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"Teachers around the world are gearing up for the new school year -- but the experience is going to be vastly different for new teachers. Where an experienced teacher has the knowledge of what worked and what didn't, a new teacher is going to be bombarded with tons of new info and the need to process it! Not to mention, they will be preparing for the most important piece of all: their classroom instruction. In no way, do I want to add to the burden of the already-filled-to-the-brim, new teacher stress bucket. I do however, want to share just 20 tidbits which I hope will help ease new teachers into a fun, successful school year. Some of these will be in the form of social media tools, which I think are awesome, and wish I had had as a newbie. And each little tidbit is linked to a resource which I hope you will find supportive. "

Some tips for beginning teachers from Edutopia

"We've all been itching to get our hands on iOS 6 since it got its first unveiling at WWDC back in June, and today, three months after that announcement, the software finally gets its public debut. Apple's packed a ton of new features into this update, including some major new features like Map and Passbook, plus some enhancements to existing apps and features, such as new Siri capabilities and a VIP inbox in Mail. Apple's been promoting some of these features on its website, but there are tons you may not have heard about. With that said, here's your comprehensive guide to everything that's new in iOS 6."

"The internet has changed the way with think of information. The web as we know it is significantly changing our literacy and information encounters.Participative media tools have altered the shape and experience of learning, and provided teacher and librarians in this changing learning environment with the need to embrace new skills, new tools and new ways of working with literacy, information literacy and digital fluency. If there is any doubt about the scope and impact of the new technology environment, the Horizon Report K-12 edition (2011) issued annually since 2009 has identified and described emerging technologies that are having a significant impact on K-12 education, re-iterating the diversity of influences in the learning spaces of our schools."

"So it's mid-August and for many teachers the new school year has begun and for others it's not too far away. Some of you will be starting at new schools and with that there's a chance that you'll be coming to terms with a new interactive whiteboard. You may already be familiar with whiteboards already, and are just starting at a school with a different brand. Either way, here's a summary of blogposts I've written in the past that hopefully will prove useful to you."

This could be a useful reference for some of you heading to schools.

After Google+ entered the social networking scene not so long ago, the number of online distractions hasn't really decreased. At the same time, innovations and smarter solutions to handle your actions online have fortunately continued to thrive too. Instead of the usual to-do lists, news readers, or sharing tools, they tackle things in new and more helpful ways. What's most important for me, is that they slot right into my workflow, and allow me to become more efficient without changing my behavior. A few apps recently managed to do so brilliantly. Here are my favorite new tools to help you stay focused and use the Web more innovatively.

More recently I've discovered some great new tools to read and share my favorite content which I've included here in this list. Whether you are a person who just likes to stay on top of the latest news, a blogger like me who needs a way to organize the vast amount of information that comes my way or a person who just enjoys sharing what they find with others you'll love this list.

"While the term has become controversial since Prensky penned the phrase, the idea is still relevant-and the social perception of the "new students" Prensky was talking about continues to shift with the birth of new digital tools. However, the question that many experts are asking remains: does a fluency in new media tools like Facebook and Apple TV equate to digital savviness?"

"In simple terms, RSS is a simple and effective way of keeping in touch when new information is added to a website without having to visit the website to check for new updates. How it works is you subscribe to your favorite website using the RSS feed in a RSS feed reader such as Feedly.  Whenever new information is added to the website it is automatically sent to your RSS feed reader where you can read it at your convenience."

"As the web becomes more and more inundated with blogs, videos, tweets, status updates, news, articles, and countless other forms of content, "information overload" is something we all seem to suffer. It is becoming more difficult to weed through all the "stuff" out there and pluck out the best, most share-worthy tidbits of information, especially if your topic is niche. Let's face it, Google definitely has its shortcomings when it comes to content curation and the more it tries to cater to all audiences, the less useful it becomes. The demand for timely, relevant content that is specific to our unique interests and perspectives has given rise to a new generation of tools that aim to help individuals and companies curate content from the web and deliver it in a meaningful way. These new tools range from simple, application-specific types such as social media aggregators and discovery engines, to more complex, full-blown publishing solutions for organizations."

Just when you thought you were getting a handle on all this stuff eh?

"Published on Aug 7, 2013 Some pretty big changes are going on at Google Gooru! The first of which was our brand new logo which we introduced yesterday (8/6), and today we're giving our newsletter subscribers and followers a sneak preview of our new website."

"Call it the "learning paradox": the more you struggle and even fail while you're trying to master new information, the better you're likely to recall and apply that information later. The learning paradox is at the heart of "productive failure," a phenomenon identified by Manu Kapur, a researcher at the Learning Sciences Lab at the National Institute of Education of Singapore. Kapur points out that while the model adopted by many teachers and employers when introducing others to new knowledge - providing lots of structure and guidance early on, until the students or workers show that they can do it on their own - makes intuitive sense, it may not be the best way to promote learning. Rather, it's better to let the neophytes wrestle with the material on their own for a while, refraining from giving them any assistance at the start."

"Bringing multimedia into the classroom is a great way to engage students in learning. Supplementing lessons, opening up new interests, and offering inspiration, online videos make for an incredible teaching tool. In 2010, we covered our favorite 100 video sites for educators, and we've now updated our list for 2012 with more than 100 resources and more than 25 brand new entries. Read on, and you'll be able to check out the very best sources for educational videos on the web."

"WHILE education experts across Australia grapple with Gonski, high school graduates thinking of a career in teaching ought to think again - because in the future the traditional role may be gone-ski. Instead, tutoring is tipped to take on a very different form."

Today, we're excited to introduce the latest version of Edmodo. We listened to your feedback and added new features that will make it simpler to connect with resources, and get insight into how students feel about assignments, classroom discussions and shared content. We also made the features you love even more powerful. We will be rolling out the latest version to all of our users over the next few weeks. Here's a peek at what's new:

A new Creative Commons license chooser launched this week.  The very simple interface presents four boxes that update dynamically as users select options and complete attribution metadata. After completing the form, users are presented with a suggested license, a choice of regular or compact size icons, and embed code for inserting their license on a web page.

Google has developed an interactive curriculum on YouTube to support teachers in educating students on how to be safe, engaged and confident model netizens. The initiative is aimed at students aged 13 to 17 and will help them to develop digital literacy skills on YouTube that would be applicable across the web. A list of 10 lessons has been devised, in which students can learn about YouTube's policies, how to report content, how to protect their own privacy, and how to be responsible YouTube community members and, in the broader picture, digital citizens. Each lesson comes with guidelines for teachers and ready-made slides for presentation. There's also a YouTube Curriculum channel where videos related to the project will be posted.

"With the launch of Google Hangouts, the world just got a lot more social! As +Vic Gundotra puts it, Google is now connecting people in new ways, with one of the new ways being Hangouts. Never heard of Google Plus Hangouts? Read on and discover one of the most useful tools for global socializing and collaboration."

"It seems like every other month, Evernote gets additional upgrades. A few are quietly released, while others are highly anticipated by heavy Evernote users. Since I wrote my last article about Evernote's new design and file storage upgrades, the popular notebook has gotten important new features, including Reminders, a highlighter and tighter security for subscribers, among others."

"I pointed out recently that many of the older theories of pedagogy were formulated in a pre-digital age. I blogged about some of the new theories that seem appropriate as explanatory frameworks for learning in a digital age. These included heutagogy, which describes a self-determined approach to learning, a new model of peer-peer learning known as paragogy, a post modernist 'rhizomatic' learning explanation, distributed learning and connectivist theory, and also a short essay on the digital natives/immigrants discourse. I questioned whether the old models are anachronistic."

"When a teacher, school, or district tells parents and community members, "We're going to do Project Based Learning!" the response may vary. You're lucky if some say, "Great news! Students need to be taught differently these days!" but a more typical response might be: What's Project Based Learning?  That's not how I was taught. Why do we need PBL, if (a) our school is already doing well, or (b) what we really need is a better literacy/math program to raise test scores?  Isn't that just a trendy new thing that doesn't really work?  How is this going to affect my child (and me)?  Basically, they're asking for the what, why, and how. Here are some successful strategies we've seen to answer these questions."