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Edmodo is one of the startups whose name pops up a lot when you talk about "edtech." Founded in 2007, the company is almost old school, yet, in spite of the influx of new education-focused startups, Edmodo continues to press forward. This is largely due to due to its appeal as a social learning platform for K-12 education - one that has earned it the "Facebook for the classroom" moniker - meaning that Edmodo enables teachers to share to share content, manage projects, assignments and notifications, distribute quizzes and events - both among students and colleagues. But the real key, and where it departs from being synonymous with an "educational Facebook," is that all this collaboration and classroom management takes place within a network that it completely private and secure.

"The battle for supremacy in the K-12 whiteboard market is heating up. Companies are scrambling for new sources of revenue, making strategic moves to reinvent their products in the age of tablet computing, and sizing up their competitors to see what they can do to differentiate themselves from the pack. Who ultimately ends up on top has huge implications for educational technology leaders, who must determine which company is the best fit for their needs, and at a cost their districts can afford in still-difficult budget times. Complicating those decisions are changes in the technological landscape that are raising questions about the long-term educational relevance of interactive whiteboards. Do classrooms really need them in the age of iPads?"

When it comes to using technology in school, the tension between what students and parents want and what schools allow is becoming more apparent - and more divisive. Students want more control over how they use technology in school, but many classrooms are still making it difficult. That's according to the most recent Speak Up 2011 report, "Mapping a Personalized Learning Journey," which reflects the views of more than 416,000 K-12 students, parents, and educators nationwide surveyed on how technology can enhance the learning environment.

The NMC Horizon EdTech Weekly App delivers curated, relevant, and timely edtech projects and news to your iPad or iPhone every weekend. It also includes the entire NMC Horizon Report series on emerging technology across various learning sectors, and a rich, searchable, re-mixable database of educational technology and innovation resources. Whether you are in higher education, K-12, or the museum world, the NMC Horizon EdTech Weekly App delivers the best of the NMC Horizon Project.

"Google launched an open source course building web application for the growing list of K-12 and big-name universities developing online classes. The barebones website is a lightweight way to bring course material online, track student engagement (with web traffic and surveys), and evaluate performance. "We want to use this launch to show that Google believes it can contribute to technology in education," says Google's Director of Research, Peter Norvig."

"Apple is upping its bid for its hot-selling iPad to be a teaching device, with an update today to its iTunes U app that allows any teacher to create a private course. The new features, aimed at K-12 teachers who use iPads in the classroom, allow teachers to create up to 12 private courses."

"This year, our K-6 staff began learning in a new virtual way using Twitter. After a couple staff in-service trainings and after school workshops, parents and teachers ventured into this new educational Twitterverse. As we enter the final week of school, I'd like to share it's initial impact on teaching and learning from my principal's lens."

"Apple's new Device Enrollment Program (DEP) is a significant new enterprise initiative that removes one of the biggest, if not the biggest, roadblocks to iOS device deployments within businesses or schools: The need to touch each device to ensure that it is fully managed and locked down. The Device Enrollment Program was announced yesterday along with a slew of new IT-focused documentation and tweaks to managing Apple IDs for K-12 students and Apple's app volume purchase/licensing program. It offers the ability to configure iOS devices as supervised without using Apple Configurator, allowing for over-the-air management with these evice management capabilities. As such, this can be considered one of the most groundbreaking iOS management additions since Apple introduced MDM support nearly four years ago."

"This guide shows you how to get a US iTunes account, and get all the free apps from the US store. Getting paid apps is a bit tricky, as you'll need to find a way to add credits to your US iTunes account without a US credit card (or a US PayPal account).  The steps in this guide will also work for signing up to the U.K iTunes store."

"Common Sense Media's K-12 Digital Literacy and Citizenship Curriculum is now available in the iBooks Store. Download our interactive, multimedia Teacher Editions and Student Workbooks today!"

"First launched in 2006, the Infinite Thinking Machine (ITM) is a high-energy Internet TV show directly targeted at K-12 educators, parents and students. Our goal is to inspire creativity and innovation in education."

"A wiki approach to developing joint guidance to support the Computing Curriculum" ... but useful guidance for anyone delivering Computing with their K-12 students.

"Cyber-bullying, update-addiction, sexting - from the perspective of a parent raising a ''digital native'' child, social media seems fraught with dangers. But new research suggests the risks inherent in social media use by younger generations might be overblown. danah boyd, assistant research professor at Harvard and principal researcher for Microsoft Research - like k.d.lang, she prefers the lower case - has completed a large-scale study on how US teenagers use the internet in general, and social media in particular. Her book is called It's Complicated, and is the result of in-depth interviews with scores of teens over an eight-year period."

"How do these teachers find and then evaluate the games that they use? The most common way of learning about any educational tools is from peers. While face to face networks are limited by the number of interactions with people in one's grade, school, or conferences, online professional learning networks have become invaluable."

Online library of picture books that kids can read independently or as a read along. Great for K-2. Books can be personalised with students names. Register for free if you want to save/share your books.

"The Buck Institute for Education commissioned the cutting-edge advertising agency, Common Craft, to create a short animated video that explains in clear language the essential elements of Project Based Learning (PBL). This simple video makes the essential elements of PBL come alive and brings to light the 21st Century skills and competencies (collaboration, communication, critical thinking) that will enable K-12 students to be college and work-ready as well as effective members of their communities."

Interesting article commenting on the results of the annual "PBS Digitally Inclined" report indicating '76 percent of K-12 educators said they use digital media in the classroom, up from 69 percent in 2008. Of those teachers, 80 percent are frequent or regular users'. This type of data is of value to teacher librarians when reviewing their role within schools. If you don't have a focus on multimedia, here is proof that it's time to have a closer look.

Some free tools for making your own ebooks! "Being an open source format, ePub books are already widely available on the net. But you can also create your own electronic books in ePub format. Here are two free multiplatform tools to create iBooks - a.k.a: ePub books."