Group items tagged

"We're in the middle of that dreary time of year, when the excitement of the new term has faded away but the Easter holidays are still too far off to contemplate. The days are cold and grey and settling back into the school routine for another year can feel a bit too much like hard work. So there's no better time to inspire your students with the multitude of connections to inspirational stars past and present that are helpfully provided by the internet's obsession with famous quotes!"

"21st century skills is a term that's been bandied about for over a decade now. Loosely, it refers to the creative and technology-based skills students are increasingly required to demonstrate to use information in the real world. While there's plenty of tools, leadership, strategies, and even rhetoric surrounding this discussion, what's there's less of is data."

"At this point, some of you are probably sick of hearing about Minecraft. It has gone from game to phenomenon, selling bajillions of copies and crowding the mindscape of 6th graders everywhere for what seems like centuries. But before you go, there may be some lessons you can takeaway for your classroom-lessons that can help promote the creativity in students you've been looking for."

"Gen i Revolution is an online game designed to help middle school and high school students develop and test their knowledge of concepts in personal finance. Gen i Revolution contains fifteen "missions" in which students have to select "operatives" to assist them. Each mission is designed to help someone make better personal financial decisions. Some of the mission topics include credit, budgeting, and investing for the future. "

"Want to Amplify Student Voice? Write a Book Together"

"It never ceases to impress me how great teachers consistently find new and innovative educational tools to put in their class toolkit. They do it in a multitude of ways - through sound preparation and in-depth knowledge of the subjects they teach; fresh activities and exercises; engaging resources; and creativity - all to inspire a love of learning and encourage students to think and dream big."

"Over the summer, I have been blogging about Redefining Learning in the Mathematics Classroom through the use of individual student blogs. After hearing about the great things going on in Kristen Wideen's classroom and her use of QuadBlogging for creating a Primary Blogging Community, I have been inspired to attempt modifying a similar approach for blogging in mathematics."

"Having been involved with student robotics programs for many years, I feel that robotics just may be the most perfect instructional approach currently available. It offers classroom activities that teach high-value STEM content as well as opportunities to powerfully address ELA Common Core Standards. In fact, there are connections to robotics across the full spectrum of the curriculum. Robotics is also a highly effective way to foster essential work skills like collaboration, problem solving and project management. It does all this while keeping kids so motivated and engaged that getting them to stop working and move on to the rest of the school day can be a challenge -- a good problem to have! "

"Like all teachers I have found that the right visual aids can make all the difference between students understanding a term or walking away shaking their heads. This pattern is carries over to learning new vocabulary words and or seeing the connections between similar words. Here are five visual dictionaries and thesauri that can help your students learn new vocabulary words."

"4 websites for creating student projects"

"Thinking about using Twitter with your students ? The visual below is one of the best guide I have come across online. The graphic is created by Langwitches and provides a cognitive incentive for those reluctant teachers out there to start using social media with their students and particularly Twitter."

"The kindergarten student, a shy, Mandarin-speaking five-year-old immigrant in the tiny community of Sangudo, Alta., had barely spoken a word during the first three months of class. So her teacher was surprised one day last year when the girl struck up a conversation. The subject of their animated discussion? An image on the screen of an iPad. "

"Last year my grade 1 students were uploading videos to their personal blogs and to youtube, tweeting from our classroom Twitter feed, face timing, skyping and participating in Google Hangouts with peers, soon to be teachers, teachers, experts in a certain field, and the class down the hall. We participated in global projects like the Global Read Aloud and created our own global projects. Why?"

"School is a time in a students life where they are learning as much about how to be students and operate successfully in a school as they are about how to read, write, and think. But oftentimes, the demand for pure academic instruction and practice can fly in the face for a student's need-at any age-to play, build, interact, explore, and construct their own learning experience. Issues like these can make mobile technology like tablets a boon to learning, as they can allow individual access to the right app-and the right content, creative opportunity, game, or learning simulation-at the right time. It is the collision of the need for interaction, personalization, creativity, and constant feedback that can make video games powerful tools for learning-and the following 38 games, curated by Sam Gliksman-and excellent place to start. "

"A new study by researchers at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA) shows that students grasp the unimaginable emptiness of space more effectively when they use iPads, rather than traditional classroom methods, to explore 3-D simulations of the universe."

"In this age of social media, edtech, smartphones, tablets and MOOCs, software applications play a larger role than ever in the learning environment. In fact, apps have reached such a level of ubiquity and everyday integration that a number of software companies are turning out apps that can help students create apps of their own. Here's a list of 10 software tools that can jumpstart a student's knowledge and skill in computer programming:"

"My criteria for picking these tools was pretty straightforward, and will not be unfamiliar to a lot of you who may have a similar criteria of your own: It had to be free, or at least offer enough free services to be useful in the classroom It had to be engaging, interactive, and/or instantly appealing to students. It had to be a multi-platform tool that was accessible on as many devices as possible. The slides from the session are below. If you see something you like feel free to share it with someone else who might benefit from using some of these great web tools in their classroom!"

"Most students need all the help they can get when it comes to planning big projects. Here's a list of apps that can help them stay organized when they're working on group presentations, research papers or other big tasks that might take a little extra energy to keep everything together."

"A list of some of the The Best Free Web Tools for Engaging Students in 1:1 Classrooms, as presented at the Iowa 1:1 Conference in April 2014."