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Online classes may be a relatively young instructional practice for K-12 schools, but experts already generally agree on one point: Research shows that virtual schooling can be as good as, or better than, classes taught in person in brick-and-mortar schools.

Welcome to the 2008 Comment Challenge! Challenging bloggers to become better blog citizens. Challenge runs from May 1 - 31, 2008. Coordinated by Sue Waters, Silvia Tolisano, Michele Martin and Kim Cofino Sponsored by coComment and Edublogs We would like to challenge participants to be better blog citizens tracking who is the commenter with: * The most comments on a wide range of blogs (not just the "top" edubloggers) * The most high quality comments that thoughtfully reflect on the topic * The comments that provoke and promote the most learning

Advancing Excellent Teaching in American Schools Annenberg Media uses media and telecommunications to advance excellent teaching in American schools. This mandate is carried out chiefly by the funding and broad distribution of educational video programs with coordinated Web and print materials for the professional development of K-12 teachers. It is part of The Annenberg Foundation and advances the Foundation's goal of encouraging the development of more effective ways to share ideas and knowledge.

"Transcending beyond a make-believe world, Toontastic, by Launchpad Toys, can be a fully-functioning learning experience for your child, student or class! I have to admit that when we first looked at Toontastic we envisioned one child on a rainy summer day lazily creating a pretend world of their own on their parent's iPad. However, the more we experiment and test out this app for iPads we realize its true potential. Whether you are introducing storyline to your English/Literature students, historical documentary to your Social Studies class just "What I did on my Summer Vacation" you will find that the app brings the children's skills to life. Winner of top awards in their industry, Toontastic offers a simple venue for initiating, coordinating and presenting ideas, thoughts and imagination."

"Camilla Gagliolo got the first inkling there could be some real use for iPads in the classroom when she tried them out initially with students who had learning disabilities. Today, the instructional technology coordinator with Arlington (VA) Public Schools said she thinks the iPad is emerging as a tool that can greatly enhance educational technology after what she believes has been a lull in the field's progress."

"Over the weekend on the FreeTech4Teachers Facebook Page I received a message from a technology integration coordinator who was looking for some apps that might be appropriate for middle school anatomy and physiology lessons. Here's what I pulled out of my archives to share."

"I'm now a little over a month into my new role as the coordinator of our brand-new makerspace in my PS-8th grade school here in Seattle, and I'm honestly loving it every bit as much as I expected! Over the course of this month, 450 students made prototype boats for their stuffies (PK), built "doodle bots" (K and 1),  "hacked" their notebooks with surface-mount LEDs (2), made dioramas powered by Hummingbird Robotics kits (3 and 4), designed and laser cut labels for their new classroom spaces (5), made postcards using the greenscreen of themselves visiting exotic locales (5 French), built casino games for math class (6), and built symbolic representations of their personal core values (8). 7th grade will be building turbine-driven generators next week! And, that's not even a comprehensive list… In the process of collaborating with my colleagues to develop and implement these projects with our students, I've figured out a few tips to pass along to educators at other schools initiating similar programs."

"I didn't think 2015 would be the year I created a teen maker space, but it was-and it turned out to be an exciting, challenging, and rewarding experience. After six months of planning, our maker space at the Public Library of Mount Vernon and Knox County, Ohio, where I am the YA services coordinator, opened last month. How did it come together? Organically. It began during our teen summer reading program seven months ago, when I hosted a few extremely popular Maker Mondays. Our children's librarian, Debbie Baker, and I created a collection of circulating maker-related titles. We also assembled 20 small circulating maker kits with Snap Circuits (kits for creating objects with electronic circuitry), stop-motion animation materials, and LEGO. These were such a hit that a dedicated maker space seemed ideal for us. Ideal-until we considered our budget and space restraints. We started planning anyway. Our process began with a lot of research, online and in person, visiting libraries and maker faires. There was heavy-duty continuing ed: online workshops and webinars, many hosted by School Library Journal. We knew that a maker space would benefit our community, but we couldn't see how to make it happen. With time and goal adjustments, we reached the finish line and launched in January."

"Some makerspace components are so commonly known that I can even use them to explain my job to non-educators: "I'm our makerspace coordinator. You know, the person who supports the kids with 3D printing and basic electronics and stuff like that." Then they know exactly what I mean. (I can tell because they respond with "Wow! That sounds like the best job ever!" They're right!) Educators planning makerspaces know they can start small with simple circuitry materials, cardboard and hot glue guns. Or they can go bigger with soldering capabilities and power drills. Or they can go to the biggest with 3D printers and laser cutters."

"As the coronavirus continues to spread across the country, students are coming into class with misconceptions about the outbreak-and teachers are trying to figure out how best to explain the facts and debunk rumors.   Some teachers have made COVID-19 a focus of their lessons. Discussing the origin and effects of a new virus easily lends itself to science class. But teachers in other subjects-like algebra, statistics, and media literacy-have found ways to address the topic, too.  Designing a lesson around the outbreak could be a helpful way to answer students' questions and calm fears, said Stephen Brock, a professor and coordinator of the school psychology program at California State University, Sacramento.  And if students have misconceptions about the virus or how it spreads, providing more information could help kids more accurately gauge threat, he said. "

"GE Teach Tour is a free tool that you and your students can use to create tours to play in the new web version of Google Earth. To get started head to geteach.com/tour/ then enter a title for your tour. The next step is to give your first placemark a title and to enter a description of the location you're featuring with that placemark. To place your placemarks in your tour you can either manually enter latitude and longitude coordinates or you can click on the map to insert your placemarks. Finally, to add images to your placemarks you will have to link to publicly available images that are in your Google Drive account or on another image hosting service like Flickr (by the way, linking to images found on sites that prevent hotlinking won't work)."

"Peering up, a teacher asked me, "What are we going to use it for?" as I flew our shiny new drone up between the umbrellas on the quad, past the roof of the gym, and into the low scattered clouds. The camera projected back to my iPhone, and I could see the newly planted trees in our quad, the only green for miles in the Mondrian concrete grid that is our local community. The students and teachers in the quad all looked up too, shielding their eyes to see the drone fly. Our custodians pulled up in their cart, and my assistant principal whooped like one of the middle schoolers on my campus. Get the best of Edutopia in your inbox each week. It's my job this year to answer questions like the one above. As a teacher on special assignment currently serving as curriculum coordinator for my school, I get to learn what's coming our way and devise methods of implementation. I specialize in technology and project-based learning, and I began thinking about implementing the drone immediately upon hearing that our district had purchased it. And I'm not the only one thinking about this issue. In the book Drones in Education, the International Society for Technology in Education touts the engagement factor but also sees academic potential in using drones. To guide schools to successfully implement the technology, the book promotes the SOAR model, which stands for Safety (ethics and legal use), Operation (flight and maintenance), Active learning (engagement in problem solving), and Research (practical applications)."

"Few middle schoolers are as clued in to their mathematical strengths and weakness as Moheeb Kaied. Now a seventh grader at Brooklyn's Middle School 442, he can easily rattle off his computational profile. "Let's see," he said one morning this spring. "I can find the area and perimeter of a polygon. I can solve mathematical and real-world problems using a coordinate plane. I still need to get better at dividing multiple-digit numbers, which means I should probably practice that more." Moheeb is part of a new program that is challenging the way teachers and students think about academic accomplishments, and his school is one of hundreds that have done away with traditional letter grades inside their classrooms. At M.S. 442, students are encouraged to focus instead on mastering a set of grade-level skills, like writing a scientific hypothesis or identifying themes in a story, moving to the next set of skills when they have demonstrated that they are ready. In these schools, there is no such thing as a C or a D for a lazily written term paper. There is no failing. The only goal is to learn the material, sooner or later."

"Sandy Welbergen loves geocaching, but especially loves sharing her passion for discovery with her students. She has been teaching for about 15 years and currently instructs grades 5/6 at Beaumont School in Winnipeg, Manitoba, where she uses geography as a lens through which kids can learn about their own communities and understand the local issues that affect them. Outside the classroom, Welbergen has served on the board of the Manitoba Geocaching Association for six years as their training coordinator, and despite stepping aside this year, she is still involved with the community. Recently, she has been helping out the Assiniboine Park Zoo with a big geocachi"

"Student discussion can be a powerful tool, but many students struggle with academic language. This can be helped by providing them with tools such as sentence starters, sentence stems, examples of simple sentences with the correct academic language, and many other strategies. As a previous teacher, I had many students who didn't like to talk out loud, but if I got them by themselves or provided them with a digital alternative, they were more likely to open up a discussion with other students and me. There are two technology tools that can help your students have academic discussions, and these digital tools in coordination with academic language resources can help students use their voice in your classroom."