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This special report features a series of columns by Dr. Lawrence C. Ragan, Director of Instructional Design and Development for Penn State's World Campus, and will help you establish online instructor best practices and performance expectations. The following snippets are just a taste of the insider's advice found in the full report: Principles of Effective Online Teaching: #1 Show Up and Teach - The necessity of this statement is borne of the misimpression that the online class "teaches itself." Since most of the course is already authored and designed for online delivery, instructors may believe they simply need to serve as the proverbial "guide on the side" as the students navigate the learning system. Not true! Principles of Effective Online Teaching: #2 Practice Proactive Course Management Strategies - The online instructor can help create a successful learning experience by practicing proactive course management strategies such as monitoring assignment submissions, and communicating and reminding students of missed and/or upcoming deadlines. Principles of Effective Online Teaching: #3 Establish Patterns of Course Activities - Although the online classroom environment provides tremendous flexibility of time and place of study, establishing and communicating a course pace and pattern of work can aid both instructor and student, and alleviate confusion around how the course operates. Principles of Effective Online Teaching: #4 Plan for the Unplanned - For those small or not-so-small occasions when "life happens," having a strategy for informing students of these changes can go a long way to maintaining course continuity. Principles of Effective Online Teaching: #5 Response Requested and Expected - Timely instructor feedback is essential for the online learner to manage their learning experience. Instructors are expected to respond to student inquiries within one business day.

Technology utilization in distance education has demonstrated its significance in the transfer of knowledge for both the instructors and the learners. This is also made possible through the use of the Internet which helps change the traditional teaching approaches into more modern methods when integrated with the pedagogical instruction. Mobile devices together with other forms of technology-based tools in education have established their potential in language teaching. In this regards, the Teaching of English as a Second Language (TESL) has become easier and more attractive via mobile learning. The aim of this study is to review the mobile-based teaching and learning in the English language classroom. Such integration of mobile learning with English language teaching may offer great innovations in the pedagogical delivery.

The First Steps into Learning and Teaching in Higher Education massive open online course (mooc) will run from 21 May to 22 June 2012. This mooc is developed by the HEA/JISC funded OpenLine Project at Oxford Brookes University. First Steps into Learning and Teaching in Higher Education, is targeted at new lecturers, people entering higher education teaching from other sectors and postgraduate students who teach. We also welcome experienced lecturers to update and share their knowledge and expertise. The First Steps course is an element of the Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development's (OCSLD) HEA accredited Post Graduate Certificate in Teaching in Higher Education (PCTHE).

For teachers and trainers to fulfil their instructional role most effectively, their teaching methods must be grounded in educational learning theory. Understanding the learning process is a key element of educational learning theory and provides a framework for teachers and trainers to plan, create and deliver effective lessons, and assess each student's learning. In this free online education course, you will be introduced to the learning process. The course begins by differentiating between teaching and learning, and by describing teachers' and trainers' perspectives on learning. The course provides details about two major learning theories: behaviourism and constructivism. Within the section on Behaviourism, operant conditioning and its implications for teaching are examined in detail. The section on Constructivism compares and contrasts two subtypes of constructivism: psychological constructivism and social constructivism. Finally, the implications of constructivism for teaching are discussed using two practical strategies. This free online education course will be of great interest to professionals in the education sector who would like a greater knowledge and understanding of the learning process that will enhance their teaching and training, and to all students who are interested in the process of how we learn. Introduction to the Learning Process for Teachers and Trainers is originally from and published by Global Text Project and has a duration of 2-3 Hours for the average learner.

Course Objective You may know about Moodle, Blackboard, Blogging, using Wikis, Edmodo, Canvas, or other learning or course management systems and how to add content and perhaps evaluate and grade students, but how do you facilitate online courses? Join the workshop to get tips and tricks on how to optimize your work as a facilitator of an online course. Free for teachers who wish to teach or are teaching online. Course Description Teachers will learn about online facilitation and how to turn online students into active learners. Participants will focus on best practices and learn a few tricks and tips on how to facilitate online classes and courses.Who should EnrollThe course is for current and future teachers who wish to teach blended or fully online classes.

TES Teaching Resources is where teachers share and download free lesson plans, classroom resources, revision guides and curriculum worksheets. Whether you are looking for SEN teaching strategies and approaches, VCOP activities, or secondary classroom activities, you can choose from 1000s of teacher resources, download them for free and adapt them to suit your classroom activities.

As a 21st century teacher, have you ever took the time to ponder on the skills you need to work on to improve your teaching ? what about technology, is it included in those skills ? Posing such questions and trying to find answers to them is one major component of a successful teaching experience. It is a healthy process indicative of a sound professional growth and the more we ask questions the better our teaching practice becomes.

"Teach your Monster to Read is a series of free games to practise the first stages of reading. Combining top quality games design with essential learning, the game is built on the principles of synthetic phonics and follows the teaching sequence of the Letters and Sounds programme."

"Graphite is a free platform from Common Sense Education that saves you time by making it easy to discover the best apps, games, and websites for your classroom. With thousands of reviews of tools such as Edmodo, Kahoot, ClassDojo, and LightSail, our community of educators take the guesswork out of finding innovative ways to transform your teaching practice. Graphite is changing the way educators discover the best edtech tools by providing reviews written by teachers like you and experts in the field. On Graphite, you can learn best practices for teaching and connecting with our growing community of educators. Enjoy and expand your love of teaching with Graphite."

From flipping your classroom to deploying digital textbooks, there's a lot of disruption happening in the classroom. We talk about these trends every day on Edudemic and hope that helps you stay on the so-called bleeding edge of education innovation. But rather than talk about the latest trends, why not actually find out how (and if) teachers are adopting each trend? The below infographic details the 6 hottest teaching trends and looks at how they're being adopted

Welcome to the Innovative Teaching and Learning Research project wiki. The main ITL Research website is www.itlresearch.com The ITL Research project's goal is to contribute to the understanding of how technology can be used most effectively to improve teaching and learning outcomes. The project is sponsored by Microsoft's Partners in Learninggroup.

As the The Gamification of Learning and Instruction Blog Book Tour has been underway, another interesting discussion has been occurring in the learning blogosphere. It was sparked by Ruth Clark's article "Why Games Don't Teach." The article kicked off a firestorm of debate, demands for proof and even name calling. Christy Tucker addresses the question in her post. There is a healthy discussion on the eLearning Guild's LinkedIn group. In Guy Wallace's post on the subject, he quotes Dr. Richard Clark talking about the "ideologically committed gamester." (ok, so its mild name calling, but still….)

When we heard the buzz surrounding the new role video games are playing in education, we had to throw our hat in the ring. Today, innovative educators are finding ways to incorporate Portal™ and Portal 2 into their classrooms-helping teach physics and critical-thinking skills. It's eye-opening to see how video games can be used in amazing and unexpected ways to help educate our next generation. In response we've created Teach with Portals and there you'll find the beginnings of an engaging set of lesson plans, created by teachers, using the Portal 2 Puzzle Maker. Teachers sign up for the Education Beta and get access to Portal 2 and the Portal 2 Puzzle Maker and a teacher-created collection of puzzles for as many students as they'd like - for free. Using interactive tools like the Puzzle Maker to draw students in makes physics, math, logic, spatial reasoning, probability, and problem-solving interesting, cool and fun, which gets us one step closer to our goal - engaged, thoughtful kids!

"I have been asked by a few different people to boil down the "essence" of teaching with technology, whatever that means. I doubt this is what they meant, but this is what they got, and I share it humbly with you."

There are many resources available to help support schools to teach pupils to be responsible users of the Internet and to educate pupils to be as safe as possible when using online tools.  Here are some resources to support teaching digital literacy:

27 Apps that have changed my Teaching and Learning Practice - Updated - @RachelJones via @joevans http://t.co/DH5iztcaGc

27 Apps that have changed my Teaching and Learning Practice - Updated - @RachelJones via @joevans http://t.co/DH5iztcaGc

"Nowadays it is hard to not see QR codes printed in advertisements, on products, and everywhere else. QR codes are one of the biggest trends in marketing right now, and you might wonder: can QR codes be of any use for academics? I say yes, and I urge you to use your own QR code everywhere it makes sense. That is, whenever there is an opportunity to supply an offline audience with additional online information including, but not limited to, your personal webpage, a research paper that accompanies your talk, or web resources that supplement your lecture. This post is about the basics of why, where and how to use QR codes in your research and teaching. In addition, it will also suggest a few design tweaks that allow you to blend QR codes with the surrounding context (e.g., the keynote slide or a poster). And if you invest some time you can even closely integrate a QR code with your overall self-branding efforts."

The conference will be of interest to educators, administrators, students, and community members who value the importance of integrating technology into the curriculum to improve instruction, learning, and business. Online learning involves various skills on the part of the instructor and learner. These include social and communication skills, social networking, independent learning strategies, critical and higher order thinking skills, creativity, and effective online and face-to-face facilitation. In addition, there are many challenges that educators, administrators, students, businesses, and community members face. The theme of the conference is, connecting online for instruction and learning that goes beyond the classroom. Presenters from around the globe will discuss the following topics: Connecting online to improve instruction and learning: Online learning and pedagogical/instructional experiences Experiences with the use of technology in face-to-face and online classes. What worked and what didn't work for you? How do you use technology to promote your online workshops, consultation, business, and communities? Research conducted on e-learning Books written on e-learning 21st Century learning and teaching Challenges of the 21st Century learning/teaching environment Leading a business with e-learning technology

These videos were created for teachers to help them to incorporate technology into their teaching. Just click and a video will open and take you through how to use that technology. If you want to start straight away, just click on any of the links on the left.My own background is in teaching English, so if you scroll down you will see a special section of ELT videos which are grouped separatetely. There is also a special page of videos for students interested in multimedia, where you can learn Flash, Director and Photoshop Click here for Multimedia.

"12 Days of Twitter is a convenient and free way to learn to tweet on Twitter itself. Our friendly team - including people who learnt Twitter on 12 Days of Twitter themselves - will teach you how to reap the rewards whilst avoiding the risks of social media.  It will take just half an hour a day over 12 days, with live support, online chat and guidance throughout - although you may want to spend more time to get the full benefit for a current project or cause. You'll learn the mechanics of Twitter itself, as well as the tools, techniques and tactics to get it working for you and your goals - whether you're in business, using social media to learn or to teach, or trying to change the world with a hashtag."