Students taking video production, visual and performing arts, sound engineering and other multimedia courses at career and technical education centers across Maine regularly take assessments to determine whether they’ve mastered the course expectations.
Soon, multimedia students won’t be taking just any test, but an assessment that tests their mastery of the skills considered important by the businesses that might some day employ them. And their teachers will have had a hand in developing the test.
A conference on effective writing instruction and the Common Core State Standards drew 280 educators from across Maine to the Augusta Civic Center on March 16.
Teachers of students in grades K-12 are invited to the University of Maine on April 18 to learn about Maine workforce development needs and how to bring STEM-related (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) innovation back to their classrooms.
Note: This dispatch was updated on April 5 at 9:13 a.m. to correct an error in information supplied about registration.
The Maine Association for Pupil Transportation is sponsoring six free conferences this spring in every Maine region to provide training to transportation personnel in all Maine school districts.
A first public draft of the Next Generation Science Standards is expected later this month, and Maine science teachers will have the chance to weigh in with feedback and suggestions.
The following is a news release from the Maine State Board of Education.
AUGUSTA –Steve Pound, vice chair of the Maine State Board of Education, and associate director for workforce development at Cianbro, has been chosen to serve with a national panel of experts on a group that will examine how students learn and demonstrate their knowledge.
UPDATE: To model what we are asking districts to do in the classroom, to customize the learning experience, the Maine DOE, working with interested districts, will provide customized leadership retreats to requesting districts instead of the initially-planned Leadership Institute. These one-day retreats for the eight districts that showed initial interest will allow them to include more teacher leaders and school board members as they develop a strategic plan towards a learner-centered environment.
Click the image to view the fully formatted Commissioner's Update.This week, we’re highlighting examples of work in which students have found something they’re passionate about, and used the resources available to them in school to pursue it — with impressive results.
At the Middle School of the Kennebunks, students have combined lessons from art, math, science and English as they gradually redesign every room of The Nonantum Resort on a tight budget and with environment-friendly principles in mind. The students’ Maine Learning Technology Initiative (MLTI) laptops come in handy for planning the design, comparing prices, making purchases, and publicizing their work.
In Waterville last Friday, 250 eighth-grade girls attended Future Focus, where they learned about the careers of 50 women who have pursued a variety of career paths. To start the day, the eighth graders heard from Hannah Potter, a Yarmouth High School senior who used her MLTI laptop to connect her classmates with students in Iraq. On Friday, Hannah used Skype to connect the 250 eighth-grade girls with an Iraqi friend so they could discuss what they have in common — and the differences between life in Iraq and the United States.
And yesterday in Augusta, nearly 300 students from 24 schools participated in Maine History Day at the University of Maine at Augusta, where they confidently discussed the wide range of historical themes they had researched. They used documentaries, live performances, poster exhibits and other media to present their work.
Our students are using technology to do impressive work. In the process, they’re learning more because the technology is integrated in meaningful ways into every aspect of the curriculum — something that couldn’t be done without the help of teachers who know how to use technology to engage students and take their learning to a new level.
