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Summary via The Scout Report (May 2012): "How does math get used in the "real world?" The short answer is that it is used to create hip-hop music, in fashion design, and through a number of other endeavors. This interactive website combines video and web interactive to help young people develop algebraic thinking skills for solving real-world problems. The series is funded by The Moody's Foundation, along with assistance from WNET and American Public Television. The sections of the site include The Challenges, Video, and Teachers. In The Challenges area, users will find video segments profiling the various young professionals who use math in their work, along with interactive tools to help students solve the challenges they are presented with. Moving on, the Teachers area includes resources for teachers, such as a training video showing how to use project materials in the classroom, along with student handouts. Visitors shouldn't miss the Basketball challenge, featuring NBA player Elton Brand talking about the problems presented by free throw shooting. [KMG]"

A free online university course, but some of the readings might be useful to teachers in primary/secondary  - DESCRIPTION: "This is a course for those who are interested in the challenge posed by massive and persistent world poverty, and are hopeful that economists might have something useful to say about this challenge. The questions we will take up include: Is extreme poverty a thing of the past? What is economic life like when living under a dollar per day? Why do some countries grow fast and others fall further behind? Does growth help the poor? Are famines unavoidable? How can we end child labor-or should we? How do we make schools work for poor citizens? How do we deal with the disease burden? Is micro finance invaluable or overrated? Without property rights, is life destined to be "nasty, brutish and short"? Has globalization been good to the poor? Should we leave economic development to the market? Should we leave economic development to non-governmental organizations (NGOs)? Does foreign aid help or hinder? Where is the best place to intervene?"

scratch challenges to help students move through the basics and beyond of Scratch

"Monster Exchange is designed to encourage the development of reading and writing skills while integrating Internet technology into the classroom curriculum. Classrooms from a variety of schools worldwide are paired together; the students in each classroom are split into groups, each of which designs an original picture of a monster. The students must then write a description of the monster. The partnered classes then exchange their descriptions via e-mail and the Internet. These students are then challenged to use reading comprehension skills to read the descriptions and translate them into a monster picture. The true challenge involves creating a redrawn picture as close to the original picture as possible without looking at the original and using only the written description of the monster."

techtrain 2010 project challenge - interesting to see the way they have set it up.

"We are deeply and fundamentally attracted, in fact, to games: those places where efforts and excellence are rewarded, where the challenges and demands are severe, and where success often resembles nothing so much as a distilled version of the worldly virtues of dedicated learning and rigorously co-ordinated effort."

Over the last few years K-12 schools and districts across the country have been investing heavily in iPads for classroom use. EdTechTeacher has been leading iPad professional development at many of these schools and we've seen firsthand how they approach iPad integration. While we've witnessed many effective approaches to incorporating iPads successfully in the classroom, we're struck by the common mistakes many schools are making with iPads, mistakes that are in some cases crippling the success of these initiatives. We're sharing these common challenges with you, so your school doesn't have to make them.

Interesting ideas 'challenging the look and form of scholarships'

A Neurologist Makes the Case for the Video Game Model as a Learning Tool The popularity of video games is not the enemy of education, but rather a model for best teaching strategies. Games insert players at their achievable challenge level and reward player effort and practice with acknowledgement of incremental goal progress, not just final product. The fuel for this process is the pleasure experience related to the release of dopamine.

With more schools opting for 1:1 student-to-iPad access, there exists a tremendous opportunity for a transformative shift in classrooms where students are empowered to navigate their own learning. While we've witnessed many effective approaches to incorporating iPads successfully in the classroom, we're struck by the common mistakes many schools are making with iPads, mistakes that are in some cases crippling the success of these initiatives. We're sharing these common challenges with you, so your school doesn't have to make them. 1) Focusing on content apps 2) Lack of Teacher Preparation in Classroom Management of iPads 3) Treating the iPad as a computer and expecting it to serve as a laptop. 4) Treating iPads like multi-user devices 5) Failure to communicate a compelling answer to "Why iPads?"

Great read about the Touch Screen Generation & technology. Challenges the status quo in a well articulated way.

Gates & McArthur foundation looking to sponsor a version of Sim City for Educational use. 

"GlassLab is working with commercial game companies, assessment experts, and those versed in digital classrooms to build SimCityEDU, a downloadable game designed for sixth graders. Scheduled to be be released in the fall of 2013, it builds on SimCity's city management theme, but provides specific challenges to players in the subject of STEM. "The big pain point we've heard from teachers is that they cannot entertain their kids to the level that they are being entertained outside of the classroom," said Jessica Lindl, general manager of GlassLab. "They want to be able to create meaningful learning experiences and they just can't compete with the digital tools their kids are accessing all the time.""

The NMC is pleased to announce the interim results of the 2013 Horizon.K12 Project, as presented at the 2013 CoSN Conference in San Diego. The Horizon Project Advisory Board voted for the top 12 emerging technologies as well as the top ten trends and challenges that they believe will have a significant impact on teaching, learning, and creative inquiry in global K-12 education over the next five years. These initial results will be compiled into an interim report, known as the "Short List," and described in further detail.

" Kapur has identified three conditions that promote this kind of beneficial struggle. First, choose problems to work on that "challenge but do not frustrate." Second, provide learners with opportunities to explain and elaborate on what they're doing. Third, give learners the chance to compare and contrast good and bad solutions to the problems. And to those students and workers who protest this tough-love teaching style: you'll thank me later." Originally shared by JPL! Still awesome. (yes, you Jeff, and this article)

"This toolkit contains the process and methods of design along with the Designer's Workbook, adapted specifically for the context of K-12 education. It offers new ways to be intentional and collaborative when designing, and empowers educators to create impactful solutions. At IDEO, we've been using similar processes, methods, and tools for years in tackling some dauntingly complex challenges. More often than not, we've experienced how Design Thinking helps to get to the next step. "

We know that the brain has a hugely important role to play in the students' learning that goes on in our classrooms. However, surprisingly, scientists still know relatively little about the workings of the brain, and most of what we do know has been discovered only in the last 15 years. Our challenge is to ensure that what we do know about the brain is translated into classroom practice and used to maximise student learning - this is the idea at the heart of Accelerated Learning. This unit introduces some of the principles of accelerated learning and explores techniques for you to try out with your pupils.

When TED launched its educational website for younger students last week, I think teachers everywhere realised they had to up their game. The 3-10 minute videos are designed to encourage curiosity and show how the world works using compelling animation and the audible explanations of a gifted teacher.  Even if you're not in high school, the videos are sometimes fascinating, sometimes kinda strange, but generally very cool. Here are some of the best videos that are designed to amaze and challenge your brain.

Nice to see that we do all of these things already! As the iPad is currently the 'class leader' in education, there are many educators who have found themselves with an iPad to 'see what it can do?' The challenge is to demonstrate enhanced learning, so here are ten suggestions that may help:

On this site, you can see the ways fellow teachers are solving problems, leave a comment, recommend an idea, share inventive things you've done, and take on meaningful professional learning challenges.  We want to visualize and applaud how teachers can help each other develop as Learners, Sharers, Collaborators, and Influencers.  Watch your credibility amongst your peers grow while helping to build this shared professional resource.

Cooperative learning requires positive independence which boosts atmosphere of trust among students and helps them accomplish the task in result oriented and timely manner. The team will suffer if one of the students does not manage to do his/her part. The next important factor is that this type of learning encourages face to face interaction. Students must challenge and compromise one another. Team members must periodically identify the changes to achieve better results in their work.