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"AUTHOR: ISSIE LAPOWSKY. ISSIE LAPOWSKY DATE OF PUBLICATION: 05.04.15. 05.04.15 TIME OF PUBLICATION: 7:00 AM. 7:00 AM INSIDE THE SCHOOL SILICON VALLEY THINKS WILL SAVE EDUCATION Click to Open Overlay Gallery Students in the youngest class at the Fort Mason AltSchool help their teacher, Jennifer Aguilar, compile a list of what they know and what they want to know about butterflies. CHRISTIE HEMM KLOK/WIRED SO YOU'RE A parent, thinking about sending your 7-year-old to this rogue startup of a school you heard about from your friend's neighbor's sister. It's prospective parent information day, and you make the trek to San Francisco's South of Market neighborhood. You walk up to the second floor of the school, file into a glass-walled conference room overlooking a classroom, and take a seat alongside dozens of other parents who, like you, feel that public schools-with their endless bubble-filled tests, 38-kid classrooms, and antiquated approach to learning-just aren't cutting it. At the same time, you're thinking: this school is kind of weird. On one side of the glass is a cheery little scene, with two teachers leading two different middle school lessons on opposite ends of the room. But on the other side is something altogether unusual: an airy and open office with vaulted ceilings, sunlight streaming onto low-slung couches, and rows of hoodie-wearing employees typing away on their computers while munching on free snacks from the kitchen. And while you can't quite be sure, you think that might be a robot on wheels roaming about. Then there's the guy who's standing at the front of the conference room, the school's founder. Dressed in the San Francisco standard issue t-shirt and jeans, he's unlike any school administrator you've ever met. But the more he talks about how this school uses technology to enhance and individualize education, the more you start to like what he has to say. And so, if you are truly fed up with the school stat

Digital citizenship curriculum targets 4th, 5th graders

Lesson plans, articles, and tools to teach Digital Citizenship and Internet Safety

Internet safety FREE curriculum and implementation guides. The site has admin, teacher, and student resources. Digital Passport is one of the Internet Safety programs available.

Google Apps Education Edition is a broad IT solution that schools can use to bring communication and collaboration tools to the entire academic community for free. Google manages all the technology details, so you can focus your time, energy and budgets on teaching your kids. Students, teachers and staff can share ideas more quickly and get things done more effectively when they have access to the same powerful communication and sharing tools. Google Apps Education Edition lets tech administrators provide email, sharable online calendars, instant messaging tools and even a dedicated website to faculty, students and staff for free. There's no hardware or software to install or maintain, since everything is delivered through a standard web browser -- anytime, from anyplace.

Technology and teaching - two words that seem to fit together perfectly today for most teachers and learners. So much so that a slew of new blogs have come on board to talk about education technology - or, edTech. This list of the 50 best education technology blogs are not inclusive, as there are so many new blogs available; however, if you look at links provided by many of these blogs to other edTech blogs, you may learn about even more blog that you aren't reading yet.

You can't motivate students with technology because technology alone isn't motivating. Worse yet, students are almost always ambivalent toward digital tools.

This is a website to collect and share tools, hardware and applications available for the enhancement of technology in edudcation with emphasis in Special education. We have been collecting material over the last 7 years. This is our attempt to put together all that information in a categorized format so parents, educators and other professionals who work with kids with special needs can benefit from the knowledge we already acquired.

When I was a kid, one of my prize possessions was a big, red Swiss Army knife. It had everything from a plastic toothpick and a spoon to a bottle opener and screwdriver. I used it for all kinds of projects, and I always had it with me just in case someone needed to pry something open or tighten something down. Today I carry a more modern multipurpose tool-the smartphone.

A great blog post on social pedagogies and how they can be incorporated in university/college classes. A good understanding of creating authentic learning experiences through social media.

A great blog post on social pedagogies and how they can be incorporated in university/college classes. A good understanding of creating authentic learning experiences through social media.

A great blog post on social pedagogies and how they can be incorporated in university/college classes. A good understanding of creating authentic learning experiences through social media.

Nancy: You need a phased attack. Phase one involves marshaling the technologies you do have handy to create communication with parents. Use Twitter for homework updates, essential questions about reading assignments, a "writer's tip of the day" etc. This is what I call a "tier 1" communication. This technology gives few details, but provides parents talking points during dinner conversation with their kids. Then use your website to add the major details, evaluation rubrics, blogging, etc. What I like to provide are "desktop" videos that capture you using or modeling Web 2.0 technologies, and their potential in the classroom. Post these on your website and say something like, "Blocked here at [your school] but you can perhaps use these tools at home..." When parents start to see the same text appear over and over as a caption or comment in your video, they just might get angry enough to go to the superintendent, or the IT "integration specialist" and say, "Enough! Give this teacher the tools she needs!" We're fighting this battle everywhere. Educators are being treated like children who don't have a clue. Keep fighting the good fight and good luck!

I like the idea of backchannel discussion.... Think literature circle?  Kids on computers during Read to Self doing a silent discussion on a topic of MY CHOICE?  Like I can be a part of it too during a skills group or individual conference........?  Too much multitasking?

Great quote: "The age of the computer lab is kind of out." Move toward to mobile devices and digital tools.

"Crickets are small programmable devices that can make things spin, light up, and play music. You can plug lights, motors, and sensors into a Cricket, then write computer programs to tell them how to react and behave. With Crickets, you can create musical sculptures, interactive jewelry, dancing creatures, and other artistic inventions -- and learn important math, science, and engineering ideas in the process. Crickets are based on more than a decade of NSF-funded educational research. Lifelong Kindergarten researchers collaborated with the LEGO company to create the first "programmable bricks," squeezing computational power into LEGO bricks. This research led to the LEGO MindStorms robotics kits, now used by millions of people around the world. While LEGO MindStorms is designed especially for making robots, Crickets are designed especially for making artistic creations. Crickets were refined in collaboration with the Playful Invention and Exploration (PIE) museum network, and are now sold as a product through the Playful Invention Company (PICO)."

Rather than ban what should be a valuable tool in education, how about we teach the students proper usage of smartphones in and out of the classroom?