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An important read as we work to reinvent schools and make sure we measure authentic learning with more authentic measures than bubble trouble. ;-)

This infographic is an impactful one helping school boards and IT departments understand the important of BYOD environments. In 2011 70% of the workforce between 22-34 used tablets and globally 46% of the mobile workforce has a smartphone. Using, managing, and maximizing these tools is an important part of modern life. Perhaps today's issues are helping students learn to focus, but keeping them out of school is shortsighted decision that will be looked back upon as a lack of vision... that is if you can help kids focus and help teachers encourage the use of them effectively. "Smartphones and Tablet sales will soon take over laptop and desktop computer sales: Don't stick just to books - why not let students use the technology they'll need in the future?"

YEs, they are here. Smart furniture. This is the smart table. Expect to see desks and more as we begin to merge our technology with everything around us. This would make a great unit for a demo or cool interactive learning center. " SMART Table® 442i collaborative learning center. Publicly unveiled at the British Education Technology Conference in London today, the SMART Table features an engaging 360 degree, multitouch surface with a brilliant 106.68 cm (42") high-definition 1080p LCD display. The SMART Table enables up to eight students to interact simultaneously and actively collaborate to achieve shared learning goals."

An interesting guide from edutopia for parents that you can share with your parents and PTO. They share a lot of examples of 21st century learning and as you work to build support for these things, this is a great document to share. (Full Disclosure: The digiteen project is listed for middle school - after this was listed, we saw such an inundation of schools wanting to do the project, we created the DigiTween project for kids aged 10-12 and Digiteen is still for kids aged 13+.) There are a lot of other great sites including the World Peace game, information on Skype in the Classroom, World of Warcraft in School and the Digital Youth Network. Download and share.

Excellent infographic about how students are using technology. 98% own a digital device 3/4 say they wouldn't be able to study without technology 46% say they'd be more likely to read an assignment in digital format and so forth.

Gamification is one response. By embedding diverse achievements into activities and assessments, learning progress can be refracted infinitely. These systems would be able to more flexibly respond to unique learner pathways and abilities, and would further serve as encouragement mechanics -- instead of one carrot stick, there are hundreds. And not just carrots, but every fruit and vegetable imaginable.

There is a new type of wiki called the "federated wiki" that is the new brainchild of wiki inventor, Ward Cunningham. INfluenced by GitHub, this invention lets you "fork" a wiki page and make your own version with the original author having the choice to integrate your changes or keep it separate. This may be a great type of collaborative writing tool for researchers and academicians who often are concerned about adding to a common repository in that the page could evolve to no longer represent their views but their name is still affixed to the page. On the other hand, those who may not understand it, might incorrectly attribute something that has been forked and edited but not approved by the original author. I like the potential, however. For those of you who do collaborative work, this is an excellent read.

This Educause white paper is a useful write up that you can circulate among your staff. Every school should have a makerspace. Classrooms can each have them. Some are even designating parts of the library as a Makerspace. Great resource to share.

", new research demonstrates that spending does matter. The authors-C. Kirabo Jackson, associate professor of human development and social policy at Northwestern University, Rucker C. Johnson, associate professor of public policy at University of California, Berkeley, and Claudia Persico, a doctoral candidate in human development and social policy at Northwestern University-show that "increased school spending is linked to improved outcomes for students, and for low-income students in particular…Increasing per-pupil spending yields large improvements in educational attainment, wages, and family income, and reductions in the annual incidence of adult poverty for children from low-income families. As they also show, it matters how the new money is spent-such as on instruction, hiring more teachers, increasing teacher pay, hiring guidance counselors and social workers. Money well-spent "can profoundly shape the life outcomes of economically disadvantaged children and thereby reduce the intergenerational transmission of poverty. Money alone may not lift educational outcomes to desired levels, but our findings confirm that the provision of adequate funding may be critical.""

Scientists are continuing to advocate that work and school start later. Researcher Paul Kelley CLAIMS that test scores and work productivity should start at 10am. Of course, what he doesn't account for that this would push sports to later in the day and kids would go to bed even later than they do already. You can only cram so much into a day. Anyway, it is interesting reading. One of the most important things is emphasizing and encouraging to parents that kids get enough sleep.

And I'm seeing this too. This generation wants to start their own business. We see this with Shark tank type experiences. This is a cool overview of what one college is doing as they literally help students start businesses in school instead of doing projects that go in the trash.

NASA mars scientists posted at 1:30 pm on 9/28/2015 just a few hours after it was announced that liquid water was found on MARS -- that they would be answering questions on Reddit. This is a cool thread. yet another reason to join Reddit.

Documented methods that the implementation of blended learning has improved the traditional school system. The Clayton Cristensen Institute for Disruptive Innovation shares twelve of these case studies.

Description, on video, how to set up a live streaming video including equipment needed.