Gary Ackerman @garyackerman@qoto.org

I just noticed “correlated” (one of those words I can never seem to spell is “co” and “related”, but with an extra “r.” Now, if I can only remember that.

How do your students perceive the test?

Is it a gateway to a new experience?

Is it the signal they are done?

It matters.

I’m not afraid in the dark outside, but I do pay close attention for skunks.

I’m not afraid in the dark outside, but I do pay close attention for skunks.

Cherry picking data is the finely tuned practice of accepting the data which support you decisions and ignoring all others.

Seriously... if you want to regain your writing skills, read excellent writers. Stephen Jay Gould always works for me.

Teachers who conflate “scoring well on assessments” and “learning” are starting to annoy me.

If you only deal with “data and facts,” ignoring interpretation and theory, then you aren’t building any evidence.

The real scientific method begins with, “I don’t know,” and ends in much the same way.

What if you are an educator, who did your job and taught an incomplete, inaccurate, inappropriate curriculum? I used to think that could be excused... now... not so much.

Avoid single reasons and single villains.

“Predicting human behavior is a particularly difficult task.” -Igor Tulchinsky & Christopher Mason

Truer words are rarely written!

I’m trying new strategy for expanding my professional library... if the table of contents resembles something I would write, I skip it. Self-reinforcing libraries are echo chambers too.

If your efforts to “innovate” seek to return to the “glory” of the past... just stop... you misremember the past, and we were probably jerks back then.

What if our classroom tasks were as messy as real-world tasks?

So much that is “data driven” turns out to be “myth driven.”

Don’t overestimate the power of data. Sound interpretation of data is far more useful.

A friend of the family texted last evening. We venmo’ed him some money. That’s how kids sell stuff for school & club fundraisers in 2025.

Wondering why we need to keep putting volume, issue, page numbers in citations when we have a doi.

Avoid “leading by buzzword.” Some of us can recognize it and we know what it means.