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"Introduction Joan Lucariello, PhD, City University of New York Students do not come to school as blank slates to be filled with instruction. Rather, they come to school with considerable knowledge, some correct and some not. Either way, that knowledge is based on intuition, every-day experience, as well as what they have been taught in other settings. Teachers and researchers generally refer to preinstructional knowledge as preconceptions. Since a considerable amount of our knowledge is organized by subject matter (mathematics, science, etc.), so too are our preconceptions. Before beginning instruction on any new topic, teachers need to know their students' preconceptions because learning, and therefore instruction itself, varies depending on whether students' preconceptions agree with the concepts being taught or contradict those concepts. When preconceptions are consistent with the concepts in the assigned curriculum, student preconceptions are called anchoring conceptions. Learning, in such cases, is much easier. It becomes a matter of conceptual growth, enrichment, or adding to student knowledge. More often, teachers find themselves teaching concepts that are difficult for their students to learn because students' preconceptions are inconsistent with the concepts being taught. In these cases, preconceptions are termed alternative conceptions or misconceptions."

"Technology and education are pretty intertwined these days and nearly every teacher has a few favorite tech tools that make doing his or her job and connecting with students a little bit easier and more fun for all involved. Yet as with anything related to technology, new tools are hitting the market constantly and older ones rising to prominence, broadening their scope, or just adding new features that make them better matches for education, which can make it hard to keep up with the newest and most useful tools even for the most tech-savvy teachers. Here, we've compiled a list of some of the tech tools, including some that are becoming increasingly popular and widely used, that should be part of any teacher's tech tool arsenal this year, whether for their own personal use or as educational aids in the classroom."

"Creating timelines is another important digital skill to be added to the the 33 digital skills we have compiled before. Students should be able to easily create their own learning timelines and share them with each other.This can have a huge positive impact on their overall learning process. Educational Technology and Mobile Learning has sifted through some of the best free timeline making tools and come up with the list below. Just to refresh your mind, a timeline is " a way of displaying a list of events in chronological order, sometimes described as a project artifact. It is typically a graphic design showing a long bar labelled with dates alongside itself and usually events labelled on points where they would have happened.' ( from Wikipedia )."

"The Best Thing To Ever Happen To Google Drive For Teachers First came cloud-based word processing in the form of Google Docs. With cloud-based word processing in education, teachers could remotely access student work, students (provided they had internet access and had a Google account) could retrieve their work from anywhere, and writers could collaborate in real-time with their peers to double-team the pain-staking work that is the writing process. Then Google finally delivered on the long-rumored Google Drive, giving teachers and students the ability to store both documents and images, pdfs and presentations, video files, and more, turning Google into a cloud hard-drive of sorts. Further, the change to Google Drive brought with it access to apps to bolster what Google Drive could do. Which brings us to the latest-and perhaps best-evolution of Google Drive for teachers. Kaizena voice feedback."

"Engage and Assess With Nearpod it's easy, really easy. Bring the classroom to life with interactive mobile presentations that teachers create and customize themselves."

"When collaboration goes wrong, it can be toxic for learning and classroom culture. We are all familiar with the scene: a group of students that is supposed to be completing a collaborative project has splintered off into dysfunctional factions. Maybe it's one student who has sullenly separated her- or himself from the rest of the group, or maybe the group has become two non-communicative teams with separate visions. Sometimes these conflicts lead to resentments that have the potential for long-term damage to the classroom community. "

"hat is the question I've found most helpful whenever I begin one of the workshops I lead on my campus to help academics create and manage their digital identities. Faculty members, graduate students, and others typically respond by saying they would read the candidate's work and talk with others in the field, but eventually someone will say, "Google her." Indeed, it's often the first thing someone says. I then ask attendees what someone might learn if he or she were to Google them. Would they be happy with what a search-committee member, journalist, or conference organizer looking for a keynote speaker learned about their work? Would it tell the whole story?"

"f we hope to construct enduring understanding in our students, it's critical that, now more than ever, we know their strengths and interests. By incorporating students' strengths and weakness into authentic learning experiences from the beginning of each unit, while at the same time including opportunities for feedback, metacognition and revision, we promote a variety of cognitive and emotional benefits that can lead to academic success. For example, students with interpersonal learning strengths find that cooperative group work increases perseverance. Students with artistic, computer, dramatic or organizational skills benefit from appropriate opportunities to engage in building knowledge through their strengths and interests. "

"10 terrific science based Pinterest boards and Pinners I really appreciate the visual aspect of Pinterest over other social media sites. With Pinterest, one look at an appealing image and you want to know more, which makes it tailor made for certain content areas such as science. Pictures of nature, weather phenomenon, and outer space are often some of the most impressive image you can find on Pinterest. Beyond the amazing pictures, there is a great deal of useful information to be found."

"Instructional Design Trends from 2013 and Outlook for 2014: Combining the Use of Instructional Technology with Effective Communication Skills "

"eb-based tools continue to proliferate, giving teachers more to add to their arsenal, but it can be hard to determine which resources are worth spending time exploring. At the International Society of Technology in Education (ISTE) conference this year, Adam Bellow, founder of EduClipper, and Steve Dembo, Online Community Manager for Discovery Education offered a quick run through of some favorite apps. The two educators are early adopters of ed-tech classroom strategies and have a lot of experience with tech integration."

"If you're anything like me, you spend a lot of time scouring the Internet to find useful online teaching resources like web 2.0 tools. That's how you came across this list of 101 Web 2.0 Tools Every Teacher Should Know About, no doubt! Best Teacher ResourcesWhen I find something great (hint, hint!), I make sure to pin it on Pinterest, "like" it on Facebook and save it to my favorite social bookmarking site so that I can come back to it later. I was looking at my treasure trove of resources the other day it occurred to me: Why don't I share this list of awesome web 2.0 tools with my fellow educators?! So, I went through and picked out my 101 favorite tools for teachers and made this list."

"AR Tools are Being Used Today by Creative Educators in Fun, Innovative Ways, but few Know About it (yet). Educators are always looking for new ways to enhance learning and expand the horizons of students in an engaging and interactive way. Gone are the days when class plans were based around exercises from a text book. The world around us is changing rapidly and even preschool age children are becoming more proficient with different types of handheld devices like tablets."

"Can you imagine the level of first-hand knowledge today's students would have if their classrooms came equipped with time machines? Well, believe it or not, they do. Teachers can turn to YouTube to create a virtual time machine. Thanks to uploads of old footage, documentaries and reenactments, YouTube offers a plethora of opportunities to experience history. But wading through countless hours of videos, some appropriate and many not, can be a major undertaking.The handy infographic below allows teachers to take their students on an educational trip through history. Keep reading to learn more!"

"There is something that bothers us about conversations about replacing face-to-face teaching with online learning: they often fall into a trap of assuming that incorporating synchronous interaction is the optimal way to make learning more personable, that it approximates the face-to-face setting closest, and is therefore preferable and better. More often than not, synchronous interaction here implies some form of two-way audiovisual interaction, even though there are text-only forms of synchronous interaction (e.g., Twitter live chat). There are also asynchronous forms of audiovisual interaction (e.g., voicemail, recorded lectures). But we feel the enthusiasm for audiovisual synchronicity often comes without sufficient discernment, and without deliberative consideration of how asynchronous learning can be not only viable but productive."

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