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"It used to be so easy to distinguish between truth and fiction. In previous years, I would focus on just teaching my students the difference between fact and opinion. Now the Internet has become a murky river of information, and buzzwords like "fake news" and "alternative facts" have become real concerns of an educated society. How do we teach our students to discern all these differences in this post-truth era?"

"A couple of weeks ago TED-Ed released a video about spotting misleading headlines. I quickly added that lesson to my list of resources for helping students become discerning news consumers. This week TED-Ed released another video that I'm adding to that list of resources."

"After a year or two of tinkering and experimenting with apps for teaching / learing Geography, I have (finally) compiled this list of what I deem to be the most useful iPad apps for teaching Geography. I have not rated any of them, or offered any kind of review. I have merely inserted a screenshot or two and a link to the App Store. The discerning down-loader is urged to consult the ratings and reviews for each of these before buying and downloading them. I like them, and I am sure that you and your students will too."

"The Education category of the App Store features an overwhelming number of apps, great for both parents and teachers. Each subject search displays a diverse and colorful selection of apps to cover just about anything you'll be adding to your digital curriculum. However, with so many choices, it's hard to discern a download-worthy app from the next. (A simple search for math apps yielded well over 200 results.) Here is a list of educational iPad apps by subject matter that you may not have heard of before, but are certainly worth a look."

"I have owned an iPad for quite some time now, and found it to be an excellent tool for both amateur photographers like myself and professionals alike. Sure, an iPad will never be able to replace a computer for serious photo editing (well, for me, anyway,) but I feel that it has definitely earned a place in the discerning photographers kit bag."

"There are plenty of teachers and other educators who make a difference in a child's life. In an adult's life. In the lives of many. But there is a key characteristic of a great teacher that makes them someone who truly changes the lives of many. Is it the ability to discern what it'll take to get a student to unlock his or her learning potential? Is it the ability to successfully integrate education technology?"

"Michelle Joyce doesn't shy away from politicized science topics such as climate change. In fact, she works to equip seniors at Palmetto Ridge High School in Naples, Florida with the skills to accurately evaluate those topics on their own. Along with teaching chemistry and physics, she offers a class called "thinking skills" where students solve logic and math puzzles while also enhancing their media literacy. Students go beyond just learning about legitimate sources of information on the internet and delve into just how the information is put together in the first place. But teaching students those critical thinking skills only as they're about to depart for college can be too little too late. "It's a really hard thing to teach within the space of everything else that you need to teach in a classroom," Joyce said. "It's crucial that we teach it as early as we can." The internet has no shortage of dubious information; and the ability to evaluate health and science claims is a subset of media literacy. With the abundance of health/science content students may only see via social media, kids are ill-equipped to discern hype from real science."

"n this technology-immersed world, students need to know how to navigate the digital environment safely. From discerning real news from propaganda to managing their reputation online, so much of their future is dependent on possessing digital literacy skills. Teachers have to step up to the plate and integrate digital literacy into the curriculum and model it through their actions. In this article, we will discuss 10 ways that digital age teachers model digital literacy and leadership."

"People of all ages struggle to evaluate the integrity of the digital information that rains down with every web search and social media scroll. When the Stanford History Education Group released findings showing that most students couldn't tell sponsored ads from real articles, among other miscues, it intensified the scramble for tools and strategies to help students discern better. But a more recent study by Stanford's Sam Wineburg and Sarah McGrew suggests that many of the techniques that students and teachers employ - which include checklists and other practices most recommended for digital literacy - are often misleading. A better solution for navigating our cluttered online environment, they say, can be found in the practices of professional fact-checkers. Their approach, which harnesses the power of the web to determine trustworthiness, is more likely to expose dubious information. The following guidelines for interrogating online information, inspired by the fact-checkers' techniques, will increase students' odds of determining unreliable sources (and consuming reliable ones)."

Compare, contrast and find the difference between any two things!

Compare, contrast and find the difference between any two things!