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Pupils have a say in what their classroom will be. "HIGH TECH: 21st century classroom on the horizon Pupils have say in their future - by John Thorne in Mid Devon Gazette - 6/11/01 Primary school pupils have been given the opportunity to say what they think a high-tech 21st century classroom should contain. The pupils took part in a technology day at Chulmleigh Community College, which has been chosen as the site for a pioneering classroom of the future project, along with Witheridge and Winkleigh primary schools. Devon County Council has been awarded £900,000 by the Department for Education and Skills for the innovative scheme. It aims to help boost learning opportunities for children and adults in rural communities. Devon is one of 12 local authorities selected following an invitation by the Government to councils to come up with plans for a classroom of the future. Each of the three schools would be equipped with the latest computers, audio and video technology. This would allow pupils and adult learners to benefit from video links with experts at three of Devon's technology colleges, including Queen Elizabeth's at Crediton. They would be able to take lessons or give lectures without moving from their home base. The idea is to provide greater learning opportunities for people living in rural areas and help to cut down social exclusion in isolated communities."

This article has a list of great sites for the K-6 audience (many adaptable to 7-12 and adult). All of them are free and no registration is required. Some are very low tech.

Activities to develop a story.

"What you see here are candid submissions from people who have engaged in a little exercise. Here's how it works. Think about the word Race. How would you distill your thoughts, experiences or observations about race into one sentence that only has six words?" This National Public Radio blog makes the perfect starting point for a multicultural lesson for ESL/EFL students. The entries are sheer poetry and give a great deal of content to think about the issue of race and one's place in society, for better or worse. Each 6-word "poem" makes us, as one contributor said, "Look past race to underlying humanity."

These sites include RAS Animate with thought-provoking videos about education and other subjects; Problem Attic with a bank of 80,000 quetions from the NY Regents exams, review tests, quizzes, and flash card; Learners TV with thoughsands of video lectures, tests, and animations in various disciplines to support classroom instruction; Sketch Toy which lets you draw and share pictures; Daily Infographic, where you can search topics and subscribe; and Google Tutor, which gives you news, tips, and tutorials about Google. Thanks to M. Sheehan at Learning Never Stops for the info.

"Quandl is a repository of time-series data on the internet, tailored for researchers, students and other data professionals. Quickly find the numerical data you need Get that data in any format you want Have complete transparency to the source of the data Quandl is open and free. Quandl currently has over 6 million time-series datasets. Most of the data is in the domains of finance, economics, demography, sociology, energy and the environment. 1000s of new datasets are added to Quandl daily."

Each of these is explained in detail: "#1 How to manage money #2 How to manage emotions (especially worrying) #3: The importance of a healthy lifestyle #4 To question everything #5: To respect other peoples' rights to an opinion #6 To value creative arts #7 To respect the natural environment #8 Public speaking #9 Manners and etiquette #10: How to teach themselves"

This is a nice way to cheaply add subtitles (or comments!) within G-Drive. 1. Create a text file on your desktop using the format/coding recommended in this instructional video. (You will need to specify the times where each subtitle appears.) 2. Save the file, changing the extension to .SRT 3. Go back to your video in G-Drive and select the >Details tab on the right sidebar. At the bottom of the list is >Caption tracks. 4. Select >New caption track, and select the .SRT file you have created. 5. Select a language and give the caption file a name. 6. Select >Upload and >Done 7. You can edit the text file within G-Drive also. Now when you open the movie, the subtitles will show. Instead of doing the subtitles for students, this might be a great project to have students do, as a test to see if they have mastered their own work. You may find some surprising results.

An interesting article on podcasting by Forbes online, predictin that podcasting is the future because of its ubiquity on both iOS and Android mobile phones. The younger generation is once again leading innovation's way with what to us older users was a technology of the 2000s. Podcasting has many uses for ESL/EFL, and having your students create a regular podcast series, scripting and recording it; or having them do podcast exchanges with students in another country -- these will be memorable learning experiences.

Excellent online bibliography! DLIST is a cross-institutional, subject-based, open access digital archive for the Information Sciences, including Archives and Records Management, Library and Information Science, Information Systems, Museum Informatics, and other critical information infrastructures.

"Few approaches to digital storytelling have been as popular among students as stop motion video. Students can make a high-quality stop-motion animation, or stop-motion video with very simple tools, including Keynote, PowerPoint, Google Slides, iMovie, etc. The basic idea is to take a series of photos that are assembled into a video to show motion. Stop Motion Studio is an app that makes the video creation process incredibly simple, allowing students to keep their primary focus on storytelling. Plus it's free and available for iOS, Android, Mac, and Windows."

"A useful site for creating metro maps. Use it in creating writing to map out a character's travels, make Monopoly-like games or make classroom posters showing connected words, names, ideas or topics."

"Rich classroom experiences in complex questions, problems, or challenges that promote deep learning." Makerspaces -- ideas for projects and creations by actual students and classes.

"Reading Should Be Enjoyable, Not a Chore "Ask nearly any parent or student what they think of reading logs, and I'm certain you won't hear words like "inspiring, motivating." The Atlantic did a great job addressing this outdated and ineffective approach to building lifelong learners in "Can Reading Logs Ruin Reading for Kids?". " T/h N.LaFave

"From scavenger hunts, to a QR Code Jenga set, teachers have countless options for using QR codes in the classroom. But creating multiple QR codes at one time can be a time-consuming hassle. The next time you need to create multiple QR codes, check out QRExplore.com's Bulk QR Code Generator. "Just enter (or copy and paste) text or URLs, then generate multiple QR codes with one click. It's really that simple. You are then given the option of right clicking on a QR code to download it, or you can download all of your QR codes in one .zip file. The .zip file contains each QR code image as a separate file. It also contains a .csv file that lists the File Name and Data (url or text) that the QR code represents." T/h Nick LaVave Also shows how to customize the names of your QR link.

"Google Slides is too powerful to limit its use to boring presentations. Create engaging learning experiences while promoting critical thinking and creativity with these seven Google Slides templates you can use in virtually any classroom. The sharing settings for all of these templates are set up so that users can create an editable copy by clicking "Make a Copy," or "Use Template."" T/h N.LaFavre Google Slides Templates include Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, et al. Students can use a variety of approaches from their favorite media, as suggested in Nick's article.