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"If you're embarking on a video project, perhaps an explainer video, podcast, school project or video presentation, using the right production music can be the key to successfully drawing your viewers in; but finding the perfect song can seem a daunting task. Of course you could commission a track to be composed especially for you, but that can run into tens of thousands of dollars. Luckily, there are plenty of places available for you to find free music for your video project, but where can you get it from and how do you know if you have the legal right to use it for your project? Using copyrighted material in your video may seem like an easy mistake to make, but it's illegal and can get you into a lot of trouble. So how do you make sure that your choice of track is acceptable to use in your video?"

"There's a certain class of mistakes that all educators can eliminate with conscious effort, and in this post we outline 11 of them. They range from habits of practice to habits of thought, but all of them have one important thing in common: they make your job harder."

"I have always believed that teachers (and people in general) MUST have an open midset; one that tolerates and celebrates mistakes and errors; one that looks at failure as an opportunity for a better beginning. It is through falling down that we stand up robust and it is through misfortunes that we gather our strength to live the life we want and pursue our dreams. If we want to raise up socially and  emotionally strong students who can face up and overcome  the hardships of life, an important key in this is to teach (and model) them about failure. We need to show them that failure is a healthy sign and a good omen for a healthy life experience. They need to view failure as an attempt for deep reflection and meditation about what work or did not work. They also need to be reminded that failure has been a common denominator behind most of the historical achievements and invention in the history of humankind."

"Blended learning is one of the most important learning trends happening in today's classrooms. It's not always called 'blended learning' but make no mistake. It's happening. That's because blended learning is one of the driving forces of educational change right now. It's a big way schools are integrating education technology, trying out new learning techniques, rewriting curricula, and more. In order to sound like you know what you're talking about, it might be useful to take a look at this visual guide to blended learning. It's a step-by-step guide that tells you the what, why, and how of everything blended."

" I have incredible students who love to explore, create and design.  I've spent a lot of time watching them do this and have been trying to find ways to make our new curriculum fit with their passions, instead of in spite of their passions.  So this week we began to explore design challenges. The challenges themselves are quite simple but the beauty of them is that they are using tools my students love to learn with, they were co-created with the students, and the criteria for success was determined by the students.  I provided the opportunity for them to learn this way, but they came up with the purpose.  Along the way they learned that they have to collaborate to be successful. That sometimes, even with the best laid out plans, that they aren't successful. That mistakes just lead to new learning. That perseverance is a skill, and some of us need to work hard to have some, and for some of us it comes naturally.  But above all they learned, once again, that learning is and can be student centered and fun! So what exactly were our challenges this week? The first was "The Contraption Lab""

"It's easy to promote positive thinking and a can-do attitude in your classroom with these growth mindset posters. Each poster has an awesome message, reminding your students that mistakes are OK and hard work pays off. These posters are perfect for your school hallways or classroom. "

"Evaluating a student's understanding of a topic is like taking a measurement. However, it requires measuring something that is difficult to see. It's not like I can stick a ruler into a student's brain to determine the size of their physics stuff. Now, most teachers use indirect means, usually a multiple-choice test or an exam in which students work through a problem. These are poor measures of student understanding. Someone could simply guess, or flub the answer through a silly mistake. So how can I accurately assess a student's understanding of physics? Until someone invents a way of reading a student's mind, I must do something else. I use a combination of written tests and video assessments."

"One easy way to help children develop a growth mindset is to introduce them to books which promote persistence, love of learning, learning from mistakes and other key growth mindset ideas. Here's a list of our favorite and most popular books which do just that. "

"Having a growth mindset allows you to believe that you can improve and change with practice and determination. With a growth mindset, you view challenges with excitement and look forward to the opportunity to overcome them because you know you will get something out of the process and learn from your mistakes. Those with a fixed mindset, who believe their traits, talents, and abilities are permanent and cannot be improved, are less likely to enjoy as much success in school, work, and life in general. When teachers foster a growth mindset in the classroom, it helps students understand their full potential. Teachers with a growth mindset teach their students that intelligence is moldable and expandable, which keeps students inspired to learn, even if they are facing failure."

Sir Ken Robinson's views on creativity are abundantly well documented. In his 2006 TED Talk-still the most-watched of all time-he claimed that "we are educating people out of their creative capacities" and charged the current education system with being too rigid in adhering to traditional academic subjects. Kids, he argued, need time to dance, draw, create and find what they're good at. But he hasn't given up on schools or education-far from it, in fact. For his follow-up act, Robinson is releasing a new book for parents on how to raise capable children who thrive in school. Make no mistake, though, he's still shaking up the system (and redefining what that actually means).

The dangers of making learning so safe and so easy it lacks any real sense of challenge. When we do this we deny our learners the opportunities they need to learn from mistakes and grow their minds. 

"Anxious, overconfident, curious, indifferent, angry, amused, lonely, hopeful, embarrassed, empowered, afraid, excited, diminished-teachers have seen all these emotions emerge from students as they engage with classroom content. Emotional responses to lessons often go through students' minds before they even begin to think about the material: This stuff is stupid/awesome/beyond me. I'm not comfortable with this. Finally, something I'm good at. Maybe somebody will notice I can't read. Let's see her find a mistake in that one-it's perfect. Does the teacher know I didn't study this last night? Some of us deny this reality and claim we aren't trained to guide children's emotional health. We think our purpose is to teach content and skills only, not to deal with the touchy-feely stuff. This attitude turns a blind eye to the developmental nature of the students we serve, and it runs afoul of how minds learn. Unless we're the most severe of sociopaths, we all have emotional responses that affect what we do. Adding to the messiness, our individual perspectives and experiences may put us out of sync with others' emotional states, even as the institutional nature of schools demands emotional synchronicity. The resulting miscommunication, blame, anxiety, and frustration are not the best ingredients for a good day at school. Teachers who deny the emotional elements of teaching and learning can become exhausted from ceaseless confrontations with students' emotional states, often blaming their personal stress and students' failure to learn on students' lack of motivation or maturity. They grow disconnected from students, creating an almost adversarial relationship with them: I need to get them to shape up. It's them or me. These students are hopeless; why should I bother? It's the parents who created this situation. This attitude can bleed into daily interactions with students and colleagues. It doesn't have to be this way. We can develop constructive responses to our own

"A Makerspace is a place where kids can explore, create, make mistakes, and learn. It is a place of crafting, technology, inquiry, and challenge.  There is no ONE way to run a Makerspace: ​Design one that works for your school, your budget, and your students! "

"I agree with Brene Brown about developing "shame resilience" and have found the usual tug of war between with teaching and mistake making diminishes when we introduce students to a mindset in which they appreciate the importance of recognizing our errors and strive for constant improvement. When I think about design thinking, I believe it could be a powerful way for students to experience their vulnerability and develop perspective taking, all the while creating real cool stuff-whether it is a piece of writing, a t-shirt, a rollercoaster, an app or, in my Early Year's classroom, a garden. They learn how to fail forward and create another prototype. This design sprint is not a destructive but constructive element because, although they spent a lot of time developing their idea, the focus shifts from the product itself to the user-who will reap the benefits of this redesign. It gets the kids to detach from what they are making to who they are making it for. This nuance has a relatively big impact on the process of improvement."

"Why is it that some people seem to make constant progress in their professional and personal lives, while others appear to be doomed to repeat the same mistakes over and over? While the answer isn't cut and dry, I've noticed an interesting mindset difference between these two groups: they approach obstacles and challenges very differently. The first group approaches life with an open mind-an eagerness to learn and a willingness to be wrong. The second group digs their heels in at the first sign of disagreement and would rather die than be wrong. The way each group approaches obstacles, it turns out, defines much of what separates them."

"AS A PHYSICS professor, I have two jobs. The first, obviously, is to help students understand physics. That makes me something of a coach. But I want to talk about my second job: evaluating what students understand about physics. You might call this grading them. Evaluating a student's understanding of a topic is like taking a measurement. However, it requires measuring something that is difficult to see. It's not like I can stick a ruler into a student's brain to determine the size of their physics stuff. Now, most teachers use indirect means, usually a multiple-choice test or an exam in which students work through a problem. These are poor measures of student understanding. Someone could simply guess, or flub the answer through a silly mistake. So how can I accurately assess a student's understanding of physics? Until someone invents a way of reading a student's mind, I must do something else. I use a combination of written tests and video assessments."