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"Recently I hosted 20 teachers in my school district at the zoo for an afternoon. The idea was to explore how we might use iPads during a field trip. It was certainly an exciting form of professional development."

"The BBC's Skillswise website offers lots of good activities for learning and practicing skills in language arts and mathematics. A section of the site that could be useful in a lot of classrooms is the speaking and listening section. The speaking and listening section contains subsections offering lessons and activities to develop a specific skill. Those skills are listening for specifics, communication skills, formal and informal speaking, and giving presentations. Each section has a short introductory video followed by a set of quizzes and interactive games in which students test their skills."

"Drawing and coloring is a great way to get students to brainstorm about a topic, organize a group project, or contribute scenes to a digital story. For young learners, drawing and coloring offers them a way to learn patterns, symmetry, and develop motor skills. Below is my recent slide presentation with lesson ideas, free web tools and apps. After the presentation, you'll see the bookmarks. Just click on the title to visit that link. There are over 25 links! Keep scrolling. Here's a recent article I did on the topic, 25+ Ways to Create Colorful Learning Experiences for Kids."

"STEM education is "an interdisciplinary approach to learning where rigorous academic concepts are coupled with real-world lessons as students apply Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics in contexts that make connections between school, community, work, and the global enterprise enabling the development of STEM literacy and with it the ability to compete in the new economy. (Tsupros, Kohler, & Hallinen, 2009) Not coincidentally, several other trends in learning-from mobile learning and tablets in the classroom, to personalized learning and adaptive learning apps-are all at least somewhat connected to STEM education, which makes the following collection of STEM iPad apps for learning from Listly user Randy Yerrick helpful."

"ne of the most common questions math teachers hear from their students is, "why does this matter?" They are constantly trying to convince students that math is useful and could help them in their everyday lives. But it can be a tough sell. Word problems alone often feel contrived and students see right through them. Thomas Petra has taught math at every level for more than 20 years and encountered dubious students at every grade level. That's why he developed Real World Math, a free website with lessons based on Google Earth aimed at grades 5 - 10. "I was trying to show them actual applications of the math ideas that they see in the textbook," Petra said."

"The SAMR Model for integrating technology into teaching, developed by Dr. Ruben Puentedura, has gained a good deal of exposure in recent years. "SAMR" is an acronym that stands for Substitution, Augmentation, Modification, and Redefinition. The SAMR model provides a technique for moving through degrees of technology adoption to find more meaningful uses of technology in teaching and move away from simply using "tech for tech's sake"."

"The infographic we have for you today provides an excellent explanation of what Universal Design for Learning is all about. We invite you to check it out and share with us your thoughts "Universal Design for Learning is a set of principles designed to guide curriculum and lesson development to ensure that all individuals have equal opportunities to learn and can quickly engage with the instruction.Digital technologies, online resources, and mobile devices can be used to design flexible instruction with options to support all students in achieving the Florida Standards" "

"Will Smith once told a story from his childhood in which his father broke down the brick wall at his business and told him and his brother to rebuild it. It took them a year, but they finished the job and learned a powerful lesson contained within a memorable metaphor. He explains, "You don't set out to build a wall. You don't say 'I'm going to build the biggest, baddest, greatest wall that's ever been built.' You don't start there. You say, 'I'm going to lay this brick as perfect as a brick can be laid. You do that every single day and soon you have a wall." This story from Will Smith captures the very essence of the Slight Edge philosophy that we will discuss in this article. Applying this idea within the classroom will help students develop a strong long term sense of accomplishment that is necessary to achieve their goals."

"Short Circuit is an after-school experience with a fresh approach to electronics and physical computing for young people. The Short Circuit Curriculum Guide includes seven informal learning activity modules that encourage students to express their creativity and develop DIY digital media skills by exploring innovative uses for physical and digital materials, like circuits, conductive inks, LEDs and the latest programming languages. Short Circuit Curriculum Guide modules include lesson plans and individualized assessment tools based on programs piloted at Quest to Learn, as well as by the Digital Youth Network and YouMedia programs in Chicago."

"Through his experiences as a leader who has brought about large-scale and substantial change in education reform, Michael has developed what he calls the six secrets of change. A series of insightful, actionable, and concisely communicable lessons, each of the six areas can really make the difference on how you as a leader initiate and deliver successful change. "

"I normally don't like to create "click bait" blog post titles, but this one seemed to fit. Twenty-five resources can be overwhelming, but there is a good mix of different types of items. There are links to websites with lesson plans, iOS apps, books, videos, and samples of student work to fit your learning style.  Scratch was developed by MIT a little over eight years ago. It uses a visual programming language that is easy to start for students of all ages. Teachers can start with the Scratch Jr. app for the iPad. That app, linked on the list.ly below, is designed specifically for 5-7 year olds. The only way to learn new skills, is to dig in and give it a try. I love the summer for this reason. It gives me the chance to keep up and learn something new. I am going to try Minecraft with my daughter, Gwen, after I finish up this blog post. "

" This week I've been collaborating with Year 4 students, and their inspiring classroom teacher and fellow ADE Dan Aivaliotis-Martinez (@martinezgeek). We developed some ideas for teaching and learning that connected Sphero devices with art-making practices - in a nutshell, programming a Sphero ball to move with the coloured light turned on, recording the trail, or 'light painting', photographically. These cross-curricular lessons drew upon elements of the curriculum in science, maths, technology and the arts, as students created 'light paintings'."

HotChalk is a learning environment for K-12 teachers, students and parents that includes a learning management system (LMS), a rich library of teacher-contributed lesson plans, premium digital content like NBC News video, and professional development for teachers in a Web-based environment. Available through any Internet browser, the HotChalk Learning Environment is an easy to use system and brings teachers, students and parents together to improve education.

Welcome to the Planet! Promethean's free online community designed to provide Activclassroom teachers around the world the ability to share new and innovative lessons, access a wide variety of professional development materials, and connect with fellow Activclassroom teachers from around the Planet.

ThinkingGear is for educators who believe that teaching and assessing thinking matters. ThinkingGear aims to provide teachers with the online tools and resources they need to develop and implement thinking-centered lessons and instruction.

Free Media Literacy Curriculum Kits & Lessons Develop critical thinking skills while teaching core historical content with these multimedia media literacy curriculum kits. All print and media materials are downloadable. To order print verisions and DVD's click here.

"he Khan Academy is an online non-profit organization whose goal is to provide a "free world-class education to anyone anywhere." Think of it as TED for everyone, except Khan's videos, resources, and lesson plans can actually help you be one of the TED speakers one day. Currently the Khan Academy is only accessible through a browser, but, John Resig, Dean of Open Source and head of JavaScript development at the non-profit, has shown off a few alpha screenshots of the upcoming Khan Academy iPad app, and it looks awesome"

"Practising mathematics doesn't just help students develop academically, it's also a useful life skill. Here's a collection of lesson ideas and resources to help teachers get started"

"What is 21st century learning? It is collaboration. It is creativity. It is critical thinking and problem-solving. It is research and information literacy. It is digital citizenship. It is responsible use. We expect our children to develop these skills. We integrate these skills in our every day lessons so that our students can grow and expand their knowledge. We create spaces so that our students can create and collaborate, whether it is a physical space or a virtual space. We expect our students to be good digital citizens, using devices, programs, and tools responsibly.  We want our students to ask questions and explore for answers.  We expect our students to learn, grow, and then reflect on that learning. So, wouldn't we expect the same skills for ourselves as educators and professionals?"

"To help fill this gap in K-12 STEM education, Harvey Mudd created its first MOOC for middle and high school teachers. Middle Years Computer Science (MyCS) walks a teacher through the lesson plans, activities and exercises of a curriculum developed to appeal to students with a broad range of interests and no prior CS experience. Schools that have been using it have found it to be easy to use, accessible and engaging for their students. Our second MOOC offering, How Stuff Moves, supports students in their first course in calculus-based physics, a fundamental building block to further physics study in college. The course provides lectures, demonstrations, problem sets, worked solutions to every practice problem and concept tests- a wealth of resources to help students master the material, whether they are considering taking a high school AP physics course or their first mechanics course in college."