Can you teach creativity?

Racing to my office to show me a finished book or a robotic claw, smelling the spring flowers, building a rocket or a wind turbine, or enjoying dinner on the 8th grade Philadelphia trip, Parker students are always up to something interesting!

Can creativity be taught and assessed?  According to Grant Wiggins and Andrew Miller, it can!  Here's how... On Assessing Creativity  and  Yes, You Can.

Have a fractionous Friday!

Giving students ample opportunities to develop sound investigative skills at an early age is essential to nurturing their ability to think critically and mathematically as they get older.

Here is a great blog post by second grade math teacher, Jennifer Gresens.  She describes the depth of learning that happens when students write fraction books to demonstrate their understanding. 

Assessment at Parker

2-3 students give each other feedback about their Ganges River poems in a critique session. This form of peer-assessment gives students practice in critical thinking.

We had a great time at this morning's Coffee with Meg sponsored by Parent Council.  The topic was Parker Assessment vs Common Core Assessment.  One of our parents made this podcast of the conversation.  If you couldn't be there - take a listen!  https://archive.org/details/CoffeeWithMegCommonCore