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Wonderful week of Digital Citzenship ideas

"I recently wrote a post about "Creating and Collecting Digital Work". When my son brought home this really charming and heart-warming hand drawn "about me" book, I instantly wanted him to tell me about each picture. His descriptions were so amusing and charming, I felt inspired and compelled to create a digital artifact of his work… with my iPad."

"The following is an excerpt from the book The App Generation: How Today's Youth Navigate Identity, Intimacy, and Imagination in a Digital World by Howard Gardner and Katie Davis. Let's dive directly into the world of educational apps. Our survey suggests that the majority - one might even say, the vast majority - of educational apps encourage pursuit of the goals and means of traditional education by digital means. They constitute convenient, neat, sometimes even seductive pathways to accomplish what were already goals in an earlier era: mastering concepts, learning arithmetical operations, identifying geographical locations or historical figures or key biological or chemical or physical processes. We could dub them "digital textbooks" or "lectures" or "pre-programmed educational conversations." Decades ago, major behaviorist B. F. Skinner called for teaching machines that would automate the traditional classroom, allow students to proceed at their own rate, provide positive feedback on correct answers, and either repeat a missed item or present that item via another pathway. Those sympathetic to Skinner's brand of psychology and to its associated educational regimen would easily recognize many apps today and would likely nod in approval at their slick, seductive interfaces."

"The third annual Digital Learning Day is on February 5, 2014. We've compiled some useful resources to help you celebrate the day with your class and support digital learners all year long. (Updated 1/2014)"

"Today, February 5th, 2014, is Digital Learning Day. According to its website, the focus of this awareness campaign is "about giving every child the opportunity to learn in a robust digital environment everyday, with the goal of success in college and a career." To celebrate, here are 5 of the best, must-follow #edtech curators on Scoop.it."

""In Google we trust." That may very well be the motto of today's young online users, a demographic group often dubbed the "digital natives" due their apparent tech-savvy. Having been born into a world where personal computers were not a revolution, but merely existed alongside air conditioning, microwaves and other appliances, there has been (a perhaps misguided) perception that the young are more digitally in-tune with the ways of the Web than others. That may not be true, as it turns out. A new study coming out of Northwestern University, discovered that college students have a decided lack of Web savvy, especially when it comes to search engines and the ability to determine the credibility of search results. Apparently, the students favor search engine rankings above all other factors. The only thing that matters is that something is the top search result, not that it's legit. "

"Looks like this mobile learning thing might actually take off, eh? Just as we recently looked specifically at math apps for elementary school students, now we give some love to elementary students (and teachers) who have tablets and want to separate the digital wheat from the digital chaff. The following listly collection from sometimes-TeachThought contributor Sam Gliksman is an excellent starting point for elementary teachers looking for elementary apps for elementary students in the most elementary way possible: a collection of 38 possibilities, all embedded in your favorite blog whose name is a compound word. As usual, Gliksman's experience with iPads in education yields a wonderfully diverse collection of apps, from games to digital media software to math and literacy apps."

"This isn't just for people with traditional careers and family lives. It applies to all families regardless of how busy your schedule or important your job, In her book "The Obamas," author Jodi Kanter highlights the President's commitment to having dinner with his family five times a week. Unfortunately in the hustle and bustle of today's digital world, the art of the family dinner has been drained out of many homes with device interaction replacing face-to-face connection. During a panel discussion hosted by Common Sense Media that focused on raising caring kids in a digital world, Howard Gardner of the Harvard Graduate School of Education shared that many families are not even sure what to do at dinner time if all are free of digital devices. If this applies to your family, don't despair. Below are ideas for dinner time activities for each day of the week. These suggestions should serve as a helpful way to ensure dinner time is a valuable experience for families."

"When we made the decision to equip our students with iPads, either for class use for our younger users or 1:1 for students in the senior school and sixth form, we knew we were unlocking a host of opportunities. Some were easily identified, others have gradually revealed themselves through an iterative process. An illustrative list in no order of priority includes the benefits of instant access to the Internet without the hassle of booking IT rooms; enriched digital communication; a range of handy apps; a virtual multimedia studio; and the creation of our own iBooks and iTunesU resources tailored to the learning needs of our students. What we did not perhaps appreciate was the impact digital devices could have on the physical learning environment. "

"The MindShift Guide to Digital Games and Learning started as a series of blog posts written by Jordan Shapiro with support from the Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop and the Games and Learning Publishing Council. We've brought together what we felt would be the most relevant highlights of Jordan's reporting to create a dynamic, in-depth guide that answers many of the most pressing questions that educators, parents, and life-long learners have raised around using digital games for learning. While we had educators in mind when developing this guide, any lifelong learner can use it to develop a sense of how to navigate the games space in an informed and meaningful way."

"Living a life of perpetual travel is pretty exciting - new destinations, new cultures and new incredible people to meet and hang out with! However, working on the road can get pretty hectic at times. As a digital nomad I have found myself in rather awkward situations a lot - from missed deadlines due to incorrect time zone conversion to a nearly missed plane when I forgot to print out my booking and confused the time (I did catch that plane though!). Being your own boss is equally awesome and hellish. Juggling numerous tasks at once and getting things done super-fast with a terrible wi-fi connection requirea killer organizational skills and zen-like concentration. Try using the next 20 websites and apps to make your life as a digital nomad easier, less stressful and even more exciting!"

"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."

"Curation, as many of you know, is near and dear to my heart. (Heck I even wrote a book on the subject!) And especially now, for teachers, its becoming increasingly important as more and more digital devices begin to enter the classroom. Finding the right apps, videos or other digital resources can be tough. And keeping it all organized can be even tougher. I was excited to learn about appoLearning. This is a great resource where educators can find and share all the digital resources they are curating. All of the resources found there are vetted by other educators so you can trust that what you are search for will be the best of the best. Recently they unveiled Collections. And this is something I am really excited about."

"Yesterday in Yukon, Oklahoma, I led an "iPad Quick Edit Videography" workshop for Storychasers. Workshop participants and I brainstormed, planned, recorded and edited short videos focusing on digital citizenship issues which public photo and video sharing can raise. Our full curriculum from the workshop is available on Google Sites. I edited a video with some of these clips and published it to YouTube with the title, "Avoiding Digital Disasters: Video Is the New Pen." The statement, "video is the new pen," comes from Richard Wells' outstanding post from earlier this week on iPad 4 Schools, "The "One iPad" Classroom.""

"SeeSaw, a powerful and popular iPad app for creating digital portfolios, is now available as a Chrome web app and as an Android app. The new apps allow students to create and add content to digital portfolios. Through SeeSaw students can add artifacts to their portfolios by taking pictures of their work (in the case of a worksheet or other physical item), by writing about what they've learned, or by uploading a short video about things they have learned. The SeeSaw apps students can add voice comments to their pictures to clarify what their pictures document. Students can create folders withing their accounts to organize content from multiple subject areas."

There's no doubt that the experience of reading online is different than reading in print, but does it affect comprehension? While several studies have found student comprehension and retention are lower on digital devices, could it be that students just need to learn the right tools to enhance their digital reading? Maria Konnikova explores the research and theories behind reading in her New Yorker column.

"Using games to teach can increase student engagement and add meaning to learning. Hands-on apps give children the ability to mix tactile play with a digital experience. Thanks to augmented reality, more and more apps in the market blur the line between digital and analog. For example, Bloxels, new from Pixel Press, uses color-coded blocks that can be scanned in with an iPad camera to create a video game level. Osmo is another digital/analog blend. The kit includes a stand and a reflector for an iPad camera, enabling users to play with physical tangram puzzles or word games."

"Safe Digital Social Networking (DSN) -or- Proactive Approaches to Address Cyberbullying and Digital Social Networking"

How to make a digital story