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This is a call out specifically to my friends out there in the Atlanta area or anywhere in Georgia to put in for a poster session at Georgia Tech's conference about the Foundations for the future. I wish I could get away but am a bit tied up at school right now. Here's the information and link: "Foundations for the Future (F3), a K-12 outreach and research program at Georgia Tech Research Institute, knows that Georgia teachers are using technology in amazing ways to inspire and engage students. One of the most frequent comments we hear is that it is difficult for educators to know what's working for other educators because there is so much going on, not everyone can afford to attend conferences, and access to technology is inconsistent across the state. We want to honor and highlight teachers and their projects. What better way to get inspired than through a fellow colleague! What better way to meet other passionate educators and share your experiences! F3 is hosting the 2013 F3 Educator Showcase during our May Explorers Guild meeting. The showcase will include a panel discussion along with a poster session. If you are interested in applying for the poster session, all you need to do is follow the guidelines below. Posters will be chosen by a selection committee of F3 partners and Georgia Tech colleagues. Chosen posters will be printed for participants so that after the event they can take the posters back to their school to continue highlighting the good work taking place there! This event helps support F3's mission to help acquire and leverage instructional technology resources for Georgia's classrooms, schools, and districts, share best practices, and establish a community of learners. We look forward to your submissions and can't wait to see you all at the event in May!   Guidelines for Poster Abstract Submission: Title: Accurately and concisely present your idea in 15 words or less Abstract: In 350 words or less, tell us about how using technology

This story about a social media persona gone wrong is an excellent case study for educators. Personally, when I do fiction on Twitter (as in the case of a fictitious dialog between a student and teacher - I always start by disclosing it.) Secondly, I don't think it is smart to mess with people by making things up. People need to be able to trust you -- especially if you want to be a credible academic source. That said, read this so that when you see parody or fake accounts that you know they exist and you can also know that some people making things up for the fun of it.

You'll notice new quick action buttons in Gmail as announced by Google on Wednesday. They want to make things more intuitive. Expect these changes to happen on a gradual basis but they are coming. Including the ability to RSVP more easily - a feature which I like as some stragglers still refuse to properly use Google Calendar or any online calendar at all. "When the situation calls for it, new quick action buttons will pop up in an email, letting you accomplish simple tasks without reaching for the keyboard. For event RSVPs, you can even mark your attendance from the main inbox view -- a preview with all the key details will pop up, letting you respond with a simple Yes, Maybe or No. "

An excellent list of airplay enabled apps - although this was out a bit before the current Apple TV, I'm finding that these are some of the highest rated apps on the store with some very cool video capabilities. For example, the free ShowMe app combs your networks and serves up video that your friends are watching -- not to your ipad (although that is possible) but to your TV that is enabled with the Apple TV. I'm finding the Apple TV higher quality than my Roku box, although I'm keeping my Roku box because it has Amazon and my Apple TV does not. If you get an Apple TV, make sure you set up Remote and download some of these apps.

Some of my students are signing up to join the Quest2matter as part of their passion projects. Here's a link to the website and the signup. If your child wants to make a difference in the world, you may want to mention this as something they want to do. Very exciting. "The Quest2Matter is a five-week, student-focused initiative that seeks to inspire students to tackle problems that break their heart. This is an unprecedented opportunity to unlock the potential of students to think entrepreneurially and innovatively and use modern tools to solve problems that break their heart. To learn more about the Quest2Matter, read this post. We are looking to recruit 225 students, and teachers to help facilitate them for our DREAM TEAM! They will be helping us launch the Quest2Matter and its parent movement, Choose2Matter. See the general information and qualifications below, followed by the specific duties of each team. At the very bottom of this post, you'll find a link to the sign-up form."

If you have to order tshirts or come up with theme ideas, I love this website. It has more than sports slogans but slogans for just about anything. People vote them up. Very cool site for organizers of anything and principals. Enjoy!

Does your "cell phone" policy include a policy for wearable technology. What will you do when a student shows up wearing Google glass? How about when they go into the locker room? Think about it and adjust your Aup's this summer - next summer will be too late. "A heads-up display seems like a natural fit, and thus we have Google Glass. It's a headset with a projected display, a camera and a data connection that could revolutionize the mobile device industry. It could also cause a public uproar over privacy concerns. Is the potential worth the risk?"

Doug Johnson is a great read for his blunt, in your face honesty and his point about how technology companies are trying to differentiate is a great one. I think, however, we should extend this to schools as well. If your school is great, say why, but dissing the competition is no way to compete. If you think your school has no competition, think again. So, read this in light of the arriving and coming competition on the edulandscape and have an honest take on how you should "sell" the virtues of your school. If you can't talk about how great your school is and have to resort to how bad the other one is, prepare for a day when you'll shutter the windows and wonder how they're going to keep the bugs out of your empty building. Wake up and smell the wires burning their way into your student's computers and tablets, great teachers are just a click away and we've all got to learn how to blend and trend our courses, teaching, and to bridge our classrooms to add real value as teachers. It isn't hard as you think but if you just sit and teach like you've always taught, you're setting yourself up for some unpleasant days. You can't do everything but you can do something to improve yourself. Next practices are an important part of your best practice. Always innovate and never settle. Standards are only the beginning, you must have purpose if you're going to be a great teacher. Doug says: "But what I do know that when competitors trash each other, I tend to tune out. And I flat out hate it when I know they are lying - and I will NOT buy from a liar. A salesman recently promoted his video storage service by stating "unlike YouTube, we don't own your movies." That's just not true. (YouTube doesn't own your movies, GoogleApps doesn't own your Docs, CIPA, FERPA, etc. do not ban social media.)"

Displays can take up vast areas of wall space and many hours of adults' time, therefore teachers and leaders must be sure of the impact that they are having on learning so that what is on display is justified and not simply a waste of time and space.  Put simply, before a display goes up, we must ask: What will this display do to improve outcomes for children?  For this to be answered with any sort of reliability, the question must be framed within a sound knowledge of how children learn and what learning is - a change in long-term memory...

"A member of staff said to me at INSET last Friday that all they wanted from INSET was to take away at least one idea to make their teaching better or their lessons more exciting. I agree and this was my favourite idea: a pop-up museum."

Interestingly, if a stranger joins a hangout, google will kick a teen user off their own hangout. Anyone who is 13 and up can now use Google plus. "Google said Thursday that it is opening up its Google+ social network to teens 13 and over, while rolling out new protections for those teens who join."

Not exactly kicking them off, their camera will be turned off and mic muted if someone that is not in their circles joins a hangout. The teens have the choice to continue back in the hangout if they want to. Pretty powerful tool for them to have. From the Google Safety Center: Hangouts are a great way to connect with other people face to face to face. Just like in real life, you can decide which people you want to chat with. However, sometimes someone joins a conversation that you don't want to chat with (also like real life). So when someone outside your circles joins a Hangout, we'll pull you out and ask if you want to continue. This gives you a safe and easy way to leave the conversation without having to interact with the new attendee first. At the same time, this still gives you the ability to stay if the new person is someone you want to chat with, but you haven't added to circles yet. http://support.google.com/plus/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=2409072

t's not about the numbers, it's about change top-down thinking and bottom-up action are both essential a new understanding of 'learning' is needed by everyone learning professionals have to step up and let go manager engagement and capability are both critical

Listen up: nothing is ever free! If you're gong to take a MOOC or other course, you have far less accountability and must have far more discipline. Maybe paying for college classes is more paying for someone to hold your feet to the fire. But the failure rate in these MOOCs is atrocious. If you look at the cost per passing student, it might just be back up there at the regular credit price. Nothing, I repeat NOTHING is free and that ESPECIALLY includes education. Read this article and discuss. What do you think, what is the place for MOOCs? (If you write on your blog, please leave a link in the comments so others can see.)

These heartbreaking words from a teacher in the UK. As the world tries to improve education by the numbers, the world has forgotten kids aren't numbers. They are precious, individual and unique and deserve education systems that celebrate and encourage that. OK, teachers, it is time to man the media - you are the media now! Are you fed up yet? It might not be you right now, but if you don't speak, it will be, wherever you teach, such stories impact us all and the profession we care for so much. "As a teacher, I vowed that I would work hard to nurture my students, to make each and every student feel valued and for them to know that they have a voice, and a place in the world. However the last two years have made me feel like that insecure 14-year-old again: I have lost my confidence because of the overly-rigid current education system. We are constantly being told we are not good enough and that we are not doing enough: enough intervention, enough rigorous marking, enough sustained and rapid progress. What excited me the most about becoming a teacher was discovering the hidden talents and sparks of genius in my students. However, it breaks my heart to say this, but I feel that I no longer have time, nor am I encouraged to make these discoveries. We are so caught up with data and so many progress checks that we don't give our students the time to shine. I wonder what would happen if the greats of the world like Einstein, Gaudi, Picasso and Martin Luther King were to attend school in 2013, would they be able to cultivate their talents and thrive?"

Pernille Ripp's poignant post shares why more teachers don't refuse to give the tests. Unless it is done en masse, it can't really be done. That said, parents can refuse to have their children take the test without repercussions and in fact, a national opt out movement is brewing. "If I were to refuse administering these state mandated tests, I would get in trouble.  That is an absolute guarantee.  And while I have never been one to shy away from too much controversy, the kind of trouble this time would be much bigger than a write up.  I could even lose my job for failing to do my duties.  To some that may not seem like a big deal, after all, I should be standing up for my students and their rights, my own opinions, I should protect those children that I teach from the tests.  But my job is vital to my own children.  My job is our health insurance.  My job gives us just enough money so that we can pay our bills.  I wish my husband had a huge paying job, he doesn't, and so we are a very dependent two income family.  So losing my job refusing tests just isn't something I can rationally do and in a sense, I am not sure I should be the one refusing the tests anyway."

Yes, it is time to explore space. It may just take a political competitor to wake up the United States to the space-age advantage it has had for decades as the Chinese plan to land a robotic probe on the moon. We need to be talking about space. "China's mission to robotically land on the moon next month is sure to stir up lunar dust, but it may also cause a political dustup, too. China is in the final stages of preparing its robotic Chang'e 3 moon lander to launch atop a Long March 3B rocket, slated for liftoff in early December. The ambitious mission is built to first orbit the moon, then propel down to a landing site, after which a small, solar-powered lunar rover will be unleashed."

Some great ideas for clearing up space in your email.

Terry Freedman from the UK makes some great points about expertise in Computing. This is particularly relevant in the UK where every student age 5 and up is expected to be taught programming in school. (Wake up world.) Terry says: "Some Principals and Headteachers think that a good way around the problem of teaching computing is to not worry about whether teachers have subject knowledge at all. "All we need are facilitators", they say, "while the kids can teach themselves and each other." This is, as any teacher knows (or should know), easy to say, less easy to do, and not altogether the most desirable thing to do even if you can do it. However, just in case your school happens to be "led" by one of the aforementioned Headteachers, here are some arguments you may want to use. I think that any one of them should suffice, and all of them together make for a cast-iron case." Read more... this is a topic that will be increasingly discussed in other countries.

Laura Fleming is using Makerspace in her classroom. She's at New Milford HIgh School -- a place led by one of the best principals in the business, Eric Sheninger (his new book is awesome - out in January). Laura is using Mozilla's Web Literacy Standard and her Makerspace which includes robotics, stop motion animation and "Molecular gastronomy" and more. Wow. I'm fascinated. Take a look. "Setting up a Makerspace has been a priority of mine from the moment I started here at New Milford High School, and it's already well on its way to being achieved. Having a school principal who provides the perfect mix of encouragement and autonomy has, of course, been a great help, but it has also been very much a team effort: the school's tech team and custodians have been very supportive and cooperative, along with a diverse variety of students interested in 'making' experiences. At the heart of the vision for my Makerspace is to develop the space and to provide resources and opportunities that will aid in promoting web literacy.  These components encompass Mozilla's Web Literacy Standard.  The standard is make up of three key elements:  exploring, building and connecting and focuses on reading, writing and participating on the web.   "

Yes! Applause to the always innovative, always helpful National Writing Project for joining in the Hour of Code celebrations coming up. Have you signed up your school? Are you ready to participate? If you want to use writing as it relates to Computer Science, realize that this is important to all of us. "The National Writing Project is joining Code.org to support the Hour of Code . The largest initiative of its kind, the Hour of Code is a campaign to recruit 10 million students to try computer science for one hour during Computer Science Education Week (December 9-15). Join the National Writing Project, Microsoft, Google, Apple, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, the Boys & Girls Clubs of America, and over 100 other individuals and organizations to make history. Start planning the Hour of Code for your classroom (or school) at http://hourofcode.com/ ."