Group items tagged

Per David Warlick blog - "A recent report (Ready to Innovate/pdf) from The Conference Board and Americans for the Arts, in partnership with the American Association of School Administrators (AASA), reminds us that creativity, and integral part of innovation, is among the top five skills that will become more important over the next five years. Yet, according to their survey, school superintendents and American business executives differ in some significant ways in what this means."

The Australian Communications and Media Authority is aware that a list purporting to be the 'ACMA blacklist' has been posted on an overseas website. ACMA does not consider that the release and promotion of URLs relating to illegal and highly offensive material is responsible. The regulatory scheme for online content that has been administered by ACMA since 2000 . ACMA provides the ACMA blacklist to the fourteen providers of filter software which have been tested and accredited by the Internet Industry Association (IIA), as part of IIA's Family Friendly Filter scheme. ACMA is discussing with the IIA what if any action it may need to take to help ensure that ACMA's list remain secure. ACMA considers that any publication of the ACMA blacklist would have a substantial adverse effect on the effective administration of the regulatory scheme which aims to prevent access to harmful and offensive online material. Such publication would undermine the public interest outcomes which the current legislation aims to achieve.

As educators, we could stand to do some of this with students. I wonder what this would look like in the classroom? I wonder what it would look like from an administrator towards an educator?

Blogs are naturally "publish at will" platforms. While blogs certainly CAN be configured to have new posts "moderated" by someone serving in the role of a gatekeeper, by default most blogs allow users to publish INSTANTLY. If you're interested in setting up a blog for moderated posting by students, I'd recommend using Class Blogmeister for this purpose. Wordpress blogs can be configured for contributor posts to be moderated as well, but this requires a bit of configuration. (This is the setup we're using here on ISTEconnects, btw.) On the Wordpress dashboard, under SETTINGS - GENERAL SETTINGS, we've checked the MEMBERSHIP box ANYONE CAN REGISTER and set the "New User Default Role" to be CONTRIBUTOR. With these configuration settings, new posts must be reviewed by a user designated as an "editor" or "administrator" before they become "live" on the site. For more on this, see the Wordpress.org CODEX article "Roles and Capabilities." To setup a free classroom or personal Wordpress blog you don't have to host yourself, I recommend using EduBlogs or Wordpress.com. Blogs setup with Blogger can similarly be setup as "team" blogs with moderated contributions from members which can include students and/or teachers. See the Blogger help article "How do I create a team blog?" for more details. My post from July 2008, "How can our school set up a team blog for teachers?" also gives more information about this for Wordpress users.

Discover ideas for instruction that innovative districts have developed to better leverage the increasing number of laptops, cell phones, MP3 players and smart phones that students carry. This webinar explores the latest findings from Speak Up surveys given to K-12 students, teachers and administrators regarding their views on mobile devices within instruction.

This is a collaborative project to generate Social Media Guidelines for school districts. The goal of this guideline is to provide instructional employees, staff, students, administrators, parents and the school district community direction when using social media applications both inside and outside the classroom.

Education Recovery and Reinvestment Center The new search tools on our Education Recovery and Reinvestment Center help you find the resources you need or take you directly to the pages that meet your needs. * Fund Finder: Identifies total distribution of funds to your state. * State Resources page contains state-specific information. * The LPA Resource page contains specially developed tools and resources. * The calendar of events is updated regularly. District and School Administrators * The School Reform and Improvement Database contains research on school finance models, optimal resource allocation for school improvement, whole district reform, and teacher retention strategies.

Education Recovery and Reinvestment Center The new search tools on our Education Recovery and Reinvestment Center help you find the resources you need or take you directly to the pages that meet your needs. Here is a sample of what you will find:

Recent issues in this journal and other prominent distance-learning journals have established the need for administrators to be informed and prepared with strategic plans equal to foreseeable challenges. This article provides decision makers with 32 trends that affect distance learning and thus enable them to plan accordingly. The trends are organized into categories as they pertain to students and enrollment, faculty members, academics, technology, the economy, and distance learning. All the trends were identified during an extensive review of current literature in the field

A research report: the Speak Up National Research Project has collected and shared the ideas and views of more than 1.5 million K-12 students, teachers, parents and administrators on education and technology

Are you interested in how innovative districts are leveraging the increasing number of laptops, cell phones, MP3 players and smart phones their students carry? This webinar explores the views of of K-12 students, teachers and administrators regarding the use of mobile devices within instruction from Speak Up 2008. The webinar is scheduled for August 18th from 12:00pm -1:00pm PST.

FROM the Creator/Owner of WORDLE: "I'm happy to announce that from now on, the Wordle front page will never feature images or links that are inappropriate for classroom use. It's now possible to configure an institution's "site-blocking" software to keep Wordle safe for classroom use." Simply have your networking administrator block the following base URLs1: * http://www.wordle.net/gallery * http://www.wordle.net/next * http://www.wordle.net/random

With technology evolving at the speed of light, and everyone looking to benefit from the latest, greatest hardware and software, keeping up can be challenging for educators, administrators, and school districts themselves. To help, THE Journal spoke with a handful of technology experts and came up with a short list of top tech trends you'll want to watch in the new year.

School districts are leveraging the power of the Web to make a difference in student learning, teacher professional development, administrator data management, parental information, and district security. The use of broadband technology and wireless communications are key factors in delivering these opportunities. This ebook provides information on effective and cost effective solutions to providing the high-speed wireless access and applications required to enable anywhere, anytime access to the latest tools to improve student learning, provide access to data, and ensure safety and security - today and well into the 21st century.

Very poor decision. Very poor model. Very hypocritical. Adults need to set the bar. Administrators and teachers even more!

Great resource here for history topics. Access to all kinds of primary sources, including audio files, related to the JFK administration.

Eaton-Johnson Middle School is located in North Carolina, approximately 45 minutes north of Raleigh. The school is considered by the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction as a rural school, however, this is also inner city. Eaton-Johnson Middle School is located in a district with a high unemployment rate, high crime rate, and a high gang rate. When the school first implemented Synergy, the school was also suffering from low teacher morale, an unclear mission, and very little parent involvement. We had to do something, because EJMS was also considered a priority school which meant that the state was looking very closely at our instructional programs, teachers, school community, and the administration.

Life in the 21st century provides a whole new world of opportunities for self-directed, passion-driven, personalized learning. Educators who are ready to move on from teaching the way they were taught, and administrators who will let them, can begin supporting students using tools and strategies available to the 21st century learner.

"I can remember a particular English Teacher who used one of those terms in just about every sentence to us. "I have to provide you '21st Century Skills' or else you won't be prepared for college or the 'real world." Being a Senior, close to graduation, I didn't really want to know or even care about, what she was talking about; I just wanted out!"

Trying to explain to people what Twitter is and more and more what it is not. And in education it is especially hard trying to convince Superintendents, School Boards, administrators and others that Twitter is a viable place for learning about real-time events and a place where educators can take part in some really meaningful professional development.

"Creating a Facebook page for your school or college isn't as simple as it is when you're just creating a personal page. There are several pitfalls that I came across when doing so that Facebook simply hasn't addressed, and the administration process involved in adding schools on Facebook is more complex than a normal profile."