If you don't already subscribe to Royan Lee and John Spencer's blogs, give yourself an early Christmas present and get on that. These two continue to share unique, insightful, at times controversial topics and are more than willing to engage their readers in meaningful dialog. Here's a couple of recent examples:
Headphones in the Classroom: Royan talks about his thinking around how and why he allows his students to listen to music in class. This is the type of thing most teacher have pondered but perhaps haven't articulated it well. The comments are equally as informative.
Royan also does a great job of sharing tools and strategies that he uses with his middle school students. Some are quick ideas and his use of images and video are particularly appealing to me. Also the mix of personal and professional provide a wonderful picture of who Royan is as a teacher and parent.
Other recent posts from Royan:
John Spencer has been a favorite read of my for several years. He's a prolific writer and has authored several books. I can truly say, he's got a wack sack of stuff online. John's humor and insightfulness around the human aspect of technology has been very influential for me. I've had John speak to my students about his Living Facebook project, which if you've not taken a look at it, you'll want to.
John's best stuff always has some controversy around it. Those who read his blog aren't afraid to challenge him and John welcomes intelligent civil discourse. Recently he wrote about why he doesn't show a video on the day before the holidays. Clearly written, yet always a contrary point of view.
John is never afraid to think out loud, questioning his practice and invited critique as he does here with regard to the #Newtown tragedy. John moves in and out of cultural topics and education but having spent some time chatting with John, I know how the two fit.
So go ahead and check out these two and then pass their work along to your colleagues.
Photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/r_o_y_a_n/8292046044/in/photostream/
Photo: http://www.johntspencer.com/