Ken Greco

NYC English teacher and NY Knicks hoops junky

[Education Week @educationweek]

Bill Gates' Stark Warning on AI in Education: It Could Result in 'People Learning Less' https://t.co/7WBh4p62cp

[Dr. Brian Hoeflinger, MD @drhoeflinger]

I’m a retired brain surgeon and I wanna tell you why you feel like life is passing by. I just need one minute to explain this to you so hang in there.

Repetitive daily routines stop the brain from recording clear detailed memories. When every day looks the same, your brain does not track time the same as a clock does. It tracks change. If nothing new happens then days, months, and years start to blur together.

This is know as Time compression. When life lacks variety, your brain compresses past days together, making it feel like time is sped up.

To stop feeling like life is passing you by, add new experiences to your life. Break routine habits, like changing your daily home routine, taking a different route to work, or trying a new hobby.

Schedule small trips or plan new adventures so your days do not blend together.

Practice mindfulness by staying fully focused on what you are doing right now and not trying to race off to the next task.

Keep a journal and write down happy memories or memorable parts of the day before you go to sleep.

Take deep, calm breaths when you feel anxious or rushed to return your focus to the moment.

You can and you will retrain your brain to not feel like life is passing you by by following these few simple measures.

[aether @bluewdrift]

This line from Atomic Habits isn't ready to leave my head:

"It doesn't make sense to continue wanting something if you're not willing to do what it takes to get it. If you don't want to live the lifestyle, then release yourself from the desire. To crave the result but not the process is to guarantee disappointment."

[leonie haimson @leoniehaimson]

The first priority should be to reject any K12 ELA curriculum that doesn’t assign and leave plenty of time for students to read whole books at school and at home. https://t.co/eYnTuykUJc

[Tim Ferriss @tferriss]

There is a process that I have used, and still use, to reignite life...

Create two timelines—6 months and 12 months—and list up to five things you dream of having (including, but not limited to, material wants: house, car, clothing, etc.), being (be a great cook, be fluent in Chinese, etc.), and doing (visiting Thailand, tracing your roots overseas, racing ostriches, etc.) in that order.

If you have difficulty identifying what you want in some categories, as most will, consider what you hate or fear in each and write down the opposite.

Do not limit yourself, and do not concern yourself with how these things will be accomplished. For now, it’s unimportant. This is an exercise in reversing repression.

Be sure not to judge or fool yourself. If you really want a Ferrari, don’t put down solving world hunger out of guilt. For some, the dream will be fame, for others fortune or prestige. All people have their vices and insecurities. If something will improve your feeling of self-worth, put it down.

Drawing a blank? In that case, consider these questions:

1) What would you do, day to day, if you had $100 million in the bank?
2) What would make you most excited to wake up in the morning to another day?

Don’t rush—think about it for a few minutes.

If still blocked, fill in the five “doing” spots with the following:

— one place to visit
— one thing to do before you die (a memory of a lifetime)
— one thing to do daily
— one thing to do weekly
— one thing you’ve always wanted to learn

What does “being” entail doing?

Convert each “being” into a “doing” to make it actionable. Identify an action that would characterize this state of being or a task that would mean you had achieved it. People find it easier to brainstorm “being” first, but this column is just a temporary holding spot for “doing” actions.

Here are a few examples:

1) Great cook —> make Christmas dinner without help

2) Fluent in Chinese —> have a five-minute conversation with a Chinese co-worker

Determine three steps for each of the dreams in just the 6-month timeline and take the first step now.

Define three steps for each dream that will get you closer to its actualization.

Set actions—simple, well-defined actions—for now, tomorrow (complete before 11 A.M.) and the day after (again completed before 11 A.M.). Once you have three steps for each of the four goals, complete the three actions in the “now” column.

Do it now. Each should be simple enough to do in five minutes or less. If not, rachet it down. If it’s the middle of the night and you can’t call someone, do something else now, such as send an e-mail, and set the call for first thing tomorrow.

If the next stage is some form of research, get in touch with someone who knows the answer instead of spending too much time in books or online, which can turn into paralysis by analysis.

The best first step, the one I recommend, is finding someone who’s done it and ask for advice on how to do the same.

[Ken Greco @grecadactyl]

@DavidPSamson I’m sorry for your loss

[How I Write Clips @PerellClips]

Here's how to tell a better story at your next dinner conversation. Tom Segura calls it the "way in"

"One of the big things people always talk about when doing standup is having a story but wondering about the 'way in.' The reason for telling a story is often as important, if not more so, than the story itself.

You could just say, 'One time, I was almost the spokesman for Subway. Here's what happened.' But on stage, I started by saying, 'I'm so grateful to be performing here. I thought the highlight of my career was when I booked the campaign to be the spokesman for Subway.' Right there, you give yourself a reason to tell the story.

You have a story, but you need to figure out your way in. Figure out a reason for saying it. Don't get lazy about those moments; figure out why."

The way into a story is by tying it to stakes; the stakes are what make the person across from you lean in and ask, "What happened?"

[Tyler Kingkade @tylerkingkade]

NEW: Have you heard of i-Ready?

It's in a THIRD of school districts.

The company behind it makes $800m/yr revenue.

Kids are often required to use it for 90 min/week, or more, and they hate it.

It doesn't count toward grades.

Teachers can't see a student's answers.

Schools are paying millions for it hoping to improve their state test scores, but critics say there's no proof it works.

My latest @NBCNews story digs into the controversy around one of the most commonly-used software products in education today

[Daniel Pink @DanielPink]

We all work mightily to look competent on paper…
…but we still can struggle with basic life skills.

Like apologizing without making it worse.

Or remembering a name 60 seconds after hearing it.

We obsess over credentials. We neglect competence.

Here's the list of “how tos” I wish someone gave me earlier. 🧵👇

[Tim Ferriss @tferriss]

Whenever upset or anxious, ask “why” at least three times and put the answers down on paper. Describing these doubts in writing reduces their impact twofold.

First, it’s often the ambiguous nature of self-doubt that hurts most. Defining and exploring it in writing demands clarity of thought, after which most concerns are found to be baseless.

Second, recording these concerns seems to somehow remove them from your head.

[Ejaaz @cryptopunk7213]

anthropic fucking killed it with this. so many people will start using claude.

new feature lets you import your *entire* memory from chatGPT, Gemini etc into Claude so it *instantly* knows everything about you. no more reminding claude who you are.

the best fucking part is it takes literally 60s:

- copy and paste the below prompt into your alternative AI (eg chatgpt)

- paste answer into claude’s “memory” settings and… you’re done.

- Claude immediately picks up from the last conversation you had with it in chatgpt!

the opportunity cost to switch to anthropic just went to zero - their app is currently #1 in the app store

[Rita C. Joseph @CMRitaJoseph]

I am outraged by the racist remarks recently made at a CEC 3 meeting regarding Black students at @NYCSchools . This rhetoric is unacceptable and I am calling for swift action to ensure thorough accountability.

[NBACentral @TheDunkCentral]

Trae Young went off on Pat Bev, asking how he played with stars like LeBron, Giannis, Ant, Kawhi, and Harden, yet only made one Conference Finals

“I win play-in games on the road and I'm ready to get to the playoffs. You win play-in games at home and you standing on the scores table acting like it's a championship.” 😳

“I know you were labeled as a tough defender, a great defender, and the accolades say that you were. But I promise you, anytime you was on the court with me, I was never scared of you. I was never scared of Patty Bev.” 😬

(🎥 @fromthepointTY)

[Ms. A, NBCT @Lo_Teaches]

I love the dropdown menu!

[Matthew R. Kay @MattRKay]

AI crafts the assignment
AI completes the assignment
AI grades the assignment

[Amy's Sending Out My Client's Fall Subs @AmyNielsen06]

🧵I've been meeting with editors all week and asking most of them two questions. 1) What keeps you reading a submission? 2) As far as craft, what advice do you have for authors? And I'm sharing some of that with you today! #writingcommunity #amquerying

[Ken Greco @grecadactyl]

@MarisaEThompson @MrNeibauer @SharNNJoe …Can change the whole vibe and community of the classroom. I’ll
Keep you posted !

[Ken Greco @grecadactyl]

@MarisaEThompson @MrNeibauer @SharNNJoe Ultimate TQE course was very worthwhile - I’ve definitely rewatched a few times already :) … I think I just need to play around and see the best ways to weave it in. But the core of the idea — having a repeatable way for kids to annotate and
develop their own questions…