Free Video/Presentation/Animation App

If you are like me, the word "Free" got your attention. OK, so nothing in life is free, but if I don't need a large cash outlay to use something really useful, then that's OK with me. Powtoon is one of those online resources that can make your multimedia stuff better without opening your wallet much. This online app lets you easily create animated presentations. Some feature require payment, but you can do a lot of things for free to start with. If you need more features of higher resolution formats, then it may cost you. I created this embedded "Mission Impossible" theme presentation in about 5 minutes.

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Schoolhouse Rock and Musical Intelligence

I do not intend to turn this blog into a running obituary, but I believe it is important to mention that Bob Dorough passed away on April 24th, 2018. He was 94 years old. He was one of the creators of the Schoolhouse Rock animated musical series that ran during the period from 1973-1985. They were created to help children learn and remember content they needed in their school classes. I can still sing many of these tunes I heard on TV when I was a child. There are many studies surrounding the Multiple Intelligences Theory of Howard Gardner ( Brualdi, 1998). Gardner examines seven intelligences which he defines as "the capacity to solve problems or to fashion products that are valued in one or more cultural settings" ( Gardner & Hatch, 1989). One of the seven is musical intelligence. People may possess and use forms of these intelligences in various mixtures with individuals having greater abilities in some areas than others....

Human Research Ethics and Teacher/Student Relationships

As part of my Masters in Education program at American College of Education , I recently took a course in ethics related to using humans as research subjects . This course was through the National Institutes of Health and led to a certification. Some of my peers questioned why it would be necessary for teachers to be concerned about how to treat human subjects in research. However, when you think about it, we are constantly observing our students, gathering data, experimenting with our methods and planning, and making adjustments based on student feedback. We often share our observations about our students with our peers and with students' parents. We also guide our students' use of and access to outside information. This could be considered study of human subjects, and as such has certain ethical ramifications. The three basic ethical principles that came from the Belmont Report are: Respect for persons , which involves informed consent; Benef...

"Why the Best Teachers Don't Give Tests"

I stole the title for this post directly from a 2014 blog post by Alfie Kohn ( https://www.alfiekohn.org/blogs/no-tests/ ), who is a writer of many books and articles about education. I was alerted to his website by my Twitter connection to Dr. Stephen Krashen (@skrashen), the well-known explorer of language acquisition theory. Both of their accounts are worth following because they frequently post links to great resources for educators. This particular article touches on a theme that remains a hot topic in educational discussions, and I'm pretty sure we haven't solved the issues it raises. There are a couple of comments I would like to make in response to his article. The first is that I generally agree with his point that there are many effective ways to judge student progress that are not formal tests. I wish I had known more about some of these when I was teaching English in Brazil. I know for a fact that I was unable to pass certain...

American English Dan

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