Dear Colleague,
As middle school and high school math teachers, we find that almost every off-book activity we plan is well received by our students and leads to greater interest and motivation. Freeing ourselves from the constraints of set-in-stone curricula allows us to better respond to the realities of our classrooms, to better tackle situations such as heterogeneous classes, and to better implement cooperative and hands-on learning models.
However pressures of coverage, lack of time, external mandates, and isolation from like-minded teachers can undermine our efforts. I have started a network to help us launch and nurture ongoing collaborations. Working with you, I am hoping to organize both online and in-person structures to facilitate staying in touch. We can help each other escape from the textbook, whether for a lesson, a unit, or an entire course.
We have started to share ideas and resources with quarterly meetings in the Bay Area, and networking on line. We will have an Escape from the Textbook! conference at the Urban School of San Francisco on February 12, 2011.
If you are interested in participating in this project, and/or helping organize it, please e-mail me, or get involved directly by joining the online community on the edWeb.net site.
I look forward to hearing from you.
Sincerely,
Henri Picciotto
