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The demise of Britannica is being pontificated but I agree that it wasn't Wikipedia that killed it. I don't totally agree with this author in that the PC killed Britannica because it became our information portal through the Internet.

An amazing tool for sharing what's on your screen live over the Internet. Just share a link to see. You can even take control of the remote computer to fix any problems (user has to agree to this). http://ictmagic.wikispaces.com/ICT+%26+Web+Tools

How the tide turns. Just take away wikipedia and blackout google and this is what happens. This was the topic of conversation at school yesterday. Major websites may have just realized the power of those eyeballs on their site. "Three co-sponsors of the SOPA and PIPA antipiracy bills have publicly withdrawn their support as Wikipedia and thousands of other websites blacked out their pages Wednesday to protest the legislation. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) withdrew as a co-sponsor of the Protect IP Act in the Senate, while Reps. Lee Terry (R-Neb.) and Ben Quayle (R-Ariz.) said they were pulling their names from the companion House bill, the Stop Online Piracy Act. Opponents of the legislation, led by large Internet companies, say its broad definitions could lead to censorship of online content and force some websites to shut down.

While the UK celebrates safer internet day on February 7, we can go through and get some great resources for kids of all ages (including some SmartBoard templates.) 

Every day we feature the best information design and data visualization from the internet. If you share our love for data-filled illustrations, you've come to the right place. We spend countless hours searching the web for the most interesting, visually stimulating, mind blowing infographics. We curate our findings and choose one infographic to publish every week-day. Get free infographics delivered to your inbox, once a day!

A great site for making online magazines using content from the internet. Add articles, videos, audio and more in just a few clicks. http://ictmagic.wikispaces.com/ICT+%26+Web+Tools

This is a great infographic that has been making the rounds on the internet. It shows some great tips on doing better (ie. more targeted) searches on Google. Share it with your students.

Science teachers will love this - a mystery of silk towers in the Amazon is finally solved. These structures went viral after someone posted and asked what they were on the Internet and now it has been discovered: a spider - although no one is really sure how. It baffled entemologists. This whole topic is very cool because it is science but it is also social media and how the two have become inextricably intertwined. This is a great one to talk about in your science classes because there are so many ways you can go with it. So cool.

Videos, Common Core Resources And Lesson Plans For Teachers:  "Teaching Channel is a video showcase -- on the Internet and TV -- of innovative and effective teaching practices in America's schools."

Cool little light that can show various colors to indicate things that have happened. This was funded on kickstarter and I noticed it being added to ifttt.com as a channel. So, for example, if you have a big download and want to be notified when it is done - or if you want to be notified when a certain person (Grandma) logs into skype but you don't want to have to log in or look at the screen - this USB RGB light will light in the color you wish. There are so many cool applications for this as we move into the "internet of things."

Dawn Casey-Rowe hits a tough topic that is the number one complaint that teachers have. I had her on my show not too long a go and she speaks from a tough situation with lots of blocks and bans but gets it done anyway. If your complaint is blocks and bans, then take time to read this post to focus on what you CAN do. Dawn is offering a set of PD blog posts that you'll want to dig into. "This week, we're going to discuss the white elephant in the room. Tech frustration. Many teachers struggle to bring students the type of tech experience they would like because of systemic blocks and bans, or worse, feel embarrassed as students have more access to tech than teachers do. This is the issue that brought me to the tech world myself. Students continually asked the hard questions about why they couldn't utilize technology such as smartphones, laptops, and tablets, and why phones were confiscated when students were using them for educational purposes. I wanted to improve my classroom experience and give my students more, but budget was a concern. Tech access is a problem in many schools. There are legitimate reasons-the desire of administrators to protect students from the darker side of the internet, fear of the unknown, lack of wireless capacity and budget difficulties which cause insufficient numbers of computers or the inability to upgrade existing tech. Some educational leaders have overcome these hurdles, but others are still working to get to that space."

7,000 photos of school lunches are being passed around the Internet. Be aware that your school might be next as this is a hot topic (and has been for years.) Before you know it, you might find that your school has a pic. My school is blessed with amazing lunchroom staff who work hard to serve up great meals. In fact, for their Thanksgiving meal, there are people in town who come to the school to eat it is so good. It is hard with the money they have to make the meals, but we can do better. Delicious lunches are one way to make everyone's day brighter and school to be a place people want to go.

Share this article with your principal and superintendent - not to pressure them but as many start seeing the wisdom that wise leaders tweet, you'll want to help them along. Principals no longer question the wisdom of writing for the school newsletter - this is just a newsletter but in shorter form and much more personal. It is something you can do. "Great schools (online, blended, and traditional) act as nurturing centers that foster creative development and high-quality art, math, and science skills; and school is the medium to advance human development and better society. The internet took our society into hyper speed and successful schools will quickly follow."

Interesting Digital Concept map from Amal Abouldhosn and her class as they discuss media. She says "my students were born in 1998, so they've never really lived on a planet without cell phones or internet." This is a great way to brainstorm and discuss such topics- especially ones where the students have a lot of personal knowledge.

Ransomware is a new kind of malware. The worst Ransomware to hit in some time is the Crypto virus. This virus encrypts your hard drive and you have to send them a $300 certificate (untraceable) so they'll give you the encryption key to decrypt your drive and get your data back. In an interesting twist, the US government disabled the servers running this ransomware scan and now all of the people with the virus have no hope of getting their decryption keys. This is another reason you should be very careful NOT to open suspicious attachments even from legitimate sounding sources. (Many of these messages appeared to be from Fedex and UPS.) The greatest internet filter ever created is the human brain. Educate teachers and others - not through fear but through a skeptical empowerment that always thinks before it clicks and especially before it downloads.

Nice start for rubrics for 2.0 projects

Educational Origami is a blog, and a wiki, about the integration of ICT into the classroom, this is one of the largest challenges that I feel we as teachers face. Its about 21st Century Learning and 21st Century Teaching. Marc Prensky coined the now popular and famous phrase "Digital natives and digital immigrants" in his two papers on digital Children. We the teachers are the immigrants and our students are the natives, brought up in a world where there has always been computers and the internet, where information is always instant and varied. Our teaching and their learning must reflect this.

Educational Origami is a blog , and a wiki, about 21st Century Learning and 21st Century Teaching.

A list of web 2.0 tools to use in the classroom.

Why use Web 2.0 tools in science and math classes? The primary reason is they facilitate access to input and interaction with content through reading, writing, listening, and speaking. These tools offer enormous advantages for science and math teachers, in terms of helping their students learn using Web 2.0 tools. For example: * Most of these tools can be edited from any computer connected to the Internet. Teachers can add, edit and delete information even during class time. * Students learn how to use these tools for academic purposes and, at the same time, can transfer their use to their personal lives and future professional careers. * RSS feeds allow students to access all the desired research information on one page. * Students learn to be autonomous in their learning process.

EXCELLENT video for reminding parents that they need to be aware of what their children are doing on the Internet.