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I have been thinking a lot lately about the challenge we face as educators when well-intentioned learners make incorrect, inscrutable, thoughtless, or otherwise off-the-mark comments. It's a crucial moment in teaching: how do you respond to an unhelpful remark in a way that 1) dignifies the attempt while 2) making sure that no one leaves thinking that the remark is true or useful? Summer is a great time to think about the challenge of developing new routines and habits in class, and this is a vital issue that gets precious little attention in training and staff development. Here is a famous Saturday Night Live skit, with Jerry Seinfeld as a HS history teacher, that painfully demonstrates the challenge and a less than exemplary response. Don't misunderstand me: I am not saying that we are always correct in our judgment about participant remarks. Sometimes a seemingly dumb comment turns out to be quite insightful. Nor am I talking about merely inchoate or poorly-worded contributions. That is a separate teaching challenge: how to unpack or invite others to unpack a potentially-useful but poorly articulated idea. No, I am talking about those comments that are just clunkers in some way; seemingly dead-end offerings that tempt us to drop our jaws or make some snarky remark back. My favorite example of the challenge and how to meet it comes from watching my old mentor Ted Sizer in action in front of 360 educators in Louisville 25 years ago. We had travelled as the staff of the Coalition of Essential Schools from Providence to Louisville to pitch the emerging Coalition reform effort locally. Ted gave a rousing speech about the need to transform the American high school. After a long round of applause, Ted took questions. The first questioner asked, and I quote: "Mr Sizer, what do you think about these girls and their skimpy halter tops in school?" (You have to also imagine the voice: very good-ol'-boy). Without missing a beat or making a face, Ted said "Deco

"While we've witnessed many effective approaches to incorporating iPads successfully in the classroom, we're struck by the common mistakes many schools are making with iPads, mistakes that are in some cases crippling the success of these initiatives. We're sharing these common challenges with you, so your school doesn't have to make them."

"Making is about realizing that you can be a creator instead of just a consumer. At its best, making allows kids to follow their own interests and passions and create something that is uniquely theirs, while applying the knowledge that they are gathering in all aspects of their life. "

"Schema theory explains how our previous experiences, knowledge, emotions, and understandings affect what and how we learn (Harvey & Goudvis, 2000). Schema is the background knowledge and experience readers bring to the text. Good readers draw on prior knowledge and experience to help them understand what they are reading and are thus able to use that knowledge to make connections. Struggling readers often move directly through a text without stopping to consider whether the text makes sense based on their own background knowledge, or whether their knowledge can be used to help them understand confusing or challenging materials. By teaching students how to connect to text they are able to better understand what they are reading (Harvey & Goudvis, 2000). Accessing prior knowledge and experiences is a good starting place when teaching strategies because every student has experiences, knowledge, opinions, and emotions that they can draw upon. "

Game designers understand how to make games memorable and "sticky" in the sense that, even when you aren't playing the game, you're still thinking about solving its problems and puzzles. As teachers, how might we make our projects and content as sticky as games? How can we engage kids in thoughtful learning even after they leave the classroom? Here are game designers' top five secrets and some tips on using these same game dynamics to make learning in your classroom as addictive as gaming.

It's common for Facebook to undergo drastic (or silent) changes whether the users like it or not. The real question is, how ready are you when Facebook is determined to 'make the world more open and connected'? Have you made full use of the privacy and account settings to your advantage? Also, if you've been observant enough you should've discovered several improvements on the existing features to make them more visible and user friendly. Why not give this list a run-through and see if you missed any.

"We recommend discussing explicitly the purpose, associated practices, and changed roles that the use of Essential Questions entails. Here are some examples of key ideas framed as sentences to be spoken in class to prepare students for the changes: "There's not a single correct answer for this question. Life is about the consideration of plausible and imperfect alternatives." "Coming to understand important ideas is like fitness: it takes practice over time." "When a question is posted on the wall, it means that we are going to consider it again and again." "Inquiry is not a spectator sport: each of you needs to listen actively and participate." "Everyone is fair game. I won't only call on people who raise their hands." "If and when I or others challenge your comment, it doesn't mean we don't like you or don't value your contribution." "Making mistakes is an expected part of learning. If you never take a risk of making a mistake, you're not likely to improve." "You may find that you are re-considering things that you thought you understood. That is normal - even desirable." Like the care of seedlings, the new rules will require patience, careful nurturing, and constant reminders. Overtime, they will become the norms, allowing big ideas to take root and mature understandings to blossom."

Quick tips about making book trailers This is not a book report, it is an old fashion book talk. Get really big pictures. 640 by 480 at least Use advanced searches for images. Script writing and image searching go hand in hand. Get the narration right. Think end game - how am I going to share this? Youtube, Schooltube, my own web or wikisite, school news."

This animation was produced on behalf of the Australian delegation to the Global Education Leadership Programme (GELP). It makes the case for making big changes in education, to keep up with the big changes that are taking place in society.

"Ever since I was young I've always loved thinking of ways to fix things, build products and make money. And, over the years, I've been fortunate to have worked with so many creative and innovative people. I'm talking about people like Whitepages' Alex Algard, Cheezburger's Ben Huh and BuddyTV's Andy Liu. These guys are absolute masters at drawing profitable conclusions from problems and ideas from totally unrelated fields. The businesses that these new ideas trigger speak for themselves. So I thought I would put down on paper what it is that makes these guys innovative thinkers and leaders, and tips that you can use to help you reach their kind of success, too. Here are 10:"

Rubrics can be an incredibly useful tool for your classroom. Aside from being one of those cool words that sounds a little weirder every time you say it, using a rubric can help your students understand the assignments in your classroom, and will make your grading process clearer, faster, and more objective and consistent. Online rubric makers can make rubric creation pretty simple, so we've collected a few sites that offers online rubric makers (some of them are free) that can help you out in your classroom. There are many sites out there that also offer shared rubrics from other users that you can use as well - quite a helpful tool if you're either in a pinch, or at a loss for where to start.

"Evernote has transformed the way I organise myself as a teacher. Using Evernote as an organisational tool in the classroom has changed the way I assess students, keep notes and records and complete many day to day tasks. I am a big believer in not making more work for myself than I need to and using Evernote effectively makes things much easier"

"Flickr currently hosts more than 75 million images that are licensed under a Creative Commons license. Depending on the license, you may use the images on your private or commercial webpage, or make changes to it."

"Often students are called upon to make presentations for class projects, and many are eager to break out of the mold of the standard PowerPoint and do something really special."

My point is that here most of us have created a PowerPoint and done a presentation (or will at some point) and yet it is likely to be one of the most poorly done things on a computer.

How about flipping your classroom using iPad apps ?There are now several apps out there to help you create tutorials and video guides to help your students learn while they are not in class. Be it you want to totally flip your classroom teaching or simply to provide extra help to students, the apps below will definitely help you make a difference in your students learning.

"teacher-ready tips for stimulating curiosity in others. First, she suggests starting with the question, rather than the answer-which teachers will recognize as the foundation of inquiry-based or discovery learning (see: math teacher Dan Meyer's take on how to make math "irresistible" to students). She then suggests offering some initial knowledge on the subject. "We're not curious about something we know absolutely nothing about," she writes. Again, teachers may know this as "activating prior knowledge" or "setting the stage" before a lesson. Finally, she says it helps to require communication, or "open an information gap and then require learners to communicate with each other in order to fill it." The think-pair-share technique and vocabulary activities that require students to teach each other their words both exemplify this. What would you add to the list? How does stimulating curiosity gel with other motivation tactics-or should teachers think of curiosity and motivation as one and the same?"

If you haven't heard of 20% time in the classroom, the premise is simple: Give your students 20% of their class time to learn what they want. Yes, that's it. Below is a list of the 10 reasons you should consider 20% time in your school, and you will not regret making that choice!"

"Administrators across the United States are recognizing that the education system needs fundamental changes to keep pace with an increasingly complex global society. Yet, the deeper we get into the process of change, the more confused we can become. We need some sense of what to expect and what direction to take. Seeing the patterns of change can be difficult; stakeholders in a system tend to see change primarily from their own perspective. Often teachers may not understand what is seen by administrators and parents, nor do administrators or parents see change from a teacher's perspective, or from each other's. To give stakeholders an aerial view of the shifts occurring in educational systems, the matrix "A Continuum of Systemic Change" defines six developmental stages and six key elements of change (see fig. 1). A composite of experiences in systemic change from across the United States and at all levels of education, the matrix provides stakeholders with a common vantage point for communicating and making decisions about change."

"Once the students had selected a topic from our over-arching theme of civil/human rights, and I had a rubric, it was time for the real work to begin. We started our project-based learning by making a list on the board of things we know about the topic followed by a list of things we "need to know." Basically, we completed the K and W of our KWL chart (PDF)."