I recently came across this post A Teenager’s View on Social Media and it made me think about how quickly technology is changing and how far ahead (in what a different space) young people are. The post contains the personal views of an “actual teen” (his words), a 19 year-old student in the U.S. commenting on the apps teenagers use and don't use. The young man admittedly writes (in his follow up post) that his views are based on personal opinion “to provide a different view based on [his] life in this ‘highly coveted’ age bracket.” I found his perspective interesting both as an educator and father for many reasons and have shared my observations below. Meeting our students where they are My first thought to the blog post was a question: How do we meet (communicate with) our students where they are? While I recognize that it is not considered "social media" (the…
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Learning how to be a better learner
As educators we are always looking for quality feedback from our students and parents on their learning experience. What are the big “take aways” that our graduates carry forward with them as they pursue new endeavours, whether it is a gap year involving travel and service or a competitive program at university or college? Coming off the heels of our last post on the value and benefits of reading, I was so pleased to read the following words by Jesse Sarkis ’13, now in his second year as a photography student at Ryerson University in Toronto. He describes some of the “big take aways” related to his learning experiences in Advanced Placement (AP) and other English classes at Lakefield College School. His words reflect well the confident, curious and critical thinker that he is. They are also beautifully aligned with the key 21st Century Learning goals we strive to meet as a school. Great feedback for us,…
Nourishing a Culture of Reading
What is the most important skill you learn at school? Is it the social skills: taking turns, sharing and asking questions? Or perhaps numeric skills: how to add and subtract and discovering more complicated solutions to math problems? What about reading? Reading impacts everything we do in our lives - DAILY When I was the Elementary Principal at the International School Bangkok, we made it a point to tackle reading. We researched the latest theories on reading, we taught our teachers how to teach reading, we taught our parent community how to support their children in learning how to read and we focused on sharing our passion for reading with the kids – nourishing in them a love of reading. The results were remarkable. We created a culture of reading. Everyone read - everyday. As the principal, I too made every effort to share my love of reading and modeled…