"It's up to teachers to guide students in choosing to uplift, teach, inform, challenge, and care for others with their messages versus break down others. Additionally, our students need guidance in realizing their self worth and seeing themselves as individuals in a digital world. They need to practice choosing what they feel is right as individuals versus going along with their peers for instant approval. These are ideas Shelly Terrell shared in a keynote speech"

"Photos For Class makes it easy for students to quickly find copyright-free images that are automatically cited upon download." This will be a useful tool for helping to teach my students about being good digital citizens and understaning more about cpoyright and creative commons licensing. I also want them to correctly to cite sources and in the easiest way.

"An annotated list of 21 of the best presentation apps for educators."

"The biggest responsibility of any teacher is to equip students with the tools that they can use in everyday life. The content is important, but with information so easily accessible, it is ultimately more helpful to them if they have critical thinking, analytic ability, and research skills. You can best serve your students by engaging them in active debate, fun and absorbing problem-solving activities, and relevant research assignments. High-school students are among the hardest to engage, so you have to approach them in a way they understand. Traditional is out, online is in. Giving them the opportunity to use the tools they are most comfortable with can help them in ways that no amount of lecturing can accomplish. You can make your students better researchers, and thinkers, with the 10 online tools listed in this post"

Makerspace pinterest board with great resources

A good discussion trying to understand the different but related terms and what they mean to education

How to create Twitter style book reviews

This id a great list that iffers many ideas babout how to approach the topic "Edutopia's collection of articles, videos, and other resources on internet safety, cyberbullying, digital responsibility, and media and digital literacy. "

Printable Reading Bingo containing 24 reading challenges that will help you read more and have more fun with it.

"A list of some short stories with surprising endings that could be used for learning or teaching careful reading. Sometimes the author tries to give the reader a fair chance to figure out what's going to happen. Even though a twist ending is supposed to give the reader a jolt, in hindsight it should seem perfectly reasonable. The best ones seem inevitable and seamless."

"The idea behind the shift? A kind of empathy-moving beyond see one's self, and moving towards seeing one's self in the physical and digital company of others. As digital technology and social media become more deeply embedded in our lives, and more nuanced in their function, this is a shift whose time has come."

A lot of great links o all things Makerspace

A short video that address the issue of your onine persona "Published on 7 Aug 2014. Think before you post! This unit teaches students about digital citizenship. We offer the top ten to think about before you post to social media platforms. See the full lyrics and lesson plan at http://www.flocabulary.com/oversharing/"

"Building on the example of sports fans, this video illustrates how bias is a common and sometimes productive part of how we communicate. It also shows how bias can cause problems when it's hidden or not detected. This video teaches: * Why bias is a common and expected part of communicating * Why high quality information needs to be unbiased * What problems occur when bias is ignored * What to look for - common signs of bias in media

"Building on the example of sports fans, this video illustrates how bias is a common and sometimes productive part of how we communicate. It also shows how bias can cause problems when it's hidden or not detected. This video teaches: * Why bias is a common and expected part of communicating * Why high quality information needs to be unbiased * What problems occur when bias is ignored * What to look for - common signs of bias in media

Based on US situation but still applicable to Australian situation. "Despite the increasing emphasis on technology as a learning tool in the classroom, many school districts still aggressively filter the Internet that teachers and students can access. While the federal Children's Internet Protection Act (CIPA) requires that schools filter for pornographic images, many districts are over-filtering, blocking sites that can be used positively for education. There are a lot of myths about how tight these required filters must be."

"This collection of blogs, articles, and videos aims to help educators deploy social-media tools to develop professionally, connect with parents and communities, and engage students in 21st-century learning. By Ashley Cronin, Edutopia. originally published Feb 12, 2013. Updated: Feb 19, 2015"

Good article about Makerspaces (& STEM /STEAM) and schools. The discussion puts perspective into the equation. The authors talk about three values of student learning and empowerment: agency, authenticity, and audience and these are used as a basis for decisions about what happens in classrooms. I like the last few sentences. "Defining making in education in terms of tools, spaces, or disciplines is insufficient. Learning through making is a philosophical approach that can affect classes across the curriculum and schools across the globe. It's time to change the paradigm."