EST430

Social Media has fast become part of many people's every day lives. With so much new technology being introduced today, there are many benefits and reasons for students to be using social media on a daily basis. Social Networks are being utilized by students not to just talk to their friends or share the cutest cat video they can find, but to make use of these networks to develop and enhance the student lifestyle. Many students are using websites like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube to market themselves to potential employers by setting up business pages and uploading videos for all to see.

Our education system was perfectly designed...to prepare workers for routine jobs that no longer exist. As we try to out-drill and out-test Korea we are leaving millions of young adults ill-prepared, uninspired and lacking the skills they need to thrive in an innovation economy. After seeing this film, you'll never look at school the same way again.

"For teachers, blogging can be the difference between mediocre and exceptional. Taking the time to reflect on pedagogy and problem solve publicly can enhance the learning for the teacher and the students by proxy. There are many ways that educators can use blogs to enhance classroom learning."

"I have written extensively on what makes a good blogpost and why it is so powerful. From personal experience blogging is one of the most beneficial professional development activities I have ever engaged with. I learn more from blogging than I do from almost any other activity I participate in. Here are 7 good reasons why teachers should blog:"

"Our education system was perfectly designed...to prepare workers for routine jobs that no longer exist. As we try to out-drill and out-test Korea we are leaving millions of young adults ill-prepared, uninspired and lacking the skills they need to thrive in an innovation economy. After seeing this film, you'll never look at school the same way again. " See Trailer https://vimeo.com/122502930

"Get connected with Google+ is a short video for teachers promoting the value of using social media for connecting and developing a Personal Learning Network (PLN), showcasing Google+ as one option for a starting point. It can be viewed as a standalone resource but I envisage it being used as an engagement strategy for a face-to-face or online workshop for teachers."

"By far the most prevalent issue I see in schools struggling with their technology integration and implementation is the lack of a collective vision for how digital learning tools will be used to enhance learning. Schools often purchase software, computer devices, and technology-based learning systems because they are effective marketing tools for recruitment, or because they want to keep pace with the digital investments of rival institutions, or simply because they fear appearing outdated. None of these have to do with learning, of course, and inevitably are insufficient to smooth over the challenges that arise as digital tools enter classroom spaces."

"When it is used correctly YouTube can be a good platform for spreading news about the great things that are happening in our classrooms and schools. It can also be a good platform for students to share their thoughts and projects. But before you upload videos to YouTube there are a few settings that you should be aware of. In the video embedded below I provide an overview of those settings."

"Get your hashtags ready: Twitter is a far more effective source of CPD than more traditional approaches, research has found. Indeed, teachers believe they derive more from the 140 characters of a tweet than they do from several hours of seminars or lectures. Academics from two US universities surveyed 755 members of school staff about Twitter. They found that the most popular use of the social media website was for CPD, with many praising Twitter's advantages over more traditional methods. Twitter, many teachers told researchers, allowed them to create a virtual staffroom, filled entirely with their own choice of colleagues. Indeed, a middle school English teacher explained: "I have learned so much from other teachers. It has transformed my teaching. And this is my 18th year [in the profession].""

"In an exclusive extract from his new book, Sir Ken Robinson argues that our approach to teaching is wrong - and hundreds of years out of date"

If you're still trying to wrap your head around what the "Internet of Things" is, this data visualization makes things easy to understand and is fun to explore. The visualization, from the team at Information is Beautiful, does a great job of explaining what the Internet of Things is, what it can and will affect, who the major players are, and even provides some eye-opening statistics regarding the direction we're all headed with technology. Additionally, it mentions some of the challenges facing our "always connected" world. You can check it out at the link below.

""I Will Not Let An Exam Result Decide My Fate" picks up on the education topic but takes a different stance and angle from "Why I Hate School But Love Education". This poem talks about how we have been made to think about how education and getting university degrees can give us opportunities to have a better chance in making our dream careers a reality. It also touches on how as individuals we are judged and tested by how well we perform on exams, but not all people perform well in exams so why are they made out to feel like they're dumb? The inconsistencies of the education system are really peeled open to reveal a deep problem that needs to be addressed and how society's needs have changed to make this even more apparent. "

"A good blog post delivers its message by combining words with visual interest in a well-structured format that's easy to read. Follow the basics in this article to start writing posts that attract and hold your readers' attention."

"1. Assessment as and for learning - Formative Assessment How may assessment guide teaching and learning? Cameron Paterson" Lecture for second-year Master of Teaching students, March 2015

"Robin Good's personal directory of the best tools and services to capture, edit, publish and distribute video online that I recommend."

"In a world ruled by content curation, every educator should be passing along social media strategies to students. The "That's a parent's job" mantra is not a sufficient excuse for ignoring your responsibility here. We're in this together. Students must be taught early and often how to create, locate, maintain and share content. And they need to understand the ramifications of everything they do on social media."

"Edmodo for Parents is an app designed just for parents. The app, available for iOS and Android, allows parents to quickly check for announcements from teachers. Perhaps more importantly the app offers a student activity feed. The student activity feed shows parents which assignments their children have completed. It also shows lists of upcoming and overdue assignments, quizzes, and events."

"Today's schools are focusing on boosting kids' technological proficiency and warning them about the perils of the web. But something critical is missing from this education. When Reuben Loewy took up his first teaching gig in 2012, he had a major revelation: The digital revolution has dramatically transformed the way that kids perceive reality."

"A rigorous and engaging classroom….what does that look like?  Recently I tweeted a link to an article by David Price that challenged the current perception of what student engagement looks like. The article was a summation and analysis of a 20 year longitudinal study of Australian students.  Using the study, David's article addressed the following myths. 1. I can see when my students are engaged 2. They must be engaged, look at their test scores 3. They must be engaged - they're having fun The article (found here) was an incredibly interesting read but the Twitter conversation after my post was for me the most interesting part. "

"The Internet Archive: Wayback Machine is a good tool to use when you want to see how a webpage used to look. This is helpful when you want to verify the citation of a webpage in an academic work. Using the Wayback Machine is also a good way to verify that a website was working at a previous point in time. In the video embedded below I provide a short overview of how the Wayback Machine works."