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Game for Science has to be one of the coolest virtual worlds for kids. This virtual world is dedicated to getting kids excited about science and technology. Students can explore various virtual islands where they will learn about health, aeronautics, genomics, environment, engineering and more. Students can learn more about science careers, what scientists do, play games, learn interesting facts, and explore science photos and videos. Students can play the Game for Science as a tourist without registering, or they can register for an account (this requires an email address with confirmation). This is an outstanding way for kids to get excited about science and technology. As students travel through the virtual world, they can collect neurons (smart stars) by answering questions and playing games. The neurons can be used to purchase items for their avatar.

"Only one Pets in the Classroom grant per teacher, per school year is permitted. Teachers who apply for more than one grant in a school year may be disqualified from the program. Pets in the Classroom grants are offered to Pre-Kindergarten through 8th grade classes only in both public and private schools. Home school settings and high schools do not qualify for grants at this time. These grants are intended to support pets or aquariums in the classroom for the purposes of teaching children to bond with and care for their pets responsibly. The welfare of the small animals involved is of paramount importance. These grants must not be used for the purposes of research or experiments of any kind."

There are new web 2.0 tools appearing every day. Although some of these tools were not originally meant for use in the classroom, they can be extremely effective learning tools for today's technology geared students and their venturesome teachers. Many of these teachers are searching for the latest products and technologies to help them find easier and efficient ways to create productive learning in their students. More and more teachers are using blogs, podcasts and wikis, as another approach to teaching. We have created a list of 100 tools we think will encourage interactivity and engagement, motivate and empower your students, and create differentiation in their learning process.

There are new web 2.0 tools appearing every day. Although some of these tools were not originally meant for use in the classroom, they can be extremely effective learning tools for today's technology geared students and their venturesome teachers. Many of these teachers are searching for the latest products and technologies to help them find easier and efficient ways to create productive learning in their students. More and more teachers are using blogs, podcasts and wikis, as another approach to teaching. We have created a list of 100 tools we think will encourage interactivity and engagement, motivate and empower your students, and create differentiation in their learning process.

"One of the wonderful video resources I have been recommending for teachers and students is TED Ed video library on YouTube. This library features a wide variety of educational videos curated specifically for education community. These TED Ed videos are explanatory tutorials and animations  that cover a given topic . Many of these animations are created by educators and teachers in partnership with professional animators. TED Ed videos are ideal for flipped classroom learning. Teachers can sift through the videos created by other teachers and share them with students on TED Ed website. TED Ed allows teachers to build a lesson around any of these videos. They can also add questions to the videos that students can answer  and get instant feedback on their answers. For those of you interested in learning about how to create flipped lessons using TED Ed, I would recommend reading this visual guide."

"School is a time in a students life where they are learning as much about how to be students and operate successfully in a school as they are about how to read, write, and think. But oftentimes, the demand for pure academic instruction and practice can fly in the face for a student's need-at any age-to play, build, interact, explore, and construct their own learning experience. Issues like these can make mobile technology like tablets a boon to learning, as they can allow individual access to the right app-and the right content, creative opportunity, game, or learning simulation-at the right time. It is the collision of the need for interaction, personalization, creativity, and constant feedback that can make video games powerful tools for learning-and the following 38 games, curated by Sam Gliksman-and excellent place to start."

"The following is our list for the 55 best apps for learning we can find. Some are formal learning-math drilling and phonics, for example-while others are RSS readers, social media platforms, and the like. These are purposely not all purely academic, "training" apps that focus on individual skills, but rather the an array of apps students could use daily to improve their ability to think, connect, and use information."

"How to Get Started Make sure you already have a Google+ account (and optionally a company page), then follow these steps. Install (or make sure you have installed) the Google Talk plugin. Follow all of the instructions to install the plugin. Then login to your Google+ account (see image for placement of steps): Click the link to "Start your own hangout" in the right column. Check in the top right corner and select the personal account or company page you want to use to host this hangout. If you have multiple cameras and microphones connected to your computer, make sure you select the one you prefer to use first. Invite an entire circle, individuals or select Public. The interface to start a hangout has a clean, simple design. Here some tips for successful hangouts: Give yourself time to practice. I'm part of a group of women on Google+ who routinely test out new features privately before we open up public hangouts. Create the list of people you want to invite by putting them all in a circle. Then just invite the circle. Create any documents you are going to share ahead of time in Google Docs to easily add them to the hangout."

"2014 ON for Learning Award Winners Common Sense Media's ON for Learning Award is given to the very best in kids' digital media. Our learning ratings program is designed to help educators surface the apps, games, and websites that truly deliver experiences that enrich and delight kids, helping them thrive with media and technology. We are excited to recognize these apps, games, and websites for earning the highest learning rating from Common Sense Media in the past year."

"Today I am sharing with you a list of handy Chrome extensions that you can use to improve your browsing experience. Using these add-ons, you will be able to do a wide variety of tasks  : from archiving web pages for offline reading to printing web content in clean formats. For more Chrome extensions that are specifically curated for teachers and students, visit the Educational Chrome Extensions section here in Educational Technology and Mobile Learning."

"NFC (near field communication) is a wireless technology which allows for the transfer of data such as text or numbers between two NFC enabled devices. NFC tags, for example stickers or wristbands, contain small microchips with little aerials which can store a small amount of information for transfer to another NFC device, such as a mobile phone. What information can you store ? There's a whole set of different data types you can store on an NFC tag. The actual amount of data varies depending on the type of NFC tag used - different tags have different memory capacities. For example, you may choose to store a URL (web address) or a telephone number. A standard Ultralight nfc tag can store a URL of around 41 characters, whereas the newer NTAG203 nfc tag can store a URL of around 132 characters."

" Today we're making it a little easier for users to quickly type equations using LaTeX equation shortcuts. For anyone who heard of LaTeX before, it's a document markup language that's often used by academics to quickly type out complex formulas. In Google Docs, when you're inside an equation you can type '\sqrt' followed by a space or a parenthesis to automatically convert the text into a square root sign √. Other examples of useful shortcuts are '\frac' for a fraction and shorthands like '\epsilon' for Greek symbols."

"Smilebox is a photo service that lets you quickly turn life's moments into digital creations you can share with others or save for yourself. Choose from hundreds of ecard, scrapbooking, and slideshow designs for every occasion. New designs are released every week. Personalize and share your Smilebox creation for free, or select premium options for print, DVD burning, expanded music choices, and no advertisements."

Recently I've been experimenting with a number of curation sites that are beneficial for creating and sharing lists. While exploring these tools, I've been "fine tuning" my Web 2.0 list for schools. I created a list of 25 Web 2.0 sites for education over a year ago -- but a lot has changed since then. More sites have been developed and more tools are available to students and educators than ever before.

This website is maintained for K-16 educators interested in the effective use of technology in the classroom. An accompanying column to this website is published in the TechEdge, the Technology and Education Newsletter of the Texas Computer Education Association. Many are also reprinted with permission by Technology and Learning Magazine, for whom I servde as the "IT guy" in the past.

This website is maintained for K-16 educators interested in the effective use of technology in the classroom. An accompanying column to this website is published in the TechEdge, the Technology and Education Newsletter of the Texas Computer Education Association. Many are also reprinted with permission by Technology and Learning Magazine, for whom I servde as the "IT guy" in the past.

"Course Builder is our experimental first step in the world of online education. It packages the software and technology we used to build our Power Searching with Google online course. We hope you will use it to create your own online courses, whether they're for 10 students or 100,000 students. You might want to create anything from an entire high school or university offering to a short how-to course on your favorite topic. Course Builder contains software and instructions for presenting your course material, which can include lessons, student activities, and assessments. It also contains instructions for using other Google products to create a course community and to evaluate the effectiveness of your course. To use Course Builder, you should have some technical skills at the level of a webmaster. In particular, you should have some familiarity with HTML and JavaScript."

The purpose of this wiki is to provide planning space for edcamps as well as a place for interested educators to connect and pull together ideas. Please refrain from using it for advertising in any way.

Robert Ballard, the explorer best known for the discovery of the Titanic and other wrecks, has not only made deep-sea exploration more accessible for K-12 and college students, but he'll feed them updates through two of their favorite web sites: Facebook and Twitter. Ballard visited the Mystic Aquarium and Institute for Exploration in Connecticut on June 23 to introduce his new Nautilus Live Theater, along with a new web site where people can watch his expeditions live.

A video camera for $19.95 (w/o memory). Add $10 for 1 hour of recording at 720 x 480 resolution!

A video camera for $19.95 (w/o memory). Add $10 for 1 hour of recording at 720 x 480 resolution!

The web is a great place for teachers to find tech tools for use inside and outside the classroom. There are now dozens of sites that offer free course authoring tools, tutorial and quiz makers, blogging platforms, gradebooks, and social applications that have been designed with the teacher in mind. Here are 15 free tech tools to explore in your spare time.