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This is a news letter you may want to subscribe to. It is free and chalked with good tech information. I tried to reproduce the news brief I received today which talked about the fallout Apple and Google had over Google's involvement with the Android operating system (Iphone's major competition) and how Apple did not renew its license with Google to include the You Tube app on their phones and IPads. Here is s snippet from this week's most read stories: Apple and Google have played a key role in education over the years. With the news earlier this week that Apple will not pre-install the YouTube app on their latest iOS upgrade, coupled with the news that they will have their own map app, you have to wonder how secure their relationship is. It seems that Apple wasn't too pleased about Google's purchase of the Android operating system, which now runs on half of the world's smartphones. If these are indeed the first steps in severing that relationship, what does this mean to districts that support both Apple iOS devices and Google? My district would fall into this category and I have to say both companies have something in common with end-users: their ease of use. Could this break-up actually make usability worse in the future? If I email a link from my Apple map app to my gmail account, what will open when I click on it? If I post something on YouTube, how will I view it on my iPhone? (for the record Apple says it will support in-browser YouTube) I don't have the answer yet, but let me Google it on my iPad and get back to you. - Carl Hooker, SchoolCIO advisor

"Welcome to the Teachers Without Borders social network, a global community of teachers working to connect education and human welfare. This is a place to connect, share experiences and resources, and support colleagues from around the world. Membership is FREE and will give you access to colleagues, information and resources you can use for your professional needs and goals, ad to support education initiatives in your schools and communities." #teachers

The George Lucas Educational Foundation (GLEF) is a nonprofit operating foundation dedicated to promoting a vision of inspired learning and teaching - where students are challenged and engaged, have access to interactive technologies, and are supported by inspired teachers and involved parents and communities. Edutopia spotlights classrooms where innovations are taking place. This organization has a plethora of materials/resources for all teachers in all content areas, and I refer to it a lot in my own practice for suggestions.

"For the uninitiated, the flipped concept suggests that we can now use technology to offload many of the more mundane classroom tasks - lectures primarily. It's not hard to see the appeal, with the advent of Khan Academy and easy screencast-recording technology that allows any of us to give a lecture for homework and free up time for in-class problem-solving and discussion. But here's the thing: flipping is nothing new, and as it stands, most flipping that I see doesn't flip the most important switch that I've been discussing here - moving ownership of learning away from the teacher and more toward the student."

"Google Drive: keep everything, share anything Google Drive is your place to keep single up-to-date versions of all of your files online." More and more schools are using this application to store and share documents, photos/images, events, student work and a whole lot more so everything is easily accessible and secure.

When schools and districts put in place top down policies they fall short exactly because they are top down. Effective policies are developed with stakeholders, not just lawyers and policymakers. Parents, students, teachers, and school leaders should be brought together to discuss and create such policies. Additionally, district policies should allow room for school-by-school customization that works best for the students in each community

"By using a new website for much of the last year to help manage his middle school charges, California teacher Ricardo Higuera said, "I found myself doing a lot less yelling." The free website ClassDojo, the brainchild of a former teacher and a computer game developer, launched quietly about a year ago, and today the education startup announced it has more than 3.5 million teacher and student users in 30 countries, most of them in the United States. It officially shed its beta label, too."

Steve Spangler Science offers hundreds of science experiments and science demos that inspire the imagination and make learning fun. Sign-up for our award-winning Experiment of the Week... it's free... or check out Steve Spangler's latest book, Fire Bubbles and Exploding Toothpaste.

Distance Learning Resource Network (DLRN) - This is the dissemination project for the Star Schools Program, a federally funded distance education program that helps small or isolated schools in rural areas use new technologies to offer courses to students, and professional development to teachers, that they could not otherwise provide. This Web site includes general information about distance education; instructional modules, enrichment activities and courses; summaries of current research; and online course-design tools....

ZippSlip enables schools and parents to fully process paper forms online, from any smartphone, tablet, or computer. All results are tracked and displayed by our cloud based app that is 100% HIPAA and FERPA compliant.

"There's an ongoing debate about the role social media should play in education. Advocates point out the benefits that social media provides for today's digital learners while critics call for regulation and for removing social media from classrooms. Finding a middle ground has become a challenge." The is an article that provides a look at both sides of integrating social media into the classroom, and was referred to by several student in this class to help them look at this debate.

"A growing criticism of the American education system is that teachers spend too much of their time distanced from their colleagues (a recent survey found that teachers spend just 3% of their school day collaborating with other teachers), encouraging competition rather than collaboration, and making it difficult for teachers to work together to solve educational and institutional issues." #teachers

This is a wiki the students in my EDUC 521 Human Learning and Motivation course created as part of the course. They did not like the textbook, so I challenged them to put one of their own together and this is what they came up with.

"The modern workplace and lifestyle demand that students balance cognitive, personal and interpersonal abilities, but current education policy discussions have not defined those abilities well, according to a special report released this afternoon by the National Research Council of the National Academies of Science in Washington."

"The study found that, of the students observed, 94 percent used the Internet, 82 percent go online at home, and 77 percent had a profile on a social networking site. When asked what they learn from using social networking sites, the students listed technology skills as the top lesson, followed by creativity, being open to new or diverse views, and communication skills."

ThingLink's technology makes it possible to embed audio, video and rich media links directly in images and share them across the web.

"If you're flipping over the flipped classroom, you may also be looking for a tool that can record and broadcast real-time screencasts in your chosen platform (i.e. Skype, MSN Messenger, UStream) that you can use for capturing webcasts, tutorials, and more."

Digital Citizenship is a concept which helps teachers, technology leaders and parents to understand what students/children/technology users should know to use technology appropriately. Digital Citizenship is more than just a teaching tool; it is a way to prepare students/technology users for a society full of technology. Too often we are seeing students as well as adults misusing and abusing technology but not sure what to do. The issue is more than what the users do not know but what is considered appropriate technology usage.

In my experience, students love creating word clouds using Wordle. It's pretty simple to use and students can change size, fonts, and colors to fit their preference.