The Steiner Education is a great idea.I understand from investigation that every Steiner School has their own interpretation of the Steiner Philosophy so it can be like chalk and cheese, but sounds like you’ve found the one that fits.XRuth

I subscribe to the Marshall Memo because for a very small fee, I receive the services of a professional, designated reader, a well-respected educator with many years of experience in K-12 education. There is no way I have the time to read as many journals as Kim Marshall reads for me, and the journals cover a wide variety of topics and themes from policy to curriculum to professional development. This service really helps me to diversify my reading, in terms of topics, authors, and viewpoints. I find that reading “mainstream” professional education journals keeps me more in touch with what my less web-connected colleagues are thinking is important and broadens my own perspective. This service helps me select which articles to read in full, but also gives me a useful summary for those articles I don’t follow up on to read the full version.

The second news digest service that I endorse is the Public Education Network (PEN) Newsblast . Although, if you are going to subscribe to only one, my recommendation is the Marshall Memo. PEN Weekly Newsblast “is a free electronic newsletter featuring resources and information about public school reform, school finance, and related issues.” To subscribe to the Newsblast, visit the main web page where there is a link to their RSS feed. This is also a good way to stay informed about mainstream topics in education, but I find that the vetting of articles included in the Marshall Memo fits my needs better.

Last, this is probably much too obvious for most readers of Will’s blog, but I also suggest subscribing to education topics through RSS feeds for the New York Times and NPR, for some of the same reasons to subscribe to the news digests mentioned above. I think that one difference between the digests and NYT and NPR is the intended audience. NYT and NPR are writing for the general reading public, while the digests are targeting readers from the education profession.

I read edublogs and visit wikis and am developing an online presence because these activities connect me to knowledgeable colleagues and allow me to create a strong personal learning network. The ideas and resources I encounter move me toward being a better Technology Director, and a better professional developer. The articles I read from PEN and the Marshall Memo help me connect my online learning to more topics of concern to educators. It is these connections that help me make progress in my own district. I advise Instructional Technology Specialists to really listen at school and to hone in to what the core curriculum concerns are in their building so that they can help teachers apply technology to those issues. For me, I try to apply the same principle on a broader scale, and these digests are a couple of the tools I use to gather information about these core concerns.

But I think that it might be something different – and I’ve noticed it a lot in my reading and experience with colleagues. It’s almost is that the “evangelizing phase” of the Web 2.0 revolution is over – Web 2.0 really is mainstream. Grandmothers have Facebook accounts, and every teacher that I know has been trained in some way on how to use particular (district approved) Web 2.0 tools.

Many of the great educational bloggers who helped spread the good word about these tools, and helped legitimize them in the educational sphere, have “moved on” – and moved out of the classroom. Many have moved into positions of tech specialists, or out of schools altogether.

And with the exception of some of the great thinker-bloggers (like you Will, Warlick, etc), I’m noticing that this disconnect with the actual students in the classroom is becoming increasingly apparent. (Why do educators use Twitter, when every person and student I know under 30 uses Facebook for the same thing?) In my PLP cohort, the best conversations have been started by teachers, and reflect what is actually going on “on the ground” (Mobile learning for example). Many of the bloggers I read have overlapping “Personal Learning Networks” and too many times it seems that those PLN’s don’t include students.

Anyway, I hope that the next phase in this movement is less tech-centric and more utilitarian.

Although I check several blogs regularly, now I mostly just follow the links. I have found by exploring favorites, I discover many new blogs that are well worth reading. I bookmark the best and stop back in when time allows.

That’s the crux of my struggle and I wonder how others deal with it.

As 2009 unfolds, I’ll move the resonating ideas that stick into the 09reader, without totally deleting 08, yet. Its an emergence system, not as severe as pressing the big D button. Gives the cream time to float and the curdled can become cheese before deletion. (however sometimes the tastiest blue takes time to become a savoury gem, hence I keep it in the larder, just in case)

Ethno/cultural/socio/economic diversity is what I actively pursue on my reading lists, follow the best of the diametrically opposed views.Forced neuro discomfort.

Not for profit? follow the free marketeers.
W.A.S.P.? then RSS some LDC Asian Zen sites.
R&B junkie? listen to Wagner.

It amazing how it deblinkers, creates brain contention and prompts critical reflection of your own core values. The new learning is more vital and the idea cross pollination amazing. The filters work overtime but I’d rather strike one precious stone than have a sack full of gravel at the end of 2009

http://www.ahistoryteacher.com/wordpress/?p=259