Group items tagged

"On Saturday, two hard-working AASL committees presented juried lists of resources. While I try my best to keep up with this stuff, these two darn committees just filled my summer with new explorations. I take that back.  They've actually significantly narrowed the field by pointing to the learning tools most worthy of exploring and integrating next school year, along with standards alignment and tips for use."

"If you frequently purchase apps and games on your iPhone or iPad, you may find yourself running out of space or cluttering up your Home screen with icons you barely launch anymore. Most people say they don't delete apps and games in fear of not being able to get them back. Luckily, thanks to iTunes in the Cloud, part of iCloud, you can easily re-download any apps or games you previously purchased whenever you'd like at no additional cost to you."

"It's a familiar classroom ritual - every June, teachers assign summer reading. And every September, students come back to school having read too few books. This is frustrating for teachers, and challenging for students. When kids aren't in school, they forget crucial skills they learned during the year - at least a month of reading achievement, on average. This so-called "summer slide" is particularly pernicious in children from low-income families. Low-income students often walk through the door of their kindergartens already behind their more fortunate peers because of a mix of poverty, poorer health, less parental education, and higher rates of single and teenage parents. With limited access to books and other academic opportunities in the summer, these children experience the summer slide threefold. Over time, this adds up. By third grade, children who can't read at their grade level (a whopping 73 percent of students eligible for free or reduced-price lunch) begin to struggle with other subjects. Students living in poverty who cannot read proficiently by third grade are 13 times less likely to graduate from high school. By ninth grade, some have estimated that two-thirds of the reading achievement gap can be explained by unequal access to summer learning opportunities. There is good news: Stemming the summer slide isn't impossible. Students who read just four to six books over the summer maintain their skills (they need to turn more pages to actually become better readers.)"

"As part of our Back-to-School series, we are sharing chapters and excerpts from the Makerspace Playbook: School Edition. Today, an excerpt from Chapter 9, Startup: tips for funding your Makerspace. One idea not shared in the playbook that has come up time and again is having a Make Sale, where you sell some of the items made in the Makerspace. Hillel Posner's students make cutting boards and necklaces in their woodworking class. Casey Shea at Analy High School recoups some of the high cost of buying and maintaining the school's laser cutter with an annual yearbook-engraving fundraiser. What have you done in your school to raise money to Make? On to our excerpt: Your Makerspace may not need much of a budget to operate, if you have a space you can use for free, tools to borrow, and materials found or donated. For some Makerspaces, the ones with lots of parental involvement, many of the projects are self-funded. But if your Makerspace takes place at a school without as much family support, or if you simply do not have this all in place, you may need to research community or family foundation grants to fill in the gap. It's possible there could be city or other government agency grants available to get your Makerspace what it needs. Sometimes you can find the funding with a "planning grant." If you are partnering with a non-profit, get advice from the fundraising staff who may be able to suggest the right foundations to approach. Ask around. Online tools like Kickstarter and Indiegogo might help you conduct pointed fundraising campaigns towards a specific goal. There are many sites like this - search on "crowdfunding" for more suggestions. While it's not a Makerspace, we know that the Rhode Island Mini Maker Faire used this tactic to launch a Maker Faire. Maybe it could work for a Makerspace too."

"TeachThought is officially ten weeks old (yay us!), and to celebrate that incredible milestone (which is also the same as the gestation period of the North American Box Turtle), we're putting together posts that reflect back on that time, while also acting as a kind of curation tool for some of the content you have found most helpful. With that, below are ten of our most popular iPad posts, in no certain order, because, well, we don't play favorites around here (even if you do). And if you suspect there might be a follow up post with ten more, you might be on to something."

"I will be teaching a free online master class via EducationCloset.com on WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 13TH at 7 EST (which is 6pm for us in the Chicago area). I will be using only one free app: Sketchbook Express to quickly demonstrate how to make these 8 art lessons. Download the app and create along with me. Don't worry, it will be recorded so you can go back at your own pace and try them all again. Sign up for the class here: http://educationcloset.com/master-class/"

"I spend a great deal of time looking up stuff. Whether that stuff is blog posts to get a pulse on what is happening in the edusphere or researching new tools to share with teachers, I come across a wide variety of resources that I need to save, catalog and be able to come back to later. Curation is a large part of my day. Wait. What is curation anyway? Think about it in terms of a museum curator. Their job is to tell a story with artifacts. They scour the globe looking for just the right piece to help convey a message. We have to do the same with the resources we gather. For educators and students, curation is a 3-part process. Gathering Resources Organizing Resources Sharing Resources"

"LEGO Bricks are toys. They're items that students willingly seek out to play with and get excited to receive as gifts under the Christmas tree. That's one of the things that make them so useful to teachers. Lessons taught using LEGO Bricks don't feel like dull schoolwork. On the contrary, students might feel like they're getting away with something. They actually get to play with LEGO Bricks in class? The idea that students can learn something valuable from play isn't new, or even controversial. A sizeable body of research has been conducted to back up what many teachers already knew to be true.  Fun and learning don't have to be mutually exclusive, and it really works better for everyone involved when they're not. As such, making LEGO Bricks part of your lesson plan can help you teach concepts that students might otherwise find tedious, in a way that doesn't feel like work to them. Many educators have already been putting this idea to the test with success. Here are a few ideas to get you started."

"It really all started with the 20+ iPads we loan out to educators. Those suckers are constantly in demand and constantly in need of charging. They're each firmly encased in Fintie Kiddie cases, which, laugh all you want, those things can stop a bullet. And they stand up. And they recline, have carrying handles and come in neon colors, perfect for locating 20+ loaned out units during the chaos of an event, but that's a whole other blog post. Anyway, we've been loaning these iPads out in tote bags, and just tossing the chargers in higgledy-piggledy. Mainly because if you have done any shopping around for charging carts you likely have needed to be resuscitated at least twice when looking at the prices. The cheapest we could find that works with our beloved Fintie cases started at $399.00, and there was no guarantee everything would fit. We've borrowed another department's iPad charging tray a couple times, but a) it cost them closer to $1,000.00, b) weighed close to 25 lbs and c) had no wheels, thus entailing that their tech guy** lug it four blocks each way. The thing about the Fintie cases is that part of their magic durability is that they surround the iPad in thick molded foam rubber - perfect for tossing in bags and bike panniers (guilty!) but problematic for trying to buy a pre-made charging cart, as the slots in those are generally cut for slimmer, uncased iPads. Plus can we get back to the whole cost thing? Are school districts really running around with so much cash? I know I'm not. And thus, with no more rambling, I present: How to Build Your Own iPad Charging Cart Out of Office Supplies"

"Twelve years after landing my first teaching job, I was invited to interview for a position in a nearby school. Job interviews had been in my rearview mirror for so long that I wasn't sure what to expect. But it didn't matter; I had a job already, and this changed my perspective completely on this one. I decided that I was going to ask the interviewers a few questions of my own. Principals routinely end job interviews by asking candidates if they have any questions. Most teachers struggle with this. Many will simply say, No, or ask when they can expect a decision. Some ask questions they believe will be endearing; things like, "Are there committees I can join?" or "Can I get into my room early?" I realized in the last job interview I ever had that my questions were the most important ones, and the last thing I was concerned with was sucking up to the principals. After all, in a way, I was interviewing them. Walking back to my car that day, I knew I wouldn't take the job if they offered it to me, because they struggled to answer the questions I asked to my satisfaction."

"Thankfully, the design community and teachers such as Jane Hewitt are doing their best to provide alternatives to the cheesy and the costly - stylish and high-resolution stock photos that are completely free to do what you like with. Gone are the days of doing a quick Google Image search and cut and pasting an image without really considering who it belongs to. On the back of our post on digital citizenship, we've been meaning to write this as a follow-up. What good is an encouragement to cite your sources, respect copyright and give credit where it's due without any help to do so? Here, then, is your help… Half-decent stock photos are not always easy to locate, but here are the best we've found. What's great about this list is that for the vast majority, you don't need to include attribution - the photographer has provided them for you to do what you like with - whether that be the background for your TED talk (!), a story-starter for your English lesson or for your students to use in their project work."

"My all time education hero, Sir Ken Robinson has been discussing the lack of creativity and that standardized does not fit all students. We were remiss back in 2012 when we did not mention him in our blog Apps to Foster More Creativity in the Classroom!  We made up for it by writing about him numerous times since, and in 2014 I had the honor of seeing, hearing and writing about him Live from ASCD 2014. He has been writing and speaking about the sad state of the fact that we are still running our schools under the Industrial Age, and our students have been educated on the standard of routine testing, using the multiple choice test model. With all the opting out going on in 2015 I would think that by know some of the administrators and government leaders would have come across his wonderful TED Talks and realized he has it all completely right. When I read this Commentary Q & A from Education Week - Sir Ken Robinson, I wanted to once again give him a shout out as he urges us all to start thinking of the future of our children's children."

Today was Dr. Davey's first Maker Day, and an amazing one at that! Here's a look at our day. All of the Grade 1-Grade 7 students participated in today's Maker Day. Students attended two of seven different sessions based on their interests: Minecraft/Coding, Collaborative Art, Beautiful Junk, Positive Graffiti, Making Music, Lego/Blocks, and Egg Drop. Staff members paired up together to facilitate the learning at each of the sessions, and the students directed most of the learning based on their interests. I (Aviva) worked with an amazing Grade 4 student that led the Minecraft/Coding session, and even worked with small groups of students on coding the Arduino. It was really quite incredible! After two sessions, students reflected on the day and on their learning, and then extended the "Maker Learning" back in the classroom. Today was all about the Learning Skills, problem solving, creativity and critical thinking. As you can hear in our video reflection, there were also links to our classroom learning including Science (Structures) and Math (shapes, figures, and non-standard measurement). There was also a lot of Arts learning today (with creating music and creating works of art including the elements of design). What an amazing day!"

Immersing myself in a book or a lengthy article used to be easy. My mind would get caught up in the narrative or the turns of the argument, and I'd spend hours strolling through long stretches of prose. That's rarely the case anymore. Now my concentration often starts to drift after two or three pages. I get fidgety, lose the thread, begin looking for something else to do. I feel as if I'm always dragging my wayward brain back to the text. The deep reading that used to come naturally has become a struggle."

"debate historical Supreme Court cases by advancing arguments and backing them up with supports."

"Flixtime - Make an amazing 60-second video - free Flixtime turns your photos and videos into stunning and unique videos in just minutes! Sign-up for a free account, and upload your images, videos and music. Then, sit back and watch your masterpiece come together!"

"Pushing students to go beyond what they think they can do is at the core of good teaching. This Teaching Channel video follows students and educators at Springfield Renaissance School, part of the Expeditionary Learning network. Students at the school understand that struggling with a particular task is part of learning. Teachers have high expectations of students, expect a positive classroom culture and are willing to gently prod students to dig deeper and reveal more. Teachers embed Common Core standards like the ability to use textual evidence to back up arguments, into the culture of class. They also understand that the love of learning takes ownership and self-awareness."

"A few years back (Wow! We can't believe Edudemic has even been around that long!) we wrote about an awesome video that was recorded by a classroom of students and their iPads. The song was such a huge success that it went up for sale on iTunes! Considering that when I was a kid, music class included me banging randomly on a wooden block with a small mallet, I think it is fair to say that technology has brought music class a long, long way. Store Van Music embarked on a tour of schools in the UK and help the students create outstanding music using iPads and their minds."