On August 28, the new Groton Dunstable middle school principal, Steve Silverman, gave a presentation to parents to share his perspective on middle school education and what he is planning to do as principal of the middle school.

We have published the Groton Channel's [1] videotape of the presentation here for your benefit.

In his invitation to parents, Silverman promised "an informative and entertaining" presentation, and it was apparent from the enthusiastic response of those who attended that he delivered exactly that. There were many laughs in response to the humor Silverman interspersed throughout the presentation, and he was often interrupted when parents clapped in response to what he had to say. The presentation was packed with insights from leaders in the field of education on how middle school kids see the world and how schools are approaching the education of those children. It answers the question of why today's practice of student-centered, differentiated instruction is more effective in getting through to students of different abilities than the lecture-based methods that have been used in the past.

We encourage all parents and community members who are interested in gaining some insight into our schools to watch this video of Principal Silverman's presentation. Unfortunately, the lighting in the auditorium was dim, but you can clearly hear what Silverman has to say, and the slides and video clips that Silverman used to illustrate some of his points show up well.

NOTE: If you need to take a break, you can pause the video using the button on the bottom left of the video window. If you stop the video and want to pick up where you left off, make a note of the time stamp on the slider at the bottom of the window so you can advance to that point when you want to resume watching the next time you play the video.