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Summary: 25 random things innovative educators can do to enhance teaching and learning

Keystone Commons is the networking platform for PAIUnet members to communicate, create, and collaborate. PAIUnet is a statewide, high-speed educational network that enables educators and students throughout Pennsylvania to access and share valuable resources for enhancing student learning. PAIUnet helps to transform the way educational services and information are delivered by connecting all 29 Intermediate Units (IUs) and their member school districts throughout the Commonwealth.

Keystone Commons is the networking platform for PAIUnet members to communicate, create, and collaborate. PAIUnet is a statewide, high-speed educational network that enables educators and students throughout Pennsylvania to access and share valuable resources for enhancing student learning. PAIUnet helps to transform the way educational services and information are delivered by connecting all 29 Intermediate Units (IUs) and their member school districts throughout the Commonwealth.

"Upgrade the typical book report with a digital spin! Integrate reading, writing, and 21st century literacy skills into an interactive and engaging project. Participating teachers will be helping students meet the demands of the Common Core, which include requirements for students to present ideas with "multimedia components (e.g., graphics, sound) and visual displays in presentations when appropriate to enhance the development of main ideas or themes.""

"The Technology Integration Matrix (TIM) illustrates how teachers can use technology to enhance learning for K-12 students. The TIM incorporates five interdependent characteristics of meaningful learning environments: active, collaborative, constructive, authentic, and goal directed (Jonassen, Howland, Moore, & Marra, 2003). The TIM associates five levels of technology integration (i.e., entry, adoption, adaptation, infusion, and transformation) with each of the five characteristics of meaningful learning environments. Together, the five levels of technology integration and the five characteristics of meaningful learning environments create a matrix of 25 cells."

Mashpedia is a web encyclopedia enhanced with cutting-edge functionalities and sophisticated features such as multimedia content, social media tools and real-time information; it's free to use and open for public participation, allowing users to discuss specific topics, post and answer questions, share relevant links or contribute in new creative ways. Mashpedia integrates a variety of online services and applications like Wikipedia, YouTube, Twitter, Flickr, Google News, Books, Blog Posts, and further contextual information into a single slick interface, presenting an organized outlook of live content feeds for every topic, thus providing a broad spectrum of services and features that eliminate the user's need to visit each service separately. Mashpedia provides articles for specific topics such as concepts, subjects, personalities, events, places, companies, products, etc., but not for broader, unspecific searches.

The Foundation and Center for Critical Thinking aim to improve education in colleges, universities and primary through secondary schools. We present publications, conferences, workshops and professional development programs, emphasizing instructional strategies, Socratic questioning, critical reading and writing, higher order thinking, assessment, research, quality enhancement, and competency standards.

Welcome to Chronicling America, enhancing access to America's historic newspapers. This site allows you to search and view newspaper pages from 1860-1922 and find information about American newspapers published between 1690-present. Chronicling America is sponsored jointly by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Library of Congress as part of the National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP).

The National Academy of the Sciences has launched this new website that gives an overview of the U.S. energy system. It covers 4 main topics: energy uses, sources of energy, the cost of energy (in terms of the environment, national security, and sustainability), and energy efficiency. The site has easy to navigate content and links to source material, and it includes n energy quiz, a glossary, and a source library. The site's producers are also developing curriculum-based materials for high school and middle school classrooms. Two special features--Our Energy System and Understasnding Efficiency--are designed to actively engage visitors and enhance their understanding of energy, including what it is, h ow we use it, and ways to conserve it.

"These self-paced classroom activities are designed to enhance the literacy skills of struggling readers in grades 5-8. Each uses videos, interactive activities, note-taking, reading, and writing to present students with an engaging science or history topic. Each activity addresses a range of specific literacy strategies. All 15 activities promote monitoring comprehension, synthesizing, asking questions, developing vocabulary, connecting prior knowledge to new learning, and developing a topic in writing."

This is a great resource for language arts. I tried the word "cognition" and was amazed by the results of the search. Any class would be enhanced with its use.

Where educators, students, and parents are networking the world together. Global COIN allows international connections via the World Wide Web for researching and collaborating with different cultures and their societies. The International Education K ­ 16 website is a collaborative effort at Pennsylvania Department of Education between the Bureaus of Teaching and Learning and Community and Student Services. This website will emphasize World Languages, World Cultures, and global issues. Global Coin will provide materials and resources to students, teachers, parents and professionals. In the future Global Coin will be enhanced and expanded technologically to meet numerous educational needs.

Kubbu is an e-learning tool designed to facilitate teachers' work and enhance the learning process *Free Teacher Account *Create games, quizzes, or crosswords *Make available to students or groups *View and analyze results

Citrify is a easy and fun way to enhance your personal photos. Best of all, it's FREE!

Bringing experts into your classroom via video conferencing can be an excellent enhancement to your students' learning experiences. Video conferencing can also be used to connect classrooms in a 21st century version of penpal exchanges.

"With Google Earth, you can create awesome tours, taking viewers on a virtual trip from place to place. You can enhance your tours with narration, images, videos, text, and other types of information. The tours you create can even be embedded into a website. "

Math by Design was created for middle school students taking Algebra I and II to enhance their understanding of geometry and measurement objectives.

Mobile Geotagging allows users to post media (photos, video, audio or text) from a mobile phone to a specific point on a map. Flagr allows users to create public, semiprivate, or private maps. Great tool for teachers in many subject areas to enhance learning. For example, students studying habitats or different biological species can take pictures within their community and then send each picture band a description of where the habitat or species was found. In the classroom the teacher opens up the class flagr map and the students then identify the species and discuss why they were found in each particular habitat.

"Picturing America, an exciting new initiative from the National Endowment for the Humanities, brings masterpieces of American art into classrooms and libraries nationwide. Through this innovative program, students and citizens will gain a deeper appreciation of our country's history and character through the study and understanding of its art. The nation's artistic heritage-our paintings, sculpture, architecture, fine crafts, and photography-offers unique insights into the character, ideals, and aspirations of our country. By bringing high-quality reproductions of notable American art into public and private schools, libraries, and communities, Picturing America gives participants the opportunity to learn about our nation's history and culture in a fresh and engaging way. The program uses art as a catalyst for the study of America-the cultural, political, and historical threads woven into our nation's fabric over time. Collectively, the masterpieces in Picturing America, used in conjunction with the Teachers Resource Book and program Web site, help students experience the humanity of history and enhance the teaching and understanding of America's past."

...using new technologies to enhance teaching and research. Primary sources for use in the classroom, Multimedia activities, eXplorations, timelines, lesson plans and more.