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Thinkfinity.org makes it easy for educators to enhance their classroom instruction with lesson plans, interactive activities and other online resources. Thinkfinity.org also provides a wealth of educational and literacy resources for students, parents and after-school programs.
All of Thinkfinity.org's 55,000 standards-based K-12 lesson plans, student materials, interactive tools and reference materials are reviewed by the nation's leading education organizations to ensure that content is accurate, up-to-date, unbiased and appropriate for students.
AWESOME! Nasa pics of earth taken by astronauts. Explicit instructions for use (free as long as you give credit). Download low res or request hi-res versions.
"In the award-winning documentary Children Full of Life, a fourth-grade class in a primary school in Kanazawa, northwest of Tokyo, learn lessons about compassion from their homeroom teacher, Toshiro Kanamori. He instructs each to write their true inner feelings in a letter, and read it aloud in front of the class. By sharing their lives, the children begin to realize the importance of caring for their classmates."
An article in last week's Education Week looks at the increasingly common practice of reading aloud to middle and high school students. In discussing the practice with Mary Ann Zehr (I'm quoted briefly in the piece) I made the point that while there is certainly nothing wrong with reading out loud to teenagers, it is symptomatic of what I call "literacy creep" - the tendency of elementary school-style instructional techniques to find their way deeper into K-12 education across all content areas.
Instructions: paste or compose a document below. Click Check Writing to get feedback on your writing. Click an underlined spelling error, grammar suggestion, or style suggestion to see more options.
UD can be applied to physical spaces to ensure that they are welcoming, comfortable, accessible, attractive, and functional.
Output and Displays.
Input and Controls.
Manipulations.
Documentation.
Safety.
it is possible to create products that are simultaneously accessible to people with a wide range of abilities, disabilities, and other characteristics.
institutions can express the desire to purchase accessible IT and inquire about the accessibility features of specific products.
UDL as "a research-based set of principles that together form a practical framework for using technology to maximize learning opportunities for every student"
curriculum designers create products to meet the needs of students with a wide range of abilities, learning styles, and preferences.
Multiple means of representation
Multiple means of action and expression
Multiple means of engagement
the following first steps for curriculum developers and teachers:
Unfortunately, most educational software programs available today do not apply these recommendations. Instead of including flexible features that provide access to students with disabilities, they continue to unintentionally erect barriers to the curriculum.
Universal design can be applied to all aspects of
instruction—teaching techniques, curricula, assessment
Class Climate.
Interaction.
Physical Environments and Products.
Delivery Methods.
Information Resources and Technology.
Feedback
Assessment.
Accommodation.
When universal design is applied, everyone feels welcome,
Project Based Learning is an instructional approach built upon authentic learning activities that engage student interest and motivation. These activities are designed to answer a question or solve a problem and generally reflect the types of learning and work people do in the everyday world outside the science or math classroom.
Dan Meyer teaches high school math outside of Santa Cruz, CA, and explores the intersection of math instruction, multimedia, and inquiry-based learning. Every Math teacher should see this!
In these video clips from actual classrooms around the country, Doug Lemov, founder of the charter-school network Uncommon Schools, analyzes techniques that effective teachers use to get students to pay attention and follow instructions.
There are two keys to building the kind of trust required to make the new system successful. The first is to train teachers to effectively facilitate student learning without being the center of attention on a daily basis. This means teachers must develop a new skill set that hybridizes their content knowledge as well as their ability to transfer that knowledge to other fields. The number one trait that districts will be using to judge new teachers in the years to come: flexibility.
The second emphasis should be on generating this type of hybrid learning on a district level before extending beyond the walls of local control.
districts should begin working with isolated courses and training their staff gradually to facilitate these types of learning environments.
This is a comprehensive checklist of best practices for online instruction. The resource was build by Joan Vandervelde and Jim Erbe from the Online Professional Development program at the University of Wisconsin Stout.
"Flipping" is referring to teacher lecture's/instruction being offered in different methods and classroom time being used for project/assignment completion.
Below you will find a set of instructional materials that should make your creation easier. You can begin by reviewing some samples of e-Portfolios created in the Educational Technology and Design class in C&I.
Excellent write up on the uses of technology integration information from the Florida Center for Instructional Technology. This is an incredible example of how a good blogger (like Richard Byrne) can take what looks very complex and help his readers understand what they will get out of it.
Of course, I could have written my own take, but since Richard does such a good job, why should I. Which brings us to another point about blogging - we give credit and don't "snarf" blogposts from others as many of the trolls out there are doing.
Florida's Center for Instructional Technology has produced some very useful matrices on the integration of technology. (Hat tip to Richard Byrne - Free Tech for Teachers)
Why teach search?
Google understands the importance of finding the right information at the right time. We create tools to let you find the information you need, of the kind you need, when you need it. In most cases, a simple search works really well. But for more specialized questions, a bit of instruction in how to search improves all searcher--from middle school students to trained professionals--and lets you discover and use more, higher quality sources than ever before.