Free homeschooling materials, my top picks. By Tristan Verboven We were scarcely a day into the imposed quarantine. Right after receiving the email declaring school cancelled indefinitely, my inbox immediately started dinging with… Continue reading
Understanding the science of motivation. By Tristan Verboven By clicking this link, and reading these lines, you have engaged in a complex alchemy. The forces that have brought you here, that cause you… Continue reading
The world ain’t what it used to be. Kids don’t read anymore. Its all the parents fault. Maybe. While history is still full of great stories, they are all trapped in dusty books. But that is about to change. Podcasting has given birth to the genre-bending works of a few intrepid historians. A new generation of storytellers trying to make the way we handle history a thing of the past.
As an ESL teacher in adult continuing education, it is important to remember that those blinking faces on the first day of class have already fought half the battle. They showed up today. That was not easy. And not to make mountains out of molehills, but their whole lives have been prelude to this. At least that’s how the teacher should see it. They are not blank slates. Because everything that has led them to your classroom, everything they have experienced in their lives until that day. All of their decisions, their hardships, their circumstances, their passions, their demons. All of those things came with them to the classroom. Because all of those things are what brought them to the classroom. We call this motivation.
The good news is that we are better at remembering than we think. Indeed, there are even things that we never forget. We need to stop thinking of our brains as filing cabinets, and treat them more like the creative, indulgent creatures that they are. Here are three rules to follow that will keep your info in their brains:
You want to take public speaking to the next level. The “beginning, middle and end” type of oral presentation has run its course. It’s time to spruce up the boardroom, classroom, sales-conference with something that will pack a punch. Here are some simple guidelines, that can be applied to any presentation, to keep your idea in your audience`s head.
In the following podcast, the historian meets the bard. World War Two was an event that has shaped the modern world. One that deserves attention to detail, requires factual accountability but must be handled with care. Newly released on itunes, The Story Engine takes a new approach to history, it puts it back in the hands of the storyteller. Spinning dusty volumes into yarn. In this two-part story of the showdown between Hitler and Stalin, every word refers to an actual event in the war, while the imagery is fantastical. A mixture of Gothic prose, operatic crescendo and fact. History the way it should be told. History the way it was once told, but with the benefit of academic accountability. I present The Curse of the Broken Cross:
The word “change” comes up a lot, whether it’s popular uprisings, important elections, or the work of great leaders. Great turning points in history always seem to be marked by great events. Its tempting, even romantic, to think of change in terms of sweeping political movements, but we ought to give ourselves a little more credit. Lets face it, Ive never seen an omelet that wasn’t made out of broken eggs. Progress does not always happen in great forward strides. Often it happens despite them.
Distance learning, e-learning, online learning or whatever you want to call it. Its a joke, right? Sure, laugh it up. You probably think online education is something you get from a Cracker Jack box or the back of an Archie comic. Here is a list of the most common beliefs associated with online learning and the equally simplistic rationale for each one. Then read contributor Jessica Meyer’s article below and find out just how the internet is changing how our world learns.
Having a romantic relationship with a person who only speaks the target language may be the best way to learn a language fast, but it is not the wisest. In fact it’s not even on this list. But learning how to do something in another language is.
