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This is a collaborative workspace for the development of instructional items for the use of the MMORPG, World of Warcraft, in a school setting. Please take a moment to explore the various sections of the site and if you would like to contribute, please email Lucas Gillispie at lucas AT edurealms.com. The original focus of this project was to develop a curriculum for an after school program or "club" for at-risk students at the middle and/or high school level. This program would use the game, World of Warcraft, as a focal point for exploring Writing/Literacy, Mathematics, Digital Citizenship, Online Safety, and would have numerous projects/lessons intended to develop 21st-Century skills. Because of the success of the first year's implementation as an after school program, the program is now being implemented as a language arts elective for middle schoolers designed to provide enrichment for students at all levels. All project materials, including a fully-developed language arts course, aligned to middle grades standards, will be made available under a creative commons license upon completion. The goal is to not only demonstrate the viability of game-based learning using commercial games, but to also provide a foundation or template upon which similar projects can be built.

The Watershed Dynamics project is a partnership between the Office of STEM Education Partnerships (OSEP) at Northwestern University, the GLOBE (Global Learning and Observations to Benefit the Environment) program, CUAHSI (the Consortium of Universities for the Advancement of Hydrologic Science, Inc.). Each organization represents a group of people interested in hydrology and science education. Working together, curriculum developers at OSEP, the worldwide network of science educators in GLOBE, and scientists and engineers from CUAHSI, have created tools and curricula to support student investigations of the watershed. This curriculum is designed to teach students about water availability and the impacts of human activty on the watersheds we live in. Watershed Dynamics promotes the use of authentic scientific data and technology in the high school classroom. Students and teachers learn to use GIS tools and various data sets to answer questions about the environment.

Research Profile: The GoodPlay Project With support from the MacArthur Foundation, the GoodPlay project explores the ethical character of young people's activities in the new digital media. We seek to understand how young people conceptualize their participation in virtual worlds and the ethical considerations that guide their conduct. We are exploring five themes which we believe are salient in the digital age, with implications for ethics-identity, privacy, ownership and authorship, credibility, and participation. In the first phase of our project, we studied youth ages 15-25 who participate in online games, social networking sites, and other online communities. Our methods included in-depth interviews and the posing of ethical dilemmas. Based on this research, and in collaboration with Project New Media Literacies, we developed classroom exercises to encourage high school-aged youth to reflect on the ethical implications of their online activities. In the current phase, we are studying the ethical perspectives of youth ages 10-14 and of influential adults in young people's lives. We are also studying "good participation," focusing on youth who use digital media to facilitate the achievement of civic and political goals.

What is the Flat Classroom™ Project? The Flat Classroom™ Project is a global collaborative project that joins together middle and senior high school students. This project is part of the emerging tend in internationally-aware schools to embrace a holistic and constructivist educational approach to work collaboratively with others around the world in order to create students who are competitive and globally-minded. The project was co-founded by Vicki Davis (Westwood Schools, USA) and Julie Lindsay(Beijing (BISS) International School, China) in 2006when Julie (then in Bangladesh) and Vicki joined their classrooms together for the first time to study and emulate the emerging flattened learning environment. The Flat Classroom Project 2006 is featured in Chapter 13, 'If it's not happening it's because you're not doing it', of the 2007 edition of Thomas Friedman's book, The World is Flat' upon which it was based. (pages 501-503) One of the main goals of the project is to 'flatten' or lower the classroom walls so that instead of each class working isolated and alone, 2 or more classes are joined virtually to become one large classroom. This is done through the Internet using Web 2.0 tools such as Wikispaces and Ning. The Project uses Web 2.0 tools to make communication and interaction between students and teachers from all participating classrooms easier. The topics studied and discussed are real-world scenarios based on 'The World is Flat' by Thomas Friedman.

Get Involved EDCOCP.org is a community of practice about the Connected Online Communities of Practice (COCP) project. In collaboration with a wide range of educational organizations and educators, COCP is increasing the quality, accessibility, and connectedness of existing and emerging online communities of practice. On this site you can: Comment on the draft report and briefs. We will be continually improving these publications, and we welcome your ideas. Join one of our communities Nominate your own favorite to be a Community of Week. Comment on the ideas, rate them, and add your own. Propose as guest blog post on innovations for a highly connected profession.

Over the past two years I've been approached by several people from around the world inquiring about our World of Warcraft in School Project. Yet, despite the numerous contacts, I'm only aware of two other schools/school systems who've started similar projects. Of course, there are many potential barriers from costs to people-barriers. Craig Lawson (@midlawsondle) and I have worked over the past year to create a full-year, standards-aligned language arts course that is based on World of Warcraft. We have several goals in doing so: 1. We want to demonstrate that there is value in considering commercial, off-the-shelf games for curricular integration. 2. We want to share our work with anyone else who might take it on, and in doing so, expand the network of educators who are exploring the potential that games like this hold for the classroom. 3. We want to create a model (using the term loosely, here) upon which similar projects, perhaps using other games might be built. 4. We hope that others will look at the work and expand on it, improve it, and share it. 5. We want to show that, "Yes! You can do this."

"It is a great pleasure to be here at the East Noble School District and to be a part of this great adventure you are embarking on. You are not alone, though you are among pioneers among educators who are learning to adapt schooling to reflect the unique demands of our times, our millennial children, and an emerging and dramatically different information landscape. For the community session, I will outline three converging conditions - a perfect storm - of change that is forcing us to rethink the fundamental of education, being educated, and even the definition of literacy"

Philadelphia's Magic Gardens is a folk art environment, gallery space, and nonprofit organization that showcases the work of mosaicist Isaiah Zagar. Located at the site of Zagar's largest public mosaic installation, the Magic Gardens includes a fully mosaiced indoor gallery and a massive outdoor labyrinthine mosaic sculpture. The installation, primarily consisting of found objects and contributions from the community, covers half a city block with myriads of tile, texture, and color. A walk through the labyrinth will reveal sculptures from Latin America and Asia, bicycle wheels from local South Street shop Via Bicycles, Zagar's hand-made tiles, and mirrors of every shape and size.

52°North refers to the degree of latitude which intersects the founding organizations' home - the city of Münster, Germany. 52°North - the R&D Network The open source software initiative 52°North is an international network of partners from research, industry and public administration. Its mission is to foster the development of new concepts and technologies in Geoinformatics through a common innovation process. Partners participate in so called R&D communities, focusing on common themes, such as Sensor Web Enablement (SWE) or web-based Geoprocessing, for example. All software developed within this collaborative development process is published under an open source license. The 52°North partners have a long and outstanding record in the Geo-IT domain. They are actively contributing to the development of international standards, e.g. at W3C, ISO, OGC or INSPIRE.

"The CoSN Value of Investment (VOI) Leadership Initiative, is designed to support the effective use of technology in K-12 education. The focus of this initiative is to provide a methodology and tools for K-12 school leaders, allowing them to better measure and articulate the costs and benefits of proposed technology projects. "

In an historic speech in Cairo, Egypt in June 2009, President Obama expressed his desire to "create a new online network, so a young person in Kansas can communicate instantly with a young person in Cairo." Since then, the Secretary of State and Secretary of Education have both emphasized the importance of learning other languages, gaining a global competency and traveling to other countries.  A number of organizations linking US schools with others around the world are coming together in a new "Connect All Schools" consortium to meet a very specific goal: to connect every school in the US with the world by 2016.

The Ocean Literacy website is here to support anyone and everyone who is interested in promoting ocean literacy. Ideas for development and evolution are welcomed. This website is maintained by the College of Exploration.  Lawrence Hall of Science and the College of Exploration are currently working together as a part of COSEE CA to develop the website.

Eracism At the Flat Classroom(tm) Conference in Doha, Qatar in January 2009, a visionary group of students proposed that a series of debates be held to promote awareness of racism on a global basis and how we need to work together to solve the world's problems. This multi-national group of four students proposed their project and were promoted through an extensive voting process including a global vote on the next project to be run by the Flat Classroom(tm) project founders, Vicki Davis and Julie Lindsay.

"Education and political leaders in countries around the world have recognized the imperative to prepare their youth for the 21st century, a goal that many believe requires the fundamental transformation of educational opportunities together with the integration of technology into teaching and learning. But educational change is complex. It takes place within an ecosystem of influences that range from national policies, programs, and supports to local community contexts and school-specific professional cultures. As part of Microsoft's commitment to education transformation, its Partners in Learning Program initiated the Innovative Teaching and Learning (ITL) Research project to contribute information and policy insights on where and how effective education transformation is taking place around the world."

Game Change Rio is a great way to understand the interconnected complexities facing our planet today. Based on a huge array of real-life data, players can explore the countless ways we can ruin our world or save the planet. Once more of us begin to understand the issues involved, we have a better chance of changing the game.

What is BlogPulse? BlogPulse is an automated trend discovery system for blogs. Blogs, a term that is short for weblogs, represent the fastest-growing medium of personal publishing and the newest method of individual expression and opinion on the Internet. BlogPulse applies machine-learning and natural-language processing techniques to discover trends in the highly dynamic world of blogs. BlogPulse is brought to you by Nielsen.

What historical event, explorer, voyage, or local history would you like to share with other schools? Have you studied the settlement history of your own community? Have you studied about your state or country and historical events that helped shape it? This site is dedicated to the explorers, voyages, events, and historical backgrounds of countries throughout the World. We'd like to hear about famous explorers who surveyed or traveled through your community long ago. Perhaps you'd like to tell us about historical events that shaped your locale or region. You may wish to report about a catastrophic event in your area. Or, you may want to tell us how your community was founded, its historical background, early settlers. Every community, every town, every country has a past, and we'd like to hear about yours. This project is open to schools all over the World. We invite a "global community" of schools to share this site with us. We can learn about each other's countries as we contribute to this site.

The JASON Project was founded in 1989 by Dr. Robert D. Ballard, the oceanographer and explorer who discovered the shipwreck of RMS Titanic. Within months, he received thousands of letters from middle school students asking to join his next expedition. Dr. Ballard knew his discovery had tapped a wellspring of curiosity and excitement about science and was determined to feed it.

Futurelab aims to inspire, challenge and engage all young people in rich and rewarding learning experiences that will equip them with the essential skills and attitudes for life, learning and work in the 21st Century. We do this by making the most of new approaches to learning and through the innovative use of technology. We take evidence of what works and turn it into practical tools and services to help teachers, schools and policy makers provide the best possible learning for young people.

UNESCO is giving a high priority to the use of ICT for more equitable and pluralistic development in education, aiming to: expand the knowledge base about the issues, The broad questions on which UNESCO focuses are: How can one use ICT to accelerate progress towards education for all and throughout life? How can ICT bring about a better balance between equity and excellence in education? How can ICT help reconcile universality and local specificity of knowledge? and How can education prepare individuals and society to benefit from ICT that increasingly permeate all realms of life?