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Steps and screenshots on how to start a Google+ community. If your school is a Google Apps school, this is available as part of the suite. Possible to create student communities for courses, clubs, etc., with fellow teachers, and the community.

"This is part of a series for being professional ina digital world and focuses on when teachers should and shouldn't use email communication." I liked the guidelines. Very clear use of email for teachers with parents, guardians, etc. ***You can download the document & revise it.

This list is considered the "best of the best" by AASL and is comprised of free, user-friendly sites that encourage a community of learners to explore and discover. They also provide a foundation to support AASL's Standards for the 21st-Century Learner. The sites offer tools and resources in content collaboration, content resources with lesson plans, curriculum sharing, digital storytelling, managing and organizing, and social networking and communication.

Excellent use of public domain video clips and voiceover to communicate "Creating Great Things Through Collaboration". Part of the #ETMOOC course I'm involved in. 

Katlin Tucker, a dynamic high school teacher presents her approach-pedagogy-instructional strategies to transform teaching and learning. She demonstrates ways she helps engage students and grow skills in several areas, including communication, comprehension & critique, collaboration, content knowledge, etc. A couple of her main tools include Collaborize Classroom and Google Docs. 

Teaching quality has been defined as "instruction that enables a wide range of students to learn" (Darling-Hammond, 2012), and it is the strongest school-related factor that can improve student learning and achievement (Hanushek, 2011; Nye, Konstantopoulos, and Hedges, 2004; Rivkin, Hanushek, and Kain, 2005). Knowing this, what is the best way to foster and provide ongoing support for good teaching practices? While every school is unique, research has identified several elements that can almost universally increase the chances for successful teacher development and create a powerful and positive school community.

"In Project Based Learning (PBL), students go through an extended process of inquiry in response to a complex question, problem, or challenge. Rigorous projects help students learn key academic content and practice 21st Century Skills (such as collaboration, communication & critical thinking)."

My response: Patrick, thanks for bringing the issue to us to consider. No matter how we see it, it is a discussion that is important to have. It does mean we have quite a responsibility to use the tools we have well. On a Classroom 2.0 Live webinar today, there was a discussion of the technology needing to be transformative, not just a substitute for paper/pencils/books, etc. or just an electronic version of the same curriculum. That brings us to the pedagogical approach of each teacher. If they just place their old methodology on top of the technology, nothing much different will occur. BUT...if they see their method of how students will interact with them and course material differently, the technology can be a tool both the teacher and student can enjoy and in the process they can become more creative, collaborative, and communicative.

"History students in the Perris Union High School District can do more than adorn their classroom walls with cool projects and posters. PUHSD students join larger communities of activists, historians, and journalists to make the world a better place." And they did it with Chromebooks!

"An infopic is a photo with text layered on top that is designed to communicate a message. The message might be a summary, quote, definition, notes, data, weblink, hashtag, or other informational tidbits. The information might come from a conference, workshop, activity, lesson, video, book, a conversation, etc. Your blog, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and Google Plus are great places to share infopics." Tony shares how to create infopic in a great video. He is an amazing teacher!

"Throughout this series, I will focus on the Substitution, Augmentation, Modification, and Redefinition (SAMR) model highlighting different tasks that school-based administrators may face during the school year. These tasks will be broken down and explained using the SAMR model in the following order: Part 1: Staff Presentations Part 2: Community Interaction Part 3: File Management Part 4: Classroom Evaluations Part 5: Staff Input"

 A safe way for teachers to text msg. students and stay in touch with parents - FREE. A quick tool for teachers to use. 

Will Richardson explores this idea: "By pairing personalized learning and technology, a teacher can help students learn what they need to learn through the topics that interest them most." How does "personal learning" fit into the structures we have in school learning environments? 

Citelighter is an easy-to-use academic research tool that utilizes a community of students to help you find valuable content, automatically cite sources, and provide an organizational framework for writing your papers.

Talkwheel creates a visual roundtable collaboration platform to allow groups in enterprises, e-learning and social networks to interact more effectively than anywhere else online. -Enterprises use it to improve communication internally, as well as externally to engage their customers around different interactive focus groups.

Nick Provenzano aka The Nerdy Teacher, shares his ideas on how to embrace and implement Ed. Tech. in 2015