Group items tagged

"The iPad is well-known as an amazing creation tool, but with Google Drive's "Open-In" feature on the iOS platform - the iPad has quickly become a collaboration device extraordinaire. Google Drive is best known for apps like Docs and Slides, and these are great platforms for students to work collaboratively on documents and presentations. However, Google Drive has one under-used feature that offers a secret collaborative power . This hidden power of Google Drive sits in the layers of the "i" button."

" Inspired by ideas like project based learning and #20Time, I decided to take a stand against "Google-able questions." Instead of students only finding information and curating content, they needed to create the learning for themselves. Our students live in a world of Web 2.0, social media, and content creation, and I needed to bring this into their learning. And together, we did. Halfway through this school year, I explained that we will no longer produce work that is forgettable and can be left in a backpack. Instead, we will create content that we can be proud of, will remember, and will help each other learn. I wanted to push students to develop more meaningful and diverse skills to prepare them for their futures by creating work that matters to them. To do this, we needed to produce for an audience; all learning was now public to the world. Suddenly, the learning was visible, the technology was more purposeful and complex, and class was more fun. Students' work wasn't hidden in their notebooks, but shared, produced, and even live-streamed, like the argument videos below. "

Teresa Penedo posted this item in the #change11 Facebook group. The one-hour video tells us "most of what we think we know about technology in general is false." According to Andrew Feenberg, "Our error stems from the everyday conception of things as separate from each other and from us. In reality they belong to an interconnected network the nodes of which cannot exist independently qua technologies." This leads to ten 'paradoxes of technology': "1. The paradox of the parts and the whole: The apparent origin of complex wholes lies in their parts but in reality the parts find their origin in the whole to which they belong. 2. The paradox of the obvious: What is most obvious is most hidden. 3. The paradox of the origin: behind everything rational there lies a forgotten history. 4. The paradox of the frame: Efficiency does not explain success, success explains efficiency. 5. The paradox of action: In acting we become the object of action. 6. The paradox of the means: The means are the end. 7. The paradox of complexity: Simplification complicates. 8. The paradox of value and fact: Values are the facts of the future. 9. The democratic paradox: The public is constituted by the technologies that bind it together but in turn it transforms the technologies that constitute it. 10. The paradox of conquest: The victor belongs to the spoils." from Stephen Downes OL Daily

Great image captured in a classroom. Not the closed laptop on the student's desk and the cellphone hidden and in use.

"Great news for Mac users. The Mac OS X can add more options that can help you facilitate your work or just plain use it to do administrative work. For example, organizing files, or just putting in order a bunch of photos. Let's start. The option key right on your keyboard actually can uncover a plethora of hidden little known tricks on Mac OS X. Here are some of the most notable ones."

"Have you recently updated your iPad to iOS 8? Have your students' iPads been updated to iOS 8? If so, Tony Vincent has a great overview of some of the "hidden" features of the iOS 8 that teachers and students will find to be helpful to them. Tony's video is embedded below."

"This year I am working at a new school where all the kids are new Dutch immigrants. That means that they have just arrived in The Netherlands and our biggest job is to teach them Dutch as quickly as possible. We are a 1:1 iPad school and we have seen students benefit greatly from all of the rich-media language learning apps. This blog post however does not focus on the apps, but the features that are built within the iPad. Take some time to explain these features in the iPad's settings to make your students aware of how they can benefit their language learning."

"YouTube is definitely one of the best platforms for searching and accessing  educational video resources. We have already covered several ways teachers can leverage the  power of this platform in instruction. In fact, the strength of YouTube is not only in it being a resource of educational videos but is also a powerful tool for creating and editing videos. Several teachers still overlook some excellent editing features and creative possibilities that YouTube provides. For instance, you can use YouTube editor to create beautiful slideshows and presentations to share in class, or create use it to create a Hangout  and invite students to take part. These and several other hacks are all available right in your YouTube account and if you need help discovering YouTube's hidden gems, this section is a good place to start with."

"There are very few companies or products that actually enter the language as both a noun and a verb. Everyone knows what Google is, and chances are that we've all used it as a verb as well; after all, it's really common to say, "I need to Google something," instead of, "I need to look for something on the Internet." As much as Yahoo, AOL and Bing would love to have their names used in the same way, it simply hasn't happened, and unless something catastrophic happens to Google, it never will."

"Over the last couple of months, Google added several new updates and features to Google Drive the latest of which is the New Google Drive. As you know, Drive is full of tons of hidden gems that allow you to enhance your productivity beyond measures. One of the features I like the most of about Drive is the third party extensions. Some of these add-ons are really wonderful and add way more functionality to Drive. In today's post, I am sharing with you two examples of good extensions to use in Google Drive. "

If you're setting up a worksheet only for yourself, you can simply leave an empty cell for this purpose. To check it, just type in an x or any other character. Then use a formula with the =isblank() function to make the contents of that cell affect the rest of the spreadsheet. But you might want something more mouse-friendly--especially if you're designing a spreadsheet for other people. I've tested the technique below on Excel 2007, 2010, and 2013. I'm not sure about earlier versions. You can insert checkboxes on Excel's Developer tab. Unfortunately, that tab is hidden by default. To make it visible in Excel 2010 or 2013, click the File tab and select Options. ClickCustomize Ribbon. You'll see two lists. Make sure that the one on the right is titled Main Tabs. Check Developer.

"Over the past few months Gmail has witnessed the addition of a lot of interesting features and functionalities that enhanced its overall performance. Gmail also provides several hidden gems to users who are willing to dig a bit deeper and take their email experience to the next level. To help you make the best of Gmail, we have gone through Gmail help documentation and handpicked these wonderful tips for you. These are simple hacks that you can use on your Gmail to increase your productivity and be a Gmail savvy teacher."

"One of the greatest ironies is that mathematics, at its core, relies heavily on a foundation of doubt. So, this self-examination of our collective practices, biases, and neglect, is something that has been come to us by our own pursuit of mathematics."

"You've heard of it before. You're probably curious about what it is. But chances are, you're still on the edge about the whole thing. We're talking about the dark web-the mysterious part of the internet that isn't for everyone. At least, that's what you've probably heard. There are many rumors about what it is and why people go on the dark web. However, it's worth learning a thing or two about it. Who knows, maybe you'll even find some of your new favorite sites there. Stick around and we'll share some of the cool websites we've discovered in the hidden corners of the dark web."