Group items tagged

The mistake some people make is believing educators instantly need to become producers of websites, blogs, wikis, podcasts, social networks etc. Most educators need to become comfortable and familiar as participants in these environments before they can feel successful as creators in these areas. To follow are ideas that educators who want to get started with educating innovatively can explore.

"What are the characteristics we would expect to see in a successful 21st century educator? We know 21st century educators are student-centric, holistic and they are teaching about how to learn as much as teaching about the subject area. We know too, that they must be 21st century learners as well. But highly effective teachers in today's classrooms are more than this - much more."

"1 It comes down to knowing how to best use the tools at your disposal to maximize the impact of education for students, which has always been what separates good teachers from bad ones. The major difference between teachers of today and teachers of the future is that in the future educators will have better online tools and will require better specialized training to learn how to utilize them properly."

Tools For Communication- In this post I highlight class websites, blogs, RSS readers, and Drop.Io for enhancing communication in and out of the classroom. Tools For Collaborating With Students- Here I discuss Google Docs, wikis, Edmodo and Social Bookmarking as ways to promote collaboration with and among students. Tools For Collaborating With Professionals- Learn about how Twitter, Ning, Skype and Google Wave can all be used to connect with and learn from other educators. Tools To Create- See how easy it is to create a multimedia-rich classroom with Animoto, podcasts and Voicethread.

One of the wonders of the Internet is that it can bring the world to you instead of your needing to find the time and money to explore the traditional way. The following virtual tours bring opportunities to explore cities, famous landmarks and buildings, museums, college campuses, and even outer space. You can learn how things are made, explore the human body or that of a life-sized whale, and visit ball parks and theme parks. There is even a section of incredible virtual tours that Google Earth has compiled that shares the world in a whole new way.

Online thinking tools are active learning places where students can engage in robust discussions, analyze complex information, pursue investigations, and solve problems.

"Young people also need guidance and adult assistance to learn how to safely navigate the virtual environments of the 21st Century. Schools must be proactive, rather than merely defensive, in helping students acquire the skills of digital citizenship needed today and in the future. Simply banning read/write web tools on school networks is an inadequate response: Educators must strive to learn alongside students and parents how these technologies can be safely and powerfully used to communicate and collaborate."

Doug Johnson's Blue Skunk Blog For the protection of your professional reputation, the district recommends the following practices: --friends and friending --content --security

we look for ways to use technology in our classrooms that is limited by our awareness of the technologies available along with limited understanding of how today's learners are truly different than those of previous years. How many of us try to find technologies that FIT into our way of teaching, instead of increasing our understanding of new ways kids who have grown up digital learn and interact with their world. What is our responsibility as educators to understand our new audience and learn new methods to reach this audience?

top-quality sites for kids

From fractions to basic math facts; problem solving to number sense; geometry to algebra, there is always room for improvements. Here are 46 sure-fire sites that will engage, enlighten, educate and Einsteinify your students. Most of the sites listed below are geared towards students in grades 1-6.

. Learning taxonomies attempt to break down and categorize types of learning to help designers (of instruction, information, education, performance) develop objectives and learning strategies best matched to the specific type of learning targeted. They are at the core of most approaches to instructional design.

introduction and assignment

search curriculum for students