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"Primary teachers leave technology to the secondary teachers; Secondary teachers leave technology to the Higher Ed Teachers; and Higher Ed teachers assume that students are "digital natives". Tech skills of Collaboration, Communication, Critical Thinking, Research, Social Learning, and Media Literacy in general are not being taught by some educators, but rather being assumed to be mastered by our digital natives."

"If you're always on the hunt for new ideas to implement in the classroom or want to keep up with the latest news in education, then turn to Twitter.  With teachers tweeting in droves, if determining whom to follow first is overwhelming, start by checking out these top 25 teachers, educators and experts on Twitter. By following their tweets, you will gain access to education news as it happens and numerous tips, activities and resources to use in your classroom or with your children."

The key sentence for me is in the second paragraph:"And the plan envisions a fundamental change in the role of teachers, making them less a lecturer at the front of the room and more of a guide helping students through lessons delivered on computers" - I see that as not just related to technology but to the new strucyure for how classrooms should be organized. To make technology the scapegoat for this new organization is deflecting from the bigger issue of how to teach effectively, through lecture or through inquiry-based, project based, and constructivist methodologies.

a professional learning community for teachers using vodcasting in the classroom

"When used effectively, technology plays an important role in enhancing the learning process. Teachers can use digital devices to present supplemental material for lessons or to encourage students to take a more hands-on role in their education. Even with all of the benefits of technology in the classroom, however, educators must use caution to ensure that students are focusing on the lesson and not giving in to distractions. Here are seven ways that teachers can use to help students pay more attention when using technology."

Basic article on the concept of Khan Academy. My takeaway was the importance of the following quote: "It can give the teacher additional class time to do more creative and customized teaching. " If you are not taking up classtime imparting knowledge where the teacher is speaking more of the time, you give students the voice to explain what is going on in their heads, or working on collaborative problem solving.

Don't know if they're actually "the best," but there are a lot here -- and they cover multiple interests and disciplines.

"create a rubric with a blatant challenge and ample encouragement for students to push themselves beyond the basic requirements" - from Shawn McCusker of EdTechTeacher.org, on Free Technology For Teachers

This teacher chose to have his students create RSA Animate-style videos as "an easy way to make them visualize their information, make connections, and re-tell their facts in a story that had a very tight story line that flowed.  All skills that would transfer nicely to any traditional essay." He really emphasizes the preparation and planning stages, which is great. He also talks about the process, which is useful.  All said, a great resource.

Math teacher Katie Gimbar answers questions about her flipped classroom. Good introductory information and some good answers, but a lot of this is from personal experience. Take with a grain of salt. 

Math teacher Katie Gimbar shares her whole flipped Algebra 1 class. Lots of great videos here, plus her rationale on how and why to flip.

Another set of flipped classroom videos from math teacher Katie Gimbarr. Wonderful examples and rationale here.

"A true flipped classroom is centered on the idea that technology can help us deliver quality teaching when and where the students are ready for it. Teaching methodology must be pedagogically sound in order for a flipped classroom to be effective, but that is no different than any other method being explored by teachers."

Good overview of action research. "This booklet discusses several types of action research, its history, and a process that may be used to engage educators in action research. Two stories from the field, written by teachers about their own reflections on the process, are given as illustrations of action research."

Video Playlist: Web 2.0 Tools Tutorials for Teachers

Another advance in the flipped classroom construct. What I found most interesting was the use of the students as peer assessors when they were given papers to write instead of quizzes. not sure how effective it would be, but it might be very effective to have 1000 or so thoughtful critiques of a paper you've written. You would see a trend of the responses, and it might weed out subjectivity. That kind of "crowdsourcing" is something unique that technology could provide. There is a module in moodle which was not ready for primetime in version 1.9, but in Moodle 2.0 it might be. It was called Workshop, and allowed teachers and students to do peer editing and grading in an organized way. If it works better in 2.0, we should consider using it for peer editing exercises... ben

"iEARN empowers teachers and young people to work together online using the Internet and other new communications technologies. Over 2,000,000 students each day are engaged in collaborative project work worldwide."

Thanks for pointing out this one, John! I'd forgotten about it.

"Questioning enables teachers to check learners' understanding.... These questions are often arranged according to their level of complexity; this is called taxonomy. Bloom's Taxonomy is one approach that can be used to help plan and formulate higher order questions."

A nice range of uses for this social bookmarking tool.