Stockyard Institute

Website is up and running... check it out!

http://www.stockyardinstitute.org/index.html

Lesson Plan Resources

http://www.curriculumsupport.education.nsw.gov.au/secondary/creativearts/index.htm

http://www.curriculumsupport.education.nsw.gov.au/multicultural_art/research_themes/research.html

Float!

Great collaborative project for students! FLOAT! 

Found it on http://carrotrevolution.blogspot.com/

drawing blog...

http://blog.drawn.ca/

What exactly is the basic skills test designed to measure?

Based on my own frustrations with having to take the Basic Skills Test, I found this article posted by Alana to be extremely relevant.  How is a standardized test supposed to measure whether someone is going to be a successful teacher?  
Fewer Teacher Candidates Pass Basic Skills Test
I found the comments underneath the article to be extremely interesting.... I really appreciated this comment posted by the Harvard grad who is a good test taker....


"what is the relationship of scoring in the top 22% of test takers (that is what the passers on the so-called Basic Skills Test did) and effective teaching (moving the student achievement gains forward in the classroom)? Would someone please tell us? Because without evidence for raising the score on the test, education bureaucrats are just expressing their prejudices and assumptions in public policy, which is a pretty dangerous thing to do. Especially when it almost eliminates teachers of color from the profession. They better have a good reason, and guessing that high scorers are better teachers is not a good reason."