We’ve all heard of wacky holidays, but did you know that June has a wacky holiday every day?

Have you ever heard of National Leave the Office Early Day? How about National Donut Day or Ball Point Pen Day? These are some of the many wacky holidays found in the lovely month of June. In 2004, Laura Stack, MBA, CSP, and bestselling author, designated June 2nd as National Leave the Office Earlier Day...

Here are the Top 5 Professional Development Tips from the 2010-2011 school year.

1. Send "Happy Notes" to Parents

2. Dealing with Difficult Parents

3. Creating Your Own PLC

4. Old Data is Cold Data

5. Keeping Your Eye on the Target

Here are our TOP 5 favorite educational tweets of the week, which were RT’ed and/or clicked on the most by you!—our loyal Twitter followers. These tweets were originally tweeted by @eyeoneducation and some of our other favorite Tweeters. If you're not yet on Twitter, join today!

On June 30th, 2011, Eye On Education author Dr. Leslie Grant will be presenting a complimentary webinar with Halogen Software. The webinar will cover how to factor in student achievement when evaluating teacher success.

The webinar comes just in time to consider the topic while teacher evaluations are being finalized for the school year. Following Dr. Grant’s presentation, Halogen Software will demonstrate how Halogen eAppraisal™ Education can simply and easily automate the teacher evaluation process.

In an article published by The New York Times, “Speaking Up in Class, Silently, Using Social Media,” Trip Gabriel explores the use of Twitter-like technology to enhance discussion in the classroom. Teachers from elementary schools to universities are now implementing what they refer to as a “back channel” to their classrooms. These “back channels” might look like digital note passing, but this is not the case. All students and the teacher sign onto one site to communicate—the teacher monitors activity to keep the discussion focused. Microblogging websites such as Twitter has made this possible, with students and the teacher all using individual laptops in a classroom setting.

Here are the Top 5 English Language Arts Tips from the 2010-2011 school year.

1. Why Students Might Have Difficulty Comprehending the Text in Multiple Choice Questions

2. The Four Categories of Readers

3. Using the Partner Scrapbook to Involve Parents in Writing Instruction

Have you been participating in the Curriculum 21 Summer Book Club: The Passion-Driven Classroom by Angela Maiers and Amy Sandvold? If not, it's not too late to join in the discussion! So far, we've talked about the Preface and Chapter One. Starting now, we'll be discussing Chapter Two. Click here to join, and help us answer the question: How is Passion different from Manufactured Fun?

If you haven't purchased the book, book club members r

Kappa Delta Pi's New Teacher Advocate recently published an article by Eye On Education author Rebekah Stathakis. The article, titled "The First Minutes," provides ideas and activities for the very beginning of a class period. Specifically, Stathakis discusses establishing a warm-up routine and effective warm-up activities.

Here are the Top 5 Teaching and Learning Tips from the 2010-2011 school year.

1. End of the School Year: What Can You Do to Keep Students Focused?

2. What's in the Bag? Get Your Students' Attention from the Start

3. Team Building with Students

Here are our TOP 5 favorite educational tweets of the week, which were RT’ed and/or clicked on the most by you!—our loyal Twitter followers. These tweets were originally tweeted by @eyeoneducation and some of our other favorite Tweeters. If you're not yet on Twitter, join today!

There was an article in today's New York Times titled "New Recruit in Homework Revolt: The Principal" by Winnie Hu. The article was about educators who are calling on limiting homework or even banning it.  In my opinion, that policy demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of children and the purpose of school.

In the past year, three films have been released that provide a remarkable commentary on educators. In a country that undervalues and underpays our teachers, films about education are fundamental in bringing attention to the matter. With the goal of bringing change to the current educational programs in this country, these filmmakers have put a magnifying glass over the profession of teaching and why it is imperative to our society.

Did you miss Heather Wolpert-Gawron's webinar on "The Skills of Tomorrow for the Students of Today?" Access the recording here by signing up for Eye On Education's Insights eNewsletters!

In this webinar, Heather explored the top five skills that students need for school and their future. She also presented classroom-tested strategies to motivate and engage students to master this skill set:

In the May 2011 edition of Educational Leadership, published by the ASCD, Larry Ferlazzo wrote an article titled "Involvement or Engagement?" In this piece about parent involvement in schools, Ferlazzo writes, "We need to relate to families not as clients, but as partners in school and community improvement."

Here are the Top 5 Poems & Tips by Annette Breaux from the 2010-2011 school year.

1. To Smile or Not to Smile

2. I Bleed Professionalism

3. The Happiest Teacher