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The United States General Services Administration (GSA) and the White House Open Government Initiative are soliciting your feedback on a concept for next generation citizen consultation, namely a government-wide software tool and process to elicit expert public participation (working title "ExpertNet"). ExpertNet could: Enable government officials to circulate notice of opportunities to participate in public consultations to members of the public with expertise on a topic. Provide those volunteer experts with a mechanism to provide useful, relevant, and manageable feedback back to government officials. The proposed concept is intended to be complementary to two of the ways the Federal government currently obtains expertise to inform decision-making, namely by convening Federal Advisory Committees and announcing public comment opportunities in the Federal Register. We are looking for you to provide: Any refinements or suggestions you have to improve the process as described; Any issues (legal, policy, technical) raised by the features described; Any tools that you know of that perform the process described in that step; Any organizations (public or private) that have a similar platform in place.

Four Ways to Differentiate Instruction: Differentiation can occur in the content, process, product or environment in the classroom. 1. Differentiating the Content/Topic 2. Differentiating the Process/Activities 3. Differentiating the Product 4. Diffferentiating By Manipulating The Environment or Through Accommodating Individual Learning Styles

Obviously,I'm not a writing expert, but I love how this post describes the writing process this teacher is using at Duke with her students. The peer editing process is tested and this approach uses a screencast (video that can include audio of what is happening on a computer- mouse movements, ability to highlight text while commenting, etc.) I think it's right up our alley and incorporates free technology.

If your school isn't using your technology very effectively then this six step process for creating a technology plan might help you focus your efforts to be more effective. 

Reading is a Problem-Solving Process. Why Not Try the Thumb Method? New blog post by Denise Finley about supporting students while they learn to read scientifically!

Great article by Julie Lindsey and Vicki Davis about working with students in the digital environment, the opportunities it presents for customization, and the requirements it places on teachers to monitor, develop student understanding of the process, and support students in engaging with others. 

Problem-based approaches to learning have a long history of advocating experience-based education. Psychological research and theory suggests that by having students learn through the experience of solving problems, they can learn both content and thinking strategies. Problem-based learning (PBL) is an instructional method in which students learn through facilitated problem solving. In PBL, student learning centers on a complex problem that does not have a single correct answer. Students work in ollaborative groups to identify what they need to learn in order to solve a problem. They engage in self-directed learning (SDL) and then apply their new knowledge to the problem and reflect on what they learned and the effectiveness of the strategies employed. The teacher acts to facilitate the learning process rather than to provide knowledge. The goals of PBL include helping students develop 1) flexible knowledge, 2) effective problem-solving skills, 3) SDL skills, 4) effective collaboration skills, and 5) intrinsic motivation. This article discusses the nature of learning in PBL and examines the empirical evidence supporting it. There is considerable research on the first 3 goals of PBL but little on the last 2. Moreover, minimal research has been conducted outside medical and gifted education. Understanding how these goals are achieved with less skilled learners is an important part of a research agenda for PBL. The evidence suggests that PBL is an instructional approach that offers the potential to help students develop flexible understanding and lifelong learning skills.

Great post about ScienceOnline2012 Sci-Art Show. I love the combination of art and science. The ability to tell a scientific story through art, metaphor, and imagery is a skill that I think we need to develop. This is a great example of why STEM needs to be STEAM. Not only does it allow us to tell the scientific story but it allows us to tell the story to mass audiences to at least get people involved in the process. 

Read Steve Fulton's approach to researching with his middle school students as they were reading the Hunger Game. I love his approach to incorporating the book, what students already knew, Diigo for sharing, summarizing, and gathering data, and then the writing process. In my opinion, this is how it should be, the focus is on writing not the use of technology. The technology just helps achieve the goal more effectively. 

Great article on looking at test preparation differently. It's not about answering a lot of questions similar to the ones on the test, but about learning processes that help students understand how to garner information from text/problems, etc. 

How do I know if my use is a fair use? This tool has been developed to help teachers and students reason through the fair use process. You can see an example of how this tool is being used HERE Use the form online. The data from this form feeds into a google spreadsheet so you can compare how individuals or groups reason the fair use of copyrighted material in a work. If you would like to use this form in your work you can click here. If you have a google account, you can sign in and copy into your google account.

or the uninitiated Wordle is essentially a word cloud generator that creates word clouds from text you either manually enter or draw from websites, news feeds or utilise tags from a del.icio.us account to create a visually appealing word cloud which you can customise and stylize to suit your needs. The beauty of Wordle is that there is no signup or login and the whole process can be completed in as little as a minute depending on how complex you wish to get.   Here is a Wordle I generated from my website at www.edgalaxy.com

Another nice description of how to think about blogging in the classroom and how to kick up the rigor of the process. I do like the description of different purposes from Will Richardson's book.  Always looking for ways to bring this conversation to the forefront again and again.... One of the highlights of the conversation centered around a section (on p. 32) of Will Richardson's Blogs, Wikis, Podcast and Other Powerful Web Tools for the Classroom that articulates so perfectly the different levels of blogging: Posting assignments (Not blogging) Journaling, i.e. "this is what I did today." (Not blogging) Posting links. (Not blogging) Links with descriptive annotation, i.e., "This site is about…" (Not really blogging either, but getting close depending on the depth of the description). Links with analysis that gets into the meaning of the content being linked. (A simple form of blogging). Reflective, metacognitive writing on practice without links. (Complex writing, but simple blogging, I think. Commenting would probably fall in here somewhere). Links with analysis and synthesis that articulate a deeper understanding or relationship to the content being linked and written with potential audience in mind. (Real blogging). Extended analysis and synthesis over a longer period of time that builds on previous posts, links, and comments. (Complex blogging).

Interactive cell tutorial. Nice way to have students study and to explore the cells. Shows different processes interactively as well. 

Mr. Greer's ISN page. Nice example of how to set it up for kids. I really like these two boxes on the page: Why use an interactive notebook? 1. Students use both their visual and linguistic intelligences 2. Note-taking becomes an active process 3. Notebooks help students to systematically organize as they learn 4. Notebooks become a portfolio of individual learning Personal Response Instructions 1. Summarize the new information you have learned from the activity/presentation 2. Relate or connect this new learning to what you previously knew about the topic 3. Tell how you feel about what you have learned. At least 3 paragraphs are needed to meet the expectations for this assignment.

250 free ebooks. If you have students who are not reading for whatever reason, it's a great place to get started. Rather than not letting them experience the text, let them experience it. Get the process of appreciating storytelling even if it is audio.

Another digital storytelling site. I've not gone through the process with this site, but sharing it.

I love using digital images (or any images for that matter) to get students looking at content differently. This site takes a very simple concept (giving students a visual prompt and asking them to write) and provides great examples of pictures that people can use for this process. For me it is a natural next step to then have students creating pictures that represent a prompt or create pictures to use as prompts, and given the ease in which students can take and share images, it is simple to do in a classroom setting.

"LiveBinders is your 3-ring binder for the Web * Collect your resources * Organize them neatly and easily * Present them with pride Best of all, it's free!" Now we are talking not only an organization tool but a creativity tool. In the process or organzing my materials, I'm creating those connections and webbing of links to where and why I post material in multiple places (3 ring binder tabs). I like it. I also like that it's drag and drop. I need to play some more with this one!