This is a marvelous post by Garr Reynolds about using the brain in presentations. He has a marvelous slideshare with his favorite quotes from the book Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School (Book & DVD)
This is my must read book for the summer, and I just downloaded it to listen to on my ipod. His videos are phenomenal and ready to share via youtube on your school's blog or intranet. (Uhm, another reason to unblock youtube.)
I love this one about the Fallacy of Multitasking –
He says that “the always online organization is the always unproductive organization.”
This is why I enjoy and adhere the inbox zero principles from Merlin Mann. Logging into email 2-3 times a day ONLY keeps me focus. I often turn off skype and gtalk as well. And sometimes during my planning period, I even close my door.
The multitasking and constant interruptions as a teacher are probably my biggest obstacle to getting things done!
tag: Garr Reynolds, Brain Rules, John Medina, research, presentation, inbox zero, Merlin Mann
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Tips for minimizing teacher stress
- Discover 10 stress-busting secrets for healthy teachers. What simple routines will help you handle the stress?
- Simple advice for coping with stress at work.
- Learn tips to help you deal with difficult colleagues and students (even those who "hate" you -- yes it is possible!)
Multitasking is traditionally viewed as a female skill. A recent programme on BBC radio 4 explored a recent research paper which concludes that no-one can actually multi-task successfully. There are some tasks which can be carried out simultaneously because they make different demands of the brain, but two tasks which require the same sort of brain activity cannot successfully be carried out simultaneously.
The research also found that women are no better than men. It seems that the tasks that women have traditionally done simultaneously have been of the sort that don’t conflict with one another for brain resource. As we move away from our traditional roles, however, we find ourselves less and less able to “multi-task” but the assumption that female=multi-tasker seems to live on… no doubt to our cost!