Blogs on Geography

Editor's Note: Today's guest blogger is Michelle Hlubinka, the Education Director for Maker Faire and Make magazine.

Maker Faire is a combination DIY festival and project showcase, sponsored by Make magazine, where "makers" of all ages convene to show off a spectacular array of projects that combine science, art, performance, creative reuse, and technology in varying degrees. Not surprisingly, an increasing number of educators are getting involved in these events which are currently held in the Bay Area, Detroit and New York. There are also many independently organized Mini-Maker Faires around the country. Maker Faire Bay Area is this weekend, May 21 - 22nd.

Editor's Note: Today's guest blogger is Don Doehla, French teacher and instructional coach at Vintage High School in Napa, California. Don recently stepped up to become the new facilitator of our World Languages group. He's got some great ideas for teaching world languages, including the use of project-based learning. He shares a few of these tips today. We hope you'll join him in the World Languages group as well.

The world may be small and flat, but it is also multilingual, multicultural, and more and more, it is an interconnected world. Consequently, cross cultural communicative competencies are increasingly important for mutual understanding and cooperation - how is that for some alliteration?! Our students' need to be able to communicate with their neighbors, here and abroad, is increasing with every moment which passes! The borders separating our countries are diminishing in importance as the global culture emerges. The definition of who my neighbor is has changed as well. No longer are we isolated from what is happening across the globe. Recent events demonstrate this quite well! Examples abound for everyone on the planet. We must be able to communicate well and proficiently across the kilometers which separate us.

March 10, 2011 - National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) conference in San Francisco, CA

This is just my opinion, but I think the world would be significantly better if scientists were treated like rock stars -- with the press stalking their every move and kids dreaming of becoming physicists, astronomers, biologists, or chemists someday.

My town borders a military base. Almost all my students have a father or brother or sister serving. In meeting these soldiers, I find they have the dignity of redwoods. To question the premise of our foreign engagements would be like shredding their bark. Yet, teaching war must go beyond the "good-evil" rhetoric of politicians and spin doctors and focus instead on the nuances: How and why do we get into wars? Is war working as a means to resolve our conflicts?