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"I didn't know they could think!" an excited high school principal blurted out. The principal was reacting to what he had just witnessed: his 9th grade students engaging in their first-ever Socratic Seminar, facilitated by my colleague and wife Denise a few years ago in a Louisiana district. It was a poignant moment (even though the students might have taken offense), since their chatter and body language made clear that they, too, were pleased with what they had done.

"Women have long been underrepresented among undergraduates in computer science and engineering for a complex variety of reasons. A new study by University of Washington researchers identifies a main culprit for that disparity: inaccurate stereotypes depicting computer scientists and engineers as geeky, brilliant and socially awkward males. And they say broadening those stereotypes is key to attracting more girls to the two fields."

"Many times I post articles on creation-based tasks for teachers and students. This morning I would like to share a story about a Westlake High School student that saw an educational need and began creating content FOR the iPad. And this is where our story begins…."

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"Districts in Indiana have created innovative alternatives to textbooks, thanks in part to a change in state policy.

"4). Stop thinking it's your school or district's responsibility to provide professional development learning opportunities. We all expect our kids to be self-autonomous learners who take some ownership of their learning; educators should be no different considering all the avenues and paths that exist."

"When smartphones first became popular, the struggle was to shrink Internet Explorer to the size of a playing card. The internet browser was the de facto app installed on every computer-it allowed you to browse the web. For many, the web browser is a computer. (See Google Chromebooks.) It quickly became clear that squeezing desktop actions on handheld technology was backwards. Mobile-first thinking changed things. Facebook became mobile-first-which meant that it's designed to not just be accessed on your phone, but work better on your phone. Websites are often now responsive, scaling to the size of your screen. But more importantly, the software and the hardware are increasingly parallel, with apps working together-iOS's Neato feeding Evernote, for example, location-based alerts, smarter notifications, simpler multitasking, improved voice recognition, fingerprint sensors, predictive notifications based on usage, and more. Today, mobile technology is awful for ambitious word processing, but for everything else it's pretty incredible. Have you seen apps like Brainfeed? A library of engaging content!"

"All the furniture in the world won't matter if there's not real change in the learning environment, the opportunities for kids, and the style of inquiry offered…"

"As academic standards shift, technology evolves, and student habits change, schools are being forced to consider new ways of framing curriculum and engaging students in the classroom, and project-based learning is among the most successful and powerful of these possibilities. Of course, content knowledge matters. It's hard to be creative with ideas you don't understand. Academics and their 'content'-organized in the form of 'content areas' like literature, math, and science-are timeless indexes of the way we have come to understand the world around us through stories, patterns, numbers, measurements, and empirical data. The idea here, though, is that we (i.e., the field of public education) have become distracted with academics. Knowledge is only useful insofar as students tend to use that knowledge as they grow into adults that live through doing so. Studying philosophy or physics or poetry but not living through them-that's the difference between knowledge and academics."

"APP GROUPS Create app groups that consolidate up to 20 apps into one convenient group. (Works just like a folder) Tap and hold an app. Once you see the icons start jiggling, move the app on top of another app. Name your group whatever you would like and place up to 20 apps within it. BOOKMARK FAVORITE WEBSITES TO THE HOME PAGEWhile on the Internet, (using Safari) load up your favorite websites. Tap on the box with an arrow in it, alongside the URL Bar. Select "Add to Home Screen" and give each site a short name so it doesn't abbreviate itself. CAPS LOCK Double tap the shift key for caps lock. Tap once to turn it off. CHANGE NOTES FONT The default in notes looks like comic sans, which I detest. Go to Notes in Settings and choose from three fonts. CREATE A TOUGHER PASSWORD"

"Math gets all the love-at least that appears to be the case in the edtech world. But applications of automated essay scoring have been growing steadily for 15 years. The shift to digital instructional materials, preparations for state online assessment, and a new crop of writing apps is adding new energy to digital ELA."

"One of the great things I've noticed in the last 2 years is how my teaching has evolved with the use of the iPads. It's been a gradual shift, but the way I am using them now is different than the first pilot year in 2011."

"A major shift in the force of education has emerged as teachers have become self-directed, independent designers of their own learning. Embracing social media, blogging, and learning from one another in digital spaces, they have forged a new era of professional development that is changing classrooms from the ground up. Simultaneously, and perhaps because of their online interactions, teachers also have begun to re-energize the professional learning in their brick-and-mortar professional spaces."

""It is not about instruction or technology. It is about the learner owning and driving their learning." Barbara Bray / Kathleen McClaskey"