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I just watched Sir Ken Robinson - Do Schools Kill Creativity
===It's funny but I always felt like you either were creative or you weren't. If you were you were just lucky to be so gifted. If you weren't there was nothing you could do about it. I never gave it much thought past that. I was not lucky enough to be thought of as creative. I don't dance, sing, draw, or play music. Now that I've seen this TED I have a whole new thought on the subject. Maybe I don't do any of those things because I was never taught any of those things. I went to a catholic elementary and middle school. We sang while a nun played into her pitch pipe (is that what it was really called?) We never danced or played instruments. I don't really remember art at school either, but surely we did have art.=== ===I have two sons. One I think of as creative and one I think of as academic. The academic one has always excelled at school. We never encouraged art or music because he didn't seem very talented in those areas. (Did we educate him in those areas? NO!) My youngest son asked to learn the guitar. I, being the practical person I am, really didn't want to spend the money. Money is very tight in my family and I didn't think this was the place to spend $100.00 a month on lessons. My husband, who played the guitar as a child, felt differently. Tom has been playing the guitar for two years and he is excellent. It is a strength of his. He is creative with his music. He sits for hours playing music. I now feel I short changed my oldest child. Just think what he could have done if he had been given the education my younger child received.===

media type="custom" key="7018643"Stefana Broadbent - How the internate enables intimacy
===﻿This was an interesting video. The discussion on how many people communicate at work was really interesting. How many people send private emails at work, use the phone for private calls, or text. I like to think while I'm at work I'm doing my job. However, when I really thought about it I talk to my husband almost every day, I call my son after school every day to make sure he got home safely, and I send emails to friends and coworkers. If I were a better texter I'm sure I'd do that too, but I stink at it, so I don't text during work hours.=== ===﻿Lots of people talk about facebook and all the friends they have. I don't use facebook. But the figures she gave on how many people we actually communicate with was surprising. Yes, we may have 200 friends on facebook, but we are only communicating with 4-6 people. So I began thinking about my communications and how many people I regularly communicate with and she's right. I only regularly communicate with 4-6 people. Technology makes it possible to communicate with hundreds of people but it seems most people don't. Quite interesting!===

Arthur Benjamin - Lightning calculators and other mathemagic
===﻿Amazing! That's really all I can say about Mr. Benjamin. I like math and math makes sense to me. My oldest son loves math and he can figure out anything. But this guy is just absolutely amazing. How he arrives at an answer before a person can get the answer on a calculator. I've never seen anyone's mine work like his mind works. I wonder can other people be taught to work problems like he can, or do you just have to be a genius? I know he showed how he figured out the five digit squared problem, but what ordinary person could even do the parts to come up with the answer?=== ===﻿I have no idea how he can figure out the day of your birth. What kind of mind do you have to have to do that? Is there a trick to it? It is mind boggling to me. I wish I knew how he did it so I could amaze my friends with that kind of knowledge. How wonderful it must be to be so talented.===

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 * Dave Eggerrs - 2008 - Once Upon a School**
 * This was my favorite TED talk of all because I feel like my job does exactly what he is saying needs to be done. Let me explain. His whole talk was about how if more kids had one on one instruction they could make rapid gains in school. However, teachers don't have time to give each child the attention they need because of the number of children in their classroom. He said that 35-40 hours of individual one on one time could give you a gain of one grade level.**
 * As a Reading Recovery teacher we work one on one with 4 children a day. Each child receives 30 min. of time. We work with the most struggling first graders in our building. Our intervention lasts 12-20 weeks. With this one on one intervention almost all children end up readidng on grade level at the end of the intervention. I have never seen an intervention work like Reading Recovery in my 27 years of teaching. Working one on one with children works! I agree with what Mr. Eggers says, "Shine light one interaction at a time."**
 * Julian Treasure - Sound**
 * Working one on one with students it's very quiet in my room. I like to leave the door open just for the fresh air. Things are fine until lunch comes and then you can hear the lunchroom, kids in the hall, kids going outside after lunch, bathroom noises, and then my lesson kind of falls apart until I shut the door. I know for a fact we are more productive without all the noise. His Ted talk proved that to me also.**
 * As a consumer there are stores I won't shop in because they are playing super loud music. Maybe if the music was music I cared for it would be OK to play it super loud, but it's always rap junk that I hate.**
 * Mr. Treasure said that music is the most powerful sound and I do believe that. It affects me emotionally. I like to walk to music. I enjoy music while I'm driving. Music that is not my style puts me in a bad mood.**
 * He says to take control of the sound around you for good productivity. I am going to try and do that.**

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