researchers who have published widely in the area of school leadership in their own countries and internationally. In conjunction with that membership, she will be studying A. Phillip Randolph High School and its new leadership.


News of Special Education Program:
K-8 School to Serve as Professional Development Site

School of Education Department of Leadership and Special Education faculty members Marvin Stober and Laura Rader have developed a partnership with PS 149, a neighboring K-8 school. The partnership is a three (3) year commitment that will develop the school as a professional development site enabling the College to send special education candidates to the school to observe quality instruction and student teach in a clinically rich setting. The clinical practice utilizes the careful evaluation of the student learning process to determine instructional delivery practices, content, level, grouping, motivation enhancement and methods used to determine student achievement. The impact of the initiative's activities on student engagement, professional practice and community leader perceptions will be measured. The partnership model was presented at the annual NYS Federation of the Council for Exceptional Children in November, 2012.

 

Alumni News & Notes


Ms. Ronnell Nathaniel ('10) Receives Major Promotion

Ronnell Nathaniel
Ms. Ronnell Nathaniel

Ms. Ronnell Nathaniel, has recently been promoted to Zone Director of the Acelero Learning Center in New Jersey. She will now directly oversee all district centers across the program. Ms. Nathaniel was instrumental in shaping the Perth Amboy (2nd Street) Acelero district center (www.acelero.net) into a flagship site over the past year. She received her Master's degree in Early Childhood Education in 2010 and was a former teacher and director of the Sharon Baptist Bronx Headstart Program before assuming the position at Acelero in NJ. She was also the recipient of the ECE Program's "Award for Outstanding Professionalism and Leadership". We congratulate her on her promotion. RNathaniel@acelero.net


INVITATION TO ALL ALUMNI:
GET YOUR NEWS IN CONNECTED

Ms Nathaniel (above) sent information about her recent promotion to Professor Beverly Falk who suggested we might, with her permission, include it in CONNECTED. We thought that was a wonderful idea and so we now invite alumni to submit professional news to CONNECTED. Even if you did not recently receive a promotion let us know where you are now and what you are doing. Along with the information you send, let us know: the education program(s) you graduated from at City College, the year you graduated and the degree(s) you received. Include your email address and a photo (optional) of yourself and send to connected@ccny.cuny.edu.


Nominate City College Alumni Who are Outstanding Teachers & Principals for Honors at May Ceremony

If you know a highly effective teacher or administrator who is a CCNY Alum, consider nominating him/her for our 2013 CCNY Education Alumni Group's Outstanding Teacher and Administrator Awards. Contact Dr. Bruce M. Billig (bbillig@ccny.cuny.edu) for an application.


Past Events of Note


Socratic Seminar/Demonstration Workshop A Major Success

Ms. Nancy Letts
Nancy Letts

On October 2nd, Ms. Nancy Letts, a nationally known expert on Socratic Seminars, worked with Professor Catherine Franklin's Inquiry class to demonstrate how to lead Socratic Seminars. The text used was James Baldwin's "A Talk to Teachers". About ten SOE faculty members, alumni and faculty from collaborating schools also attended. Readers who want to learn more should search "Socratic Seminars".


The Educational Theatre Program

The Graduate Program in Educational Theatre is proud to welcome Karel Žďárek a Fulbright Scholar from the University Prague who is visiting CCNY this year to study with Jennifer Katona in the Educational Theatre program. Karel Žďárek teaches ELT (English Language Teaching) Methodology and Drama in English at the Faculty of Education at Charles University, Prague. Karel also teaches English and Drama at Johannes Kepler High-school. He is an actor in a theatre group Divadlo BEZ PRKEN and his natural inclination towards the use of role-play in teaching English has become an integrated part of his teaching style. His passion for improvisation and acting drove him to embrace and experiment with Scott Thornbury's Dogme lessons; he enjoys the challenges of substituting various classes "open-handed", building lessons from scratch and is thrilled to see what emerges. Currently he is working on his dissertation exploring "radio role play" - an EFL technique using the concept of simulated radio studio.

Jeremiah DrakeSeptember brought some wonderful guests in conjunction with our course "Conflict Resolution through Theatre". Jeremiah Drake (see photo above) of The Riverside Church, is an Activist and Theatre of the Oppressed Practitioner. He worked with graduate candidates using Augusto Boal's techniques of Forum Theatre and Legislative Theatre. Alex Santiago-Jirau, from The Center for Arts Education and The Forum Project came in to share knowledge with graduate candidates on working with the LGBQT population in schools.

October also brought two great speakers to the program in conjunction with two Ed Theatre research courses. Two guest artists discussed their work in doing research in theatre: Stephen Belber a Tectonic Company Member who was involved in the inception, interview process and performance of the original production of The "Laramie Project and Nilaja Sun performer and writer of the one-woman show" "No Child", based on her year-long reflections on her theatre residency at a high school in the Bronx.

The Fundamentals in Teaching Theatre class began rehearsals at PS 161 for the fall production of The Jungle Book Kids. More than 40 kids will be participating and it is shaping up to be quite a show.

Readings on the Road, a staged reading series supervised by Sobha Kavanakudiyil will begin its fall tour of the community and local schools.

This fall we performed Fable Talk, Directed by Mollie Lief (graduate candidate) and performed by candidates in the program (see photo above taken at rehearsals). . Performances were held at the Hamilton Heights Halloween Event (Saturday October 27th at 11:45am) and HELP USA Homeless Shelter (Saturday October 27th at 1:30 pm). The Graduate Program in Educational Theatre has started blogging! Check out our student blogs!
http://www1.ccny.cuny.edu/prospective/education/educationaltheatre/edtheatreblogs.cfm

Coming up in the Ed Theatre Program:

  • A performance of the Jungle Book at PS 161
  • Research Share and Artistic Share
  • MasterClass in January
  • Mini Conference
  • Family Arts Saturday Program

For more information on any of our events please like us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter @ccnyedtheatre, or check out our website:
http://www1.ccny.cuny.edu/prospective/education/educationaltheatre/index.cfm


Websites of Interest

Note: If you are new to CONNECTED you can go to previous issues at and find additional recommended websites beginning with the May, 2010 issue, when we first started including them. But don't just skim these sites, put them on your browser's favorites list so that you can refer to them from time to time. You'll find the archived issues of CONNENCTED at http://www1.ccny.cuny.edu/prospective/education/community/index.cfm


  1. http://ed.ted.comWe've introduced TED.com and TEDx.com to our readers a few times in past issues, sites that have some wonderful and worthwhile videos of "ideas worth sharing". TED recently started developing and indentifying videos that would support "lessons worth sharing" that could be used by students. This site is http://ed.ted.com. They claim to have "carefully curated educational videos which represent collaborations between talented educators and animators nominated through the TEDEd platform". To capture and amplify the voices of the world's greatest educators TEDEd pairs extraordinary educators with talented animators to produce a new library of exceptional educational videos". Go to the above site and take the video tour that explains how you can us the site with your teaching.
  2. Theodore Sizer
    Theodore Sizer
    For a short video on essential questions and other teaching tips go to: https://www.teachingchannel.org/videos/structure-learning-essential-questions . While the teaching tips on the Teaching Channel are not always well contextualized, if the idea of essential questions resonates with you, you should explore the work of Theodore Sizer, who founded the Essential Schools movement. For those in secondary education (and others) his wonderful "Horace's Compromise" (1984) and the two subsequent Horace books are a must. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Sizer for a brief summary of who Ted Sizer and his contribution. Also, use 'essential schools' and 'essential questions' as search terms and you might want to search for essential questions in your discipline- science, social studies, etc.
  3. AFTShare My Lesson offers a new online portal to vast resources created by teachers/for teachers. Launched this year by the AFT and Britain's TES Connect, the new digital platform allows educators to collaborate and share teaching resources and innovative ideas straight from the classroom, each emphasizing Common Core State Standards. Lessons are peer reviewed. To see first the 9 minute video explaining what this resource is, click here. Then go to http://sharemylesson.com , sign up and explore the site.
  4. American Graduate http://edu.americangraduate.org/ This site highlights "the best" of public media's interactive resources and educational projects for use with middle school and high school students" It includes "multimedia productions created by youth, and professional development videos for educators. The 800+ resources featured here are designed to bring educational content to life in engaging and innovative ways, and include games, activities, quizzes, quests, and other interactive experiences. The materials span the curriculum, exploring the arts, careers, ELL, health & sports, language arts, math, media production, science & engineering, and social studies in ways that capture students' interest and imagination. The project is a multi-year public media initiative, supported by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB).
  5. MIT is getting in the act by launching an initiative encouraging its students to produce short videos teaching basic concepts in science and engineering to K-12 students. The videos will be accessible through a dedicated MIT website and a YouTube channel. A subset of the videos will also be available on Khan Academy, a popular not-for-profit educational site founded by an MIT alumnus. "We wanted to help inspire young people to change the world through engineering and science, and realized that the 10,000 superstar students we have at MIT are uniquely positioned to do that," says Ian A. Waitz, dean of the School of Engineering. Waitz conceived of the initiative-known as MIT+K12-to help address growing challenges in primary and secondary education in the United States, especially in the areas of science, technology, engineering, and math. In the three dozen MIT+K12 videos posted so far, students have focused on topics ranging from flying robots to basic chemistry to Earth's rotation. http://k12videos.mit.edu/

Articles of Interest

This section provides links to articles of general interest and importance in education. Keeping in mind how busy our readers are, most of the articles selected are from one to three pages.


  1. http://www.eschoolnews.com/2012/10/04/eight-economic-facts-about-education/? Eight interesting factoids about education from eSchool News, like: "in 2010, nearly 80 percent of high school dropouts earned less than $30,000. Of workers earning more than $100,000 a year, more than 75 percent had at least a college degree".
  2. Arne Duncan
    Arne Duncan
    "The world is changing," Arne Duncan, Secretary of Education said. "This has to be where we go as a country." He called for the nation to move as fast as possible away from printed textbooks and toward digital ones. "Over the next few years, textbooks should be obsolete," he declared. ... "South Korea, which consistently outperforms the U.S. when it comes to educational outcomes, is moving far faster than the U.S. in adopting digital learning environments. One of the most wired countries in the world, South Korea has set a goal to go fully digital with its textbooks by 2015". Read more of this eSchool News article at http://www.eschoolnews.com/2012/10/03/education-chief-wants-textbooks-to-go-digital/
  3. Principals matter, according to Karin Chenoweth as reported in the Huffington Post. Read why they matter and see links to related research studies at http://www.huffingtonpost.com/Karin%20Chenoweth/principals-matter-school-_b_1252598.html
  4. "The solution of the education establishment is to push young children to decode and read sooner," but the principal of PS 142 in Manhattan is taking a different tack. Working an early childhood specialist, she has made real life experiences the center of academic lessons, in hopes of improving reading and math skills by broadening children's experiences. In the photo above she is on a field trip to a garage. Read Michael Winerip's story at: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/13/nyregion/for-poorer-students-an-attempt-to-let-new-experiences-guide-learning.html?pagewanted=1&_r=2&
  5. David Brooks
    David Brooks
    David Brooks, Op-Ed Columnist for the New York Times, writes about The Relationship School which impressed him. It was the New American Academy in NYC and you can read his column at www.nytimes.com/2012/03/23/opinion/brooks-the-relationship-school.html?_r=1&ref=davidbrooks Go to the bottom of the page and you will see Brooks got 189 comments. Click "All" and you can skim through some of the most interesting ones.
  6. Try listening to a webinar either live or after it is archived. E-school news is sponsoring a free webinar on November 15th on how a school district uses Google applications to enhance collaboration and writing. To learn more and sign up go to http://www.eschoolnews.com/2012/10/08/enhancing-collaboration-writing-with-google-apps-for-education/
  7. "The Department of Education has just made their largest investment ever in improving education for students with disabilities, TakePart reports. With the goal of establishing a cohesive system to effectively train teachers who work with disabled children, the department's Office of Special Education Programs has granted $25 million over the next five years to the University of Florida's College of Education. Starting in January, the CEDAR Center will work with select states to help them bolster training for special education teachers, general teachers, and school district leaders-all of whom work directly with special needs children". http://news.yahoo.com/inadequate-teaching-may-soon-become-thing-past-many-221700075.html
  8. So do teachers and school leaders have a professional responsibility to sabotage ill conceived programs? Interesting article on using test scores to evaluate teachers by Justin Baeder writing for Education Week. Click here to read.
  9. Deanna Jump
    Deanna Jump
    Here's how Deanna Jump (above), a 43-year-old kindergarten teacher in Georgia, has unexpectedly become a self-made millionaire - by selling her lesson plans to other teachers, the Huffington Post reports. Click here.

  10. Pedro Noguera Debbie Meier
    Pedro Noguera Debbie Meier
    Read Pedro Noguera's blog post to Debbie Meier in Ed Week regarding unions and their role in school reform. Click here.





  11. eSchool News and wire service reports that the new film Won't Back Down is anti-union and backward. http://www.eschoolnews.com/2012/09/28/review-anti-union-movie-wont-back-down-is-a-step-backward/
  12. Here are some links to articles in Education Week by topic. Find a topic that interests you and click on the link. The numbers after the topics represent the number of different items/stories on each topic.
    Accountability (21) Arne Duncan (10) Bullying (9) Charter schools (18) Cheating (7) Curriculum (2) Data (5) Digital privacy (1) Discipline/Classroom Management (7) Diversity (9) Films (2) latinos (1) Leadership (134) Mayoral Control (25) New York City (22) Philanthropies (5) Policy (20) Politics (6) Principals (11) Reading list (7) Reform (11) Research (4) School Funding (14) School Safety (18) Studies (9) Teachers (9) Testing (20) turnarounds (17) Unions (5) Urban Education (95)
  13. The guide to turning around low performing schools can be found in a new report from the U.S. Department of Education's What Works Clearinghouse. The report identifies practices that can improve the performance of chronically low-performing schools -- a process commonly referred to as "turnaround." See some of the recommendations and download the full report at http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/wwc/PracticeGuide.aspx?sid=7 . There are plenty of other resources for teachers and administrators at the What Works Clearinghouse. See these resources at http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/wwc/default.aspx.
  14. Check out some of the best rated education apps for the ipad, ipod as selected both by teachers and Apple. See also some of the readers' comments for additional suggestions all at http://www.eschoolnews.com/2012/04/21/new-10-shiny-apple-apps-for-education/
  15. http://tinyurl.com/9r4sptr So when students say they are bored is it really stress? Studies link students' boredom to stress.

CONNECTED Committee: Bruce Billig, Doris Grasserbauer, Leonard Lewis, Stacia Pusey, Lisa Yu and Norman Shapiro, editor.
Web site and graphics by Kurt Brown.


For past issues of CONNECTED go to: http://www1.ccny.cuny.edu/prospective/education/community/index.cfm


Send your comments on CONNECTED to connected@ccny.cuny.edu

Click here to unsubscribe

Calendar of Events at City College | CCNY School of Education