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Great video on blogging by David Truss @datruss http://pairadimes.davidtruss.com/blogs-as-learning-spaces/

"As an advocate of BYOD, I've always talked to colleagues about the benefits of different devices and approaches within a "mixed economy" digital learning space (or "classroom where everyone's phone is different", as it's more commonly known). Largely, what you want to do should dictate the type of device you use, and I'm quite happy to work in a multi-device environment. Until I walk into my Media classroom. I should make it clear that I have no particular beef with any other individual device, or operating system, or anything else at which you think I may be showing signs of beefage. But the iPad has always been, and remains for the moment, the device with the most power in terms of Media and Film teaching. Think about it in terms of the skills you are trying to teach, and you'll see why:"

"The philosophy behind the maker movement is to explore and create with purpose. It's about embracing a child's natural curiousity and supporting the notion of learning by doing. As it should be in every classroom, play is a key component in the maker movement. Makers believe it you can imagine it you can make it."

"Augmented reality (AR) has evolved in recent years and its application in classrooms is limitless. Educators don't need to feel overwhelmed when trying to introduce AR in their classroom because there are many great apps that don't require a lot of knowledge in the field. There are useful apps for every subject and there are also apps that when a teacher is ready they can create their own AR targets. Augmented reality works well in schools because it brings close to real life experiences to the classrooms. It's fascinating to see the faces of students when they have the opportunity to explore space, the human body, cells or chemistry elements. You appreciate how eager and engaged they become with some simple AR apps."

"What makerspace materials and supplies should you buy or stock for your hands-on learning lab?  There are a lot of options out there to choose from and it can be confusing when you're first starting out as a maker educator.  Instead of just spending money randomly on items you think you will need, it's always a great idea to work backwards first.  You need to make a list of your goals for your makerspace and then define some of the projects you want to do in your makerspace.  Once you have defined the projects, you will have a better idea of the materials you need to buy.  Since money is always tight and you can't buy everything, try partnering with another maker educator and share/trade some of your items.  Lets say you're both working on a series of robotics lessons.  Each of you can buy one type of robotics kit and then when you have completed a few lessons you can trade with each other.  This is also a great way to try out new types of kits, equipment or materials before buying them. Now keep in mind makerspaces don't always need structured lessons and are great for open ended exploration.  Give your students some materials, maybe a little instruction and then let them loose to see what they do. Here are some of the top makerspace materials and supplies a classroom or library should consider adding to their space.  They are not ranked in any particular order and they all have a STEM component to them.  Please let us know in the comments section if we are missing any good materials so we can send out an updated post later on."

"Makerspaces, sometimes referred to as a hackerspace or creation stations, are places where tools, projects, mentors and expertise come together in a rich learning environment. Makerspaces are all about exploration, discovery, creation, building and trying new things. They are spaces where students are able to let their curiosity take over and engage in science, engineering and tinkering."

"Digital citizenship first depends on a more fundamental sense of citizenship-being a human being, then carrying that to digital spaces"

"Working with the MakerBus we've had to learn how to do a lot with very little. This is the first instalment of a three-part series exploring how to create library makerspaces with very little (the $100 makerspace), moderate (the $1000 makerspace), and a ludicrous (the $1,000,000 makerspace) amounts of funding. Follow along as we share our experience and insight about how to make the most of your funding to create an awesome space for creative play."

"Michelle Joyce doesn't shy away from politicized science topics such as climate change. In fact, she works to equip seniors at Palmetto Ridge High School in Naples, Florida with the skills to accurately evaluate those topics on their own. Along with teaching chemistry and physics, she offers a class called "thinking skills" where students solve logic and math puzzles while also enhancing their media literacy. Students go beyond just learning about legitimate sources of information on the internet and delve into just how the information is put together in the first place. But teaching students those critical thinking skills only as they're about to depart for college can be too little too late. "It's a really hard thing to teach within the space of everything else that you need to teach in a classroom," Joyce said. "It's crucial that we teach it as early as we can." The internet has no shortage of dubious information; and the ability to evaluate health and science claims is a subset of media literacy. With the abundance of health/science content students may only see via social media, kids are ill-equipped to discern hype from real science."

"The Maker Movement continues to grow, and makerspaces have hit a point where they are clearly no longer just a passing fad. Academic universities are conducting research and gathering data on makerspaces' impact on learning, and dozens of books have already been published. More and more makerspaces are being created in schools, some in separate labs and some in corners of classrooms. And some makerspaces, of course, are in the library. In these last four years of speaking at conferences, chatting on Twitter and talking to colleagues, I've fielded a lot of questions from two camps. One camp is made up of hesitant librarians. They're not really sure that a makerspace belongs in the library. They're afraid of it taking over their whole program and replacing the books. Their school already has a STEM lab, so why do they need a makerspace in their library too? The other camp is made up of librarians who are ready and eager to start a makerspace, but who are meeting resistance from their administration. We already have an art studio; why do we need a makerspace in the library too? Aren't those kids just playing and messing around with LEGO® bricks? Shouldn't the library be a quiet, clean, studious environment? How would a space like this tie in with curriculum, improve test scores or create better experiences for our students? This article looks to address some of these concerns and to explain why makerspaces do belong in libraries."

"As you probably know, Google Drive is far more than a place to store files online. It also includes a suite of versatile creation tools, many of which perform the same functions as the ones we use in other spaces. These include Google Docs, a word processing program that behaves similarly to Microsoft Word, Google Slides, a presentation program similar to PowerPoint, and Google Forms, a survey-creation tool similar to Survey Monkey. Although Drive also includes other tools, these three are particularly useful for creating rigorous, academically robust projects. If your school uses Google Classroom or at least gives students access to Google Drive, your students are probably already using these tools to write papers or create slideshow presentations, but there are other projects they could be doing that you may not have thought of. Below I have listed 16 great ideas for projects using Google Docs, Slides, and Forms. (If you and your students want to learn more about how to use these apps, check out my Google Drive Basics course; more info at the end of this post!)"

"In 21 years in education, I have seen many trends come and go. I am on a mission to keep makerspaces from being added to that list. That's at the core of everything I do now. Makerspaces are an educational philosophy, foundationally solid, and we can't allow them to be cast aside by cynics who might suggest they were just a fun fad that has run its course. We must work to secure the future of makerspaces. Their fundamental purpose is too important, the impact on students too significant. A true makerspace offers student-driven opportunity for open-ended exploration for everyone. Makerspaces are a mind-set, a culture. It's about the pedagogy. A great makerspace has seven key attributes: It is personalized, deep (allowing deeper learning), empowering, equitable, differentiated, intentional, and inspiring. If you have all of that, you can call your space a makerspace-maybe even a great makerspace. So what's next? What is the key to the future of makerspaces? Sustainability. That requires proper planning. I am not just talking about the initial planning that is vital to creating the right makerspace for your school. This planning is for the future, and it requires looking back."

"Figuring out how to get (and keep) your makerspace organized can be a daunting task.  I don't claim to have a magical organization system that works perfectly 100% of the time.  But I have learned a few things about keeping our space organized over the last three years.  Here's my advice:"

"Something that bothers me so much is when I read articles that talk about how libraries are becoming makerspaces.  Our makerspace is one component of the participatory culture that runs through our space.  Anyone who knows my story knows that my point of entry into the Maker Movement was through literacy, so for me, literacy and making have always gone hand in hand.   When I began as the Library Media Specialist at New Milford High School, I walked into a library that was similar to many school libraries in older schools.  It was very traditional looking, with tall stacks and lots and lots of books that students simply did not check out, nor have an interest in.  The collection was out of date and had not been weeded in decades.  One of the tasks for me was to weed the books.  During that weeding process, I decided that traditional nonfiction that made it through the weeding process would be sent to classrooms to build up their classroom research libraries.  I decided to keep any memoirs or narrative nonfiction that we had in our collection, since those were the kinds of books I discovered so many of our students did enjoy reading and would check out.  Amongst the vast fiction collection, we did find a few gems, but mostly we either discarded books that were no longer relevant to our students, gave them to classrooms who wanted them, or to individual students who showed an interest.  In the end, I was able to preserve just a few shelves of books.  As a result, I was tasked with rebuilding our collection."

"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."

"This is a collection of 100 STEAM Projects created for teachers and educators to do with youth. Each project encourages exploration, modification, and students to pursue their own ideas and curiosities. They are also meant to be accessible, both in approach and availability and cost of materials. Feel encouraged to adapt them to your local learning space."

"Welcome to the weekly edition of The Edtech Smackdown-a collection of digital resources containing a few of my most favorite activities, tools and articles curated from various social media spaces throughout the past week. Check out some super cool edtech gems right here, right now and get ready to use these ideas to support learning and to engage students in your classroom!"

"If you've opened this post hoping to read something brand-new, you might be disappointed. There will be no fancy bells or whistles here. That's because a lot of the strategies we're going to talk about are things you've already done; some teachers have probably been doing them for decades. You just might not have known exactly why they worked or how to harness them in the most optimal way. That's what cognitive scientists have been doing, trying to pinpoint exactly which activities work best for storing concepts in long-term memory. Over the past few years, we've been following their progress: In our 2015 study of the book Make it Stick, we first talked about the concepts of retrieval practice, spaced practice, and interleaving. These concepts were also addressed in the 2016 post Six Powerful Learning Strategies You Must Share with Students, and in 2017, where I made a strong push again for using more retrieval practice in our teaching."