Group items tagged

"Many teachers say the app helps them automate the task of recording classroom conduct, as well as allowing them to communicate directly with parents. But some parents, teachers and privacy law scholars say ClassDojo, along with other unproven technologies that record sensitive information about students, is being adopted without sufficiently considering the ramifications for data privacy and fairness, like where and how the data might eventually be used."

From Richard Byrne Free Technology for teacher, quoted below:Listen and Read - Non-fiction Read Along Activities Listen and Read is a set of 54 non-fiction stories from Scholastic for K-2 students. The stories are feature pictures and short passages of text that students can read on their own or have read to them by each story's narrator. The collection of stories is divided into eight categories: social studies, science, plants and flowers, environmental stories, civics and government, animals, American history, and community. Applications for Education Listen and Read looks to be a great resource for social studies lessons and reading practice in general. At the end of each book there is a short review of the new words that students were introduced to in the book. Students can hear these words pronounced as many times as they like. Listen and Read books worked on my computer and on my Android tablet. Scholastic implies that the books also work on iPads and IWBs"

I was recently at Our Lady of the Angels Rouse Hill doing a workshop with them in creating iBooks using iBooks Author.  The Principal Eva La Rocco and the teachers saw the main benefit for the software as a way of students demonstrating their own understanding and knowledge by creating  an iBook that incorporated all their work.  The focus being for the students to create content rather than it being pushed to them via a teacher created iBook textbook.

Launch of the UNESCO ICT Competency Framework for Teachers

Might help create a blended classroom, even when you have to share the blender.  Common sense advise for the real world of underequipped classrooms and stretched thin teachers.

"Top 5 reasons why every teacher or educator should be using the power of Twitter!"

"Today as I was wading through my bookmarks I came across this resource which I have saved awhile ago. This is a chart featuring what its author called 21 things every 21st century teacher should do this year. This chart is created by Sean Junkins based on a blog post by Carl Hooker. I went through the ideas suggested here and thought of providing you with some good web tools to apply to some of these ideas. The tools I am sharing are based on posts I have published in this blog. "

"Write About is a new site co-founded by educator John Spencer (his name may be familiar with readers since I've previously shared his work many times here). His co-founder is Brad Wilson. And they've created what might be the Education Site of 2014. Write About provides many (and I mean many) images with writing prompts. Students can write their response and do an audio recording of it. Teachers can create virtual classrooms and provide individual written feedback to student writing. Student creations can be shared publicly or just with their classmates. Teachers can change prompts or upload their own photos."

English teacher resources created by an English teacher.

"Figuring out which tool is right for the job is something we all struggle with every day. Whether you're a contractor, plumber, or teacher, there's a lot of options to choose from. Teachers managing connected classrooms have it quite rough, though. There's an embarassment of riches when it comes to apps, web tools, and digital services that want to make your life easier. So how do you easily figure out which are the best education apps for connected classrooms, you ask? Great rhetorical question, Jeff!"

"Saturday morning someone asked me why some of my tweets start with a period. I was participating in the New Teacher to Twitter (#nt2t) chat. A twitter chat is an hour long conversation on a particular topic. This means that I am replying quite a bit. When you reply to a tweet it starts the tweet with the @symbol. Twitter assumes that when you are replying that you are talking to that person and not all of your followers. A tweet that starts with the @ symbol does not go to the Twitter stream of your followers. It can still be publicly seen through the hashtag or on your profile, so it is not private, but it does not get as much exposure as a regular tweet does."

"You may already be using video to support your lessons, but have you considered encouraging your students to create them? Student-to-student videos enhance student understanding of a subject as well as student creativity and critical thinking skills. In a recent KQED MindShift article, Katrina Schwartz lauds peer-created videos for their ability to reach struggling students in ways that you as a teacher cannot. No longer are videos a distraction or a tool used only by teachers; videos can create a richer learning experience."

"When used effectively, iPads can develop thinkers and problem solvers. They can be used to transform learning inside and outside of the classroom, and offer limitless opportunities. Many educators are effectively integrating technology in the classroom using iPads to achieve the 4C's, or "super skills," that digital learners need to compete in our global society. But in order to do that, the focus has to shift from apps to content: that's when true redefinition takes place. When my district rolled out our iPad initiative in 2012, teachers thought they needed specific apps for every content area. Eventually, we ended up with literally thousands of apps in our portal. This was extremely overwhelming, difficult to manage, and eventually, a turn-off for teachers. Are you ready to adjust your teaching for this new learning revolution? Let me take you inside the idea of SAMR with a helpful metaphor: Starbucks. The simplest way I know to describe the levels in the SAMR model is using a visual created by Tim Holt, who uses Starbucks as a unique way of looking at the model."

"Innovation… Versatility… Performance… What teacher doesn't want to provide the best technology has to offer for students? But with a plethora of choices, sometimes it's overwhelming trying to determine what device best suits the needs of all learners. So, what should educators choose-the power of a laptop or the compact, lightweight portability of a tablet? Well, it's no longer necessary to settle for one option when the best of both worlds are at your fingertips. Yep, it's true. With the latest and greatest technologies currently available on the market, students now have access to the functionality of a laptop while also having the capability of completing captivating assignments and/or creating meaningful content via a tablet. And better yet: The instruction and learning goals can dictate the type of device being used as opposed to the reverse, which typically occurs in classrooms today. Sounds intriguing, doesn't it? In case you haven't figured it out by now, I'm referring to a super cool technology known as the 2-in-1. Whether your students need to generate a document or spreadsheet, transfer files, read an e-book, capture photos or create media, this hybrid does it all with just one simple twist, click or flip. Not only is this option flexible and convenient, but cost-effective as well because schools no longer need to provide students with more than one device to achieve desired outcomes. It's really all that-and much more!"

"It's not the "norm" today but it should be: Every K-12 classroom teacher needs access to a YouTube channel to publish student work as well as their own videos. The past two years I've used a classroom YouTube channel for my elementary STEM class. Video is a very powerful medium, and Google provides teachers via YouTube with (in the words of Jim Sill) unlimited, high definition, mobile-friendly video hosting for FREE. Consider: Over half the adults in the United States are now equipped with a smartphone capable of viewing YouTube videos. (56% as of June 2013) A year ago (in March 2014) PEW reported 63% of US adults watch online videos."

"This is a must for those teachers use the great benefits that the AppleTV can bring to the classroom. Do you see this intro screen when the Apple TV turns on? Those movies on the top? While a lot of these are the most popular movies playing though it is, they may not be the most appropriate for our students. This happened just today as I was teaching in another classroom, and it was a small distraction during my lesson. Kids were excited to see their favorite movie, in this instance, Big Hero 6. They cheered and became excited. Wild this case was harmless, I can only imagine other cases where movies that are rated PG-13 or higher can cause some concern for teachers of younger students. These can even be a distraction for high schoolers, who will likely veer off topic if they see a movie that they like or dislike."

"One of the things I've struggled with during my tenure in education is how professional development is done in schools, especially around integration of technology. PD is already confined to a couple of weeks in the summer, but then throw on top of that the "sit-and-get" style in which we teach our content, and you can see why most teachers would rather surf Pinterest than learn during these sessions. We preach how "student-centered" we want the classroom to be, yet we spend hours talking at teachers and call this "professional learning." While this isn't unique to technology, I've found that a vast majority of technology training spends 90 percent of our time teaching us about tools, and 10 percent discussing how we could use these tools in the classroom (usually at the end of the workshop, when we are all exhausted)."

"Bloom's Taxonomy's verbs-also know as power verbs or thinking verbs-are extraordinarily powerful instructional planning tools. In fact, next to the concept of backwards-design and power standards, they are likely the most useful tool a teacher-as-learning-designer has access to. Why? They can be used for curriculum mapping, assessment design, lesson planning, personalizing and differentiating learning, and almost any other "thing" a teacher-or student-has to do."