"The following TEDTalk by Rita Pierson reminds us of why we all got involved in teaching to begin with. While curriculum, assessment, and instructional design may be how you parse your thinking now, at one point it probably had more to do with content, curiosity, and relationships. In this talk, the 40-year veteran teacher reminds us that not only do relationships matters, sometimes they're all that matters."

"Last Friday, we mentioned how Google's artificial intelligence software DeepMind has the ability to teach itself many things. It can teach itself how to walk, jump and run. Even take professional pictures. Or defeat the world's best player of the Chinese strategy game, Go. The science of teaching computers how to do things is called Deep Learning. And you can now immerse yourself in this world by taking a free, 3-month course on Deep Learning itself. Offered through Udacity, the course is taught by Vincent Vanhoucke, the technical lead in Google's Brain team."

"Today's post is on the new Google Forms' guide we published a few months ago. The guide, which is based on instructions and insights from Docs Help center, walks teachers through the process of setting up, editing and sharing forms using the new Google Forms platform. More specifically, the visual covers the following how-tos:"

"Google Scholar is one of the top academic search engines out there. It provides research community with a host of useful features that facilitate their work and enhance their productivity. We have extensively covered Google Scholar in our previous posts and we have an entire section dedicated to everything teachers and student researchers need to know to tap into the educational potential of this platform. In today's post, we are sharing with you an infographic we created a few months ago that turned into one of the most popular posts of 2016. The visual features 6 important tips to smartly use Google Scholar. These are:"

"As the 2017/2018 school year approaches, it would be good to know about a couple of documents/frameworks that will be influencing the ways we teach with, learn with and support our classroom educator and coach partners."

"News has evolved, and how you read it needs to evolve too. It's not about going to one site any more. It's also not about reading through social networks. Reading the news today isn't as simple as it used to be. There is an information overload that you need to counter. Plenty of sites have their own biases that you have to manoeuvre. And lots of smaller news outlets have the most interesting articles. The 5 Best News Curation Apps to Fight Information Overload The 5 Best News Curation Apps to Fight Information Overload You've got so much vying for your attention -- news articles, Reddit posts, tweets, Facebook posts -- but what if you could get it all curated in one place? READ MORE So change how you read news: take small bites, track a single subject, or read the most trending articles. These sites and apps will give you an interesting way to consume news."

"This course is targeted to middle school grades 6-8 (ages 11-14 years). It is also written for teachers who may not have a Computer Science background, or who may be teaching an "Intro to Computer Science" course for the first time. This course takes approximately 14 weeks to complete, spending about 1 week on each of the first 11 lessons, and 3 weeks for students to complete the final project at the end. Of course, teachers should feel free to customize the curriculum to meet individual school or district resources and timeframe."

"Today's workforce, as nearly everyone knows, is increasingly global. And with that global nature comes fierce competition-students will need an arsenal of workforce skills in order to stand out from their peers. According to a recent McGraw-Hill Education survey, just 40 percent of college seniors said they felt their college experience was helpful in preparing for a career. Alarmingly, that percentage plummeted to 19 percent for women answering the same question. That same survey also found that students in STEM majors were the most likely out of any group to report that they are optimistic about their career prospects (73 percent). According to data from the nonprofit Institute for the Future, there are 6 drivers of change in today's workforce:"

"Connecting STEM and the arts is an increasingly popular method of teaching as the STEAM movement gains momentum. It's easy to recognize the benefits students will enjoy when educators teach STEM through music. After examining the required curriculum for the year, incorporate music into lesson plans to engage more students and expand their STEM repertoire. "

"Before you begin your meditation, find a quiet space to walk. It could be outdoors, or in a hallway, or even a large room, walking back and forth. Walking meditation can be a formal practice, like watching the breath. Or it can be informal, bringing awareness to this everyday activity, whenever you need to travel from point A to point B. Walking meditation gives us an opportunity to gather our awareness which so often becomes distracted or even stuck when the mind is left to its own devices. Whether moving between floors of a building, on a city street, or in the woods, it is an opportunity to guide ourselves out of the distracted autopilot we live in throughout so much of our day. Paying attention in this way, we stay safe by remaining fully aware of whatever is around. On any walk, hike, run, or other physical activity, without effort we may mentally check out-or we can practice awareness instead."

"Eating healthy and staying fit can be a challenge. You want to eat right without sacrificing deliciousness or spending a fortune. You want to stay motivated to exercise and stay in shape. Save The good news is that tech can help. Handy apps can help you plan meals that are healthy, delicious and nutritious. Using these apps you can find recipes, check out nutrition information, plan grocery lists, schedule meal plans, track your exercise and more. This infographic shows 11 highly rated apps that can help you eat healthier and stay fit more easily."

"Flashy spaces and shiny toys in makerspaces are enticing, but it takes time and explicit scaffolding to develop a true Innovator. Building and providing the space for Making to happen is one thing; nurturing a mindset that gives students the mental tools to engage with said spaces is a much larger, and timely, endeavor. Best defined by the research and work of Carol Dweck, Jo Boaler and Eduardo Briceno, growth mindset is the recognition of the brain as a muscle that-with practice, effort, and nurturing-can continue to grow and develop. When you think of an inventor or innovator, past or present, what descriptors come to mind? Creative. Persistent. Curious. Fearless. Passionate. But educators know that most students don't show up to your class on the first day of school exhibiting these qualities. So how do we provide not only the physical tools but the mental tools to Make? Here are the essential pieces:"

"While educational standards may differ from school to school there is one thing that is always nearly the same: the classroom set out. Desks are arranged in rows or groups, and the teacher stands at the front and teach. This set out has changed very little in a hundred years even with all the technological advancements that have been made. Edtech not only changes the way that children learn but changes the way they interact with one another, the classroom space and their teacher. Things need to change if classrooms are to meet the needs of the modern learner. Below are ten ways to create the classroom of the future."

"In the age of technology, when students use online databases for home research and when Khan Academy tutorials personalize learning, why does the 21st-century student come to school? They come to see their friends. They come for the community. They come to be part of a classroom culture that motivates them to stick with the online tutorial and write that last paragraph in an essay. For my first seven years of teaching, I spent the first week discussing class norms, dutifully posting group expectations on the wall, and asking that students sign an agreement to follow them in an effort to "determine class culture." Turns out there's a quicker, more fun way to establish a positive atmosphere. With a little reinforcement, this positive culture lasts past the honeymoon of the first two weeks and into the second quarter when the gloves come off. The secret is improv games. I call them warm-ups and play them once a week at the beginning of class. Many students tell me that warm-ups are the best part of their day."

"The Makerspace movement has been steadfastly gaining traction in education, and rightly so; what better way to incite creativity, encourage inventiveness, and just generally let kids have fun than by giving them Things and asking them to Make Something? One great way to introduce the concept of making to your school is through a Maker Madness Tournament.  This structured, guided, tiered competition gives faculty and students some great exposure to what it means to be a Maker while cashing in on the inherent joy that children find in some friendly competition!"

"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! "

"Another collection of good educational iPad apps specifically curated from iTunes App Store for high school teachers and students. These are apps to help students with chemistry learning from understanding the elements, molecules and atoms to exploring chemical reactions.They provide students  with activities, video lessons, simulated experimentations,  periodic tables and several other materials to boost their chemistry learning."

"YouTube remains one of the best resources for educational video content to use with students in class. Over the past few years we reviewed and shared several YouTube channels that offer educational content for teachers and students and today we are re-featuring this list of the most popular YouTube channels for math teachers. "

"With Pi Day coming up, we wanted to shout out to all the amazing YouTube creators who are making math videos! (Of course, if it's Pi Day videos you want, check out our "Hooray for Pi Day" post.) Math may not seem like a natural fit for the visually-driven medium of video -- but you'd be amazed by the creativity of some of these creators who bring the complexities of all levels of math to life on the small screen. Math teachers, this one's for you!"