Group items matching

in title, tags, annotations or url

"Whether you're learning to code or are already an experienced programmer, this GitHub repository is an incredible resource of free programming books. Victor Felder updated this Stack Overflow list with new and corrected links and shared it over on GitHub for collaborative updating. You'll find books on professional development, specific platforms like Android and Oracle Server, and about 80 programming languages. There are also lists in other languages. Definitely worth a look for your continuing coding education. There's nothing quite like free books!"

"The recent 3D printing explosion on the educational market has left many educators wondering how they can afford to integrate this technology into the classroom. Most schools do not have the luxury of purchasing a 3D printer but still want to provide the experience for their students. 3D pens made their debut on Kickstarter this year as an affordable 3D printing option. After the initial investment of the pens, they are an incredibly affordable tool for classrooms. The pens allow students to illustrate - in 3D - concepts in math, history, art, design, and chemistry, giving them a tangible means to explore complex ideas. The pens work as a manual operating 3D printer. Heated filament is extruded through the pen's tip, which quickly cools down to form a stable 3D structure. It actually adopts the same FDM technology which powers mainstream desktop 3D printers. The human ergonomic design allows students to draw an infinite variety of shapes and items, on both the 2D plane and within 3D free space."

"As a 21st century teacher, you probably need to share stuff, and have stuff shared with. "Stuff" like pdfs, various word processing documents, video files, and other digital fare. The traditional way to do this has been email, but limits here-including speed, file size, and the relative clunkiness of sharing with large groups-make sharing files through email less than "best practice." We started to create a chart that listed the nuance details of each platform, from storage and sharing limits, FTPing ability, the need to sign up to use, and password-protecting to flexible expiration dates for rights to files-but then we found that Wikipedia had already done this (and then some). So we instead picked our favorite dozen, and then ranked them in terms of their flexibility and integration that education technology demands. Though most of the tools below can share most files (mp3s, .movs, .mp4s, exe, .zip, .doc and .docx files, .pdfs, etc.), we focused more on documents, images, folders and software integration than incredibly detailed features that may make it overkill for your classrooms."

"Summer and vacation go together like, well, two of the best things in the world. Parents have time off from work, kids have time off from school, the weather is nice, the sun is shining, and travel beckons. Whether it's a day at a local fun spot, a trip across country, or an adventure half-way around the world, memories will be made. Amazing memories, crazy memories, shared memories. No matter how great a vacation is, however, you can never be there forever, nor can you take everyone you love with you. What you can do is bring the vacation home for you and for them! With your iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad, not only can you take videos and pictures of those magic travel moments, but you can edit and share them right in iMovie, even right away if you want to. Best of all, for kids (of all ages!), iMovie's trailer templates make it incredibly quick and easy to put together something short, sweet, and fun!"

"It's no secret. We're not all brought up to be dual-lingual in England. Learning a language is not as integral to us as it may be in many other countries. Of course, English is an additional language for some and many schools do incredible work to help EAL pupils. However, grasping another language is simply not a necessity for many children. With that over riding fact ringing in their ears, some pupils do not place importance on indulging this area of the curriculum. This is coupled with the fact that most teachers have limited linguistic skills. The lack of enthusiasm from the children, mixed with a teacher's own knowledge gaps can make MFL become MF-hell to teach."

"Living a life of perpetual travel is pretty exciting - new destinations, new cultures and new incredible people to meet and hang out with! However, working on the road can get pretty hectic at times. As a digital nomad I have found myself in rather awkward situations a lot - from missed deadlines due to incorrect time zone conversion to a nearly missed plane when I forgot to print out my booking and confused the time (I did catch that plane though!). Being your own boss is equally awesome and hellish. Juggling numerous tasks at once and getting things done super-fast with a terrible wi-fi connection requirea killer organizational skills and zen-like concentration. Try using the next 20 websites and apps to make your life as a digital nomad easier, less stressful and even more exciting!"

"From a wall of photos to celebrate your students to using photos as an organizational tool (for example, a photo of art supplies on the canisters where they're stored), photos can be incredible classroom tools. Here are 21 ideas for using photos in the classroom, from the first day of school to the last."

"What can you do with The Maker Space at the Cincinnati Library? The Maker Space is an incredibly useful resource for local makers and creatives of all kinds in the Cincinnati area. It is located at the main branch of the Cincinnati Library in downtown Cincinnati. In this podcast episode, we ask Ella Mulford (Maker Space Queen) about all the equipment available for use, what kind of preparations we need to make before using it and, what kind of cool stuff we can make there."

"With iOS 9, Apple has introduced a new feature called Multitasking that takes the iPad to the next level. By running two apps side by side, you can be more productive (or have more fun) than ever before. While this feature is only fully compatible with the iPad Air 2, iPad mini 4 and iPad Pro (and in limited ways on some older iPads), it's an incredibly powerful feature that might be worth the upgrade. (Note that Multitasking does not work on any model of iPhone.) Multitasking comes in three forms: you can have two apps running fully side by side in Split View mode; you can peek at an app and use it in limited ways with Slide Over; and you can run a video in a window all its own in a mode called Picture in Picture."

"TeachThought is officially ten weeks old (yay us!), and to celebrate that incredible milestone (which is also the same as the gestation period of the North American Box Turtle), we're putting together posts that reflect back on that time, while also acting as a kind of curation tool for some of the content you have found most helpful. With that, below are ten of our most popular iPad posts, in no certain order, because, well, we don't play favorites around here (even if you do). And if you suspect there might be a follow up post with ten more, you might be on to something."

"There is a shortage of people who know how to program. These are high quality, high paying jobs. How do we encourage students to learn how to code? Learning to programming not only is a skill that is in high demand, it is also incredibly useful. We have all wished we had an app or a program that would do a particular thing that is specific to ourselves. I know some HTML and some JavaScript and Google Apps Script and it is amazing what you can do with just a little knowledge"

"One of the best ways for frustrated parents, students and teachers to convince school leaders that it's time for a reboot is with amazing student work. An unconventional learning community of "makers" - people who like to figure out and fix problems with their hands - stands ready to demonstrate a hands-on learning style in which students engage problems that matter to them, taking agency and displaying creativity along the way. The Maker Movement is slowly infiltrating schools across the country with the help of dedicated educators and inspirational students proving with their creations that they can do incredible things when given a chance."

"At the CEMS LLC, we have an incredible Green Screen studio that we added as part of our big renovation. But we have many people who ask: How do I make a Green Screen video?"

"As someone who primarily taught math and science when I was a classroom teacher, I associated robots, robotics curriculum, and robot apps as things that were only used in those subjects. However, this past year my school received a robot grant that provided ten robots for us from the company Sphero. Sphero emphasizes the power of play in education and has a variety of lessons that are aligned to the Common Core and Next Generation Science Standards on their website. They also have a number of STEM challenges  in the form pre-designed engineering projects designed for collaborative group work with students and are helpful for teachers using the robots in their classes. Sphero is a robotic ball that can pair with an iPad, tablet, iPhone, or smartphone through Bluetooth, and getting started is relatively easy. Once you are ready to use Sphero, you take it off the charger stand and give it a "tap-tap" to "wake it up." When the robot wakes up, it starts to flash three different colors until it pairs with the device you are using it with via Bluetooth. Once it turns blue, then you know that it is paired and ready to go. There are at least 14 different education related apps that are available with Sphero: some of them use augmented reality technology, some of them teach the basics of coding, while others allow students to draw on a tablet to manipulate the color and movement of the robot. During the last week of June, I did a presentation at the ISTE conference with many other educators from all over the country who also received the robot grant. What amazed me was that people who taught subjects like language arts and social studies found incredible ways to integrate robotics into their curriculum to create some really engaging lessons for their students."

"This week the Associated Press, the world's largest and oldest news agency, announced that its entire Archive is viewable on YouTube, and that it will be adding new material every day.  This is an INCREDIBLE treasure for educators who teach history, culture, science, current events, global studies, media literacy-pretty much anything.  I can easily imagine students embedding this interdisciplinary fodder in their creative projects!"

"Innovation is a trait that I desperately want to instill in my students, and many teachers I talk to seem to share that goal. In the current climate of high stakes testing, state standards, and prescribed learning outcomes, it can be incredibly difficult to foster an atmosphere of innovation and creativity that inspires students. But rest assured, it is possible. Here, I outline eight basic principles for the "Innovative Classroom," around which I designed a middle school course called Physical Computing. Some of the projects and tools are specific to that course, but I think the fundamental ideas could be applied to almost any course at any level."

"Create incredible paper roller coasters using our colorful strips of heavy paper. By folding, cutting, and taping strips together you will be able to make sturdy roller coasters that reach the ceiling!"

Today was Dr. Davey's first Maker Day, and an amazing one at that! Here's a look at our day. All of the Grade 1-Grade 7 students participated in today's Maker Day. Students attended two of seven different sessions based on their interests: Minecraft/Coding, Collaborative Art, Beautiful Junk, Positive Graffiti, Making Music, Lego/Blocks, and Egg Drop. Staff members paired up together to facilitate the learning at each of the sessions, and the students directed most of the learning based on their interests. I (Aviva) worked with an amazing Grade 4 student that led the Minecraft/Coding session, and even worked with small groups of students on coding the Arduino. It was really quite incredible! After two sessions, students reflected on the day and on their learning, and then extended the "Maker Learning" back in the classroom. Today was all about the Learning Skills, problem solving, creativity and critical thinking. As you can hear in our video reflection, there were also links to our classroom learning including Science (Structures) and Math (shapes, figures, and non-standard measurement). There was also a lot of Arts learning today (with creating music and creating works of art including the elements of design). What an amazing day!"

"The premise is simple: start with a quick tour of the facility and very brief show-and-tell of the tools (less than 30 minutes!), follow with a group brainstorming session around project ideas (less than 30 minutes!), then form groups to jump into projects. Even before lunch on the first day, groups were already sketching and tinkering with Hummingbird Robotics kits, MaKeyMaKeys, cardboard and MakeDo's, and more. For two days, I jumped in to help groups, learned new tools myself (LittleBits!), fetched tools and supplies as needed (copper tape! wire strippers!), recommended resources and suppliers (Sparkfun! DigiKey!), and acted as cheerleader for teachers pushing themselves to learn incredible new skills and create amazing artifacts of their learning. The final projects blew ALL of us coaches away! The absolute best part, from my perspective, is that every single project was immediately applicable back in the participant's classroom. Most of them are generally applicable in any learning environment! Serious high school science content, literature and history, elementary grades, even social/emotional learning… This was absolutely the most excellent collection of practical and academically-oriented maker projects I've seen!"