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"What Makes a Great Teacher? Image credit: Veronika Lukasova Also in our Special Report: National: "How America Can Rise Again" Is the nation in terminal decline? Not necessarily. But securing the future will require fixing a system that has become a joke. Video: "One Nation, On Edge" James Fallows talks to Atlantic editor James Bennet about a uniquely American tradition-cycles of despair followed by triumphant rebirths. Interactive Graphic: "The State of the Union Is ..." ... thrifty, overextended, admired, twitchy, filthy, and clean: the nation in numbers. By Rachael Brown Chart: "The Happiness Index" Times were tough in 2009. But according to a cool Facebook app, people were happier. By Justin Miller On August 25, 2008, two little boys walked into public elementary schools in Southeast Washington, D.C. Both boys were African American fifth-graders. The previous spring, both had tested below grade level in math. One walked into Kimball Elementary School and climbed the stairs to Mr. William Taylor's math classroom, a tidy, powder-blue space in which neither the clocks nor most of the electrical outlets worked. The other walked into a very similar classroom a mile away at Plummer Elementary School. In both schools, more than 80 percent of the children received free or reduced-price lunches. At night, all the children went home to the same urban ecosystem, a zip code in which almost a quarter of the families lived below the poverty line and a police district in which somebody was murdered every week or so. Video: Four teachers in Four different classrooms demonstrate methods that work (Courtesy of Teach for America's video archive, available in February at teachingasleadership.org) At the end of the school year, both little boys took the same standardized test given at all D.C. public schools-not a perfect test of their learning, to be sure, but a relatively objective one (and, it's worth noting, not a very hard one). After a year in Mr. Taylo

This tool is a free service designed for college students to record and share notes in a searchable database. Students can take their notes directly in iSearchNotes using the integrated word processing platform. Notes can be tagged by subject area, course title, and or the course instructor's name.

strategies/skills 1. Every day have one student as the 'official researcher' who is looking things up on the web and saving the key information for later access 2. Reflect on your work as a learner. Look at body of work over time and reflect on what you've learnt and what you need to learn next. In a class it can be a podcast to review what has happened and how it fits in. 3. Documentation - not everyone has to write the notes. Someone or a couple of people are scribes and does the note taking but the class reviews at the end to make sure the notes are accurate and complete. It is saved where everyone and access it. 4. Suggests kids can research what they'd like to do for assignments

"you can use wallwisher for: * Personal note taking * To-do lists * Party Invitations * Feedback Collection * Wishing people on occasions, like birthdays, anniversaries * Anything that might need input from a lot of people, eg. a Mac Vs PC wall (that'll be a war, not a wall actually). "

Uses the sticky note concept and looks very promising. Reminds me of when my HSC daughter had Post It Notes all over her walls in her bedroom while doing the HSC.

Via Richard Byrne "InClass is a free iPhone and iPad app that could be a very useful tool for students carrying those devices. InClass provides students with tools for taking text, audio, and video notes. Students can also use the app to take pictures of hand-outs, slides, and other valuable information that they see in class."

Breathing Earth is a real-time simulation that purports to display the CO2 emissions of every country in the world, alongside birth and death data. The simulation tracks on a map where in the world these vents are likley to be taking place. "Please remember that this real time simulation is just that: a simulation. Although the CO2 emission, birth rate and death rate data used in Breathing Earth comes from reputable sources, data that measures things on such a massive scale can never be 100% accurate. Please note however that the CO2 emission levels shown here are much more likely to be too low than they are to be too high. "

Breathing Earth is a real-time simulation that purports to display the CO2 emissions of every country in the world, alongside birth and death data. The simulation tracks on a map where in the world these vents are likley to be taking place. Really interesting stuff. "Please remember that this real time simulation is just that: a simulation. Although the CO2 emission, birth rate and death rate data used in Breathing Earth comes from reputable sources, data that measures things on such a massive scale can never be 100% accurate. Please note however that the CO2 emission levels shown here are much more likely to be too low than they are to be too high. "

From the library to the dorm room to a friend's computer, it's not uncommon for college students to find themselves using a different computer all the time. Putting small and versatile apps on flash drives allows students to take their important programs with them wherever they go. The following portable apps cover everything from documents to note-taking to organization to security to helpful tools and more, are all small enough to go anywhere, and cost absolutely nothing.

Via Richard Byrne "SugarSync is a cloud storage service that offers apps for iOS and Android. Using the apps you can take pictures of anything including those handwritten notes and upload them to your account. SugarSync synchronizes your files across all of your devices so that you can access your files anytime you are connected to the web."

On March 1st, Google will implement its new, unified privacy policy, which will affect data Google has collected on you prior to March 1st as well as data it collects on you in the future.  If you want to keep Google from combining your Web History with the data they have gathered about you in their other products, such as YouTube or Google Plus, you may want to remove all items from your Web History and stop your Web History from being recorded in the future. It is important to note that disabling Web History in your Google account will not prevent Google from gathering and storing this information and using it for internal purposes. More information at the end of this post.

"Whether you are just beginning your flipped teaching journey, or an experienced flipped teacher, YouTube offers a variety of ways to organize instructional videos for both teachers and students alike. Note taking with VideoNot.es is just one avenue teachers and students can explore to increase the benefits of video instruction."

Error level analysis seeks to prove that whether or not an image has been altered. It takes the image and shows differing error levels throughout it, strongly suggesting some form of digital manipulation. Areas to note are the lips and shirt, as well as the eyes. All are at significantly different error levels than their surroundings. Presumably, colours have been altered and areas brightened.

Edistorm takes the metaphor of sticky notes on a boardroom wall and brings it online allowing anyone - anywhere to brainstorm with only a web browser. Each user picks their favorite ideas and Edistorm brings the best ones forward.

Eleven free apps that you could use in education

Ideas for using with Awesome Highlighter. Some of this can be done with Diigo but still useful to know about.