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"Basically, just honest to goodness, really decent human beings… Perhaps an old fashioned idea. No business degree needed for this part. Just the hard work of self reflection, personal growth and continuous striving to be accepting, caring, compassionate and trustworthy."

Throughout my nine years in the classroom, I've been eager to test out possibilities for improving teaching and learning through technology use. It's a messy process. Back in February 2010, I broadcast my eagerness to use cell phones in the classroom inEducation Week. Then I changed my stance, arguing in May 2012 that too much social media and gimmicky technology application in the classroom could lead teachers to neglect teaching students substantial skills. Since then, I've tested out Edmodo and continued to explore. After years of experimentation and reflection, here's my current take on smart-and not-so-smart-ways to use technology in the classroom:

"In fact, the focus of the framework rests on a much larger concept of the ways in which humans have altered and continue to alter the "natural world" with the goal of fulfilling "needs and desires." Technology is much bigger and more complex than a single device or site."

As mobile technology continues to permeate every facet of society, the mantra of today's youth seems to be "Make it Mobile!" With this influx of technology it will be interesting to see how the classroom looks 5, 10, 15 years down the road. Do you have any predictions?

"As the Council on Foreign Relations reported recently, America continues to slip down the international rankings in education, falling during the past three decades from first to tenth in the educational level of those leaving high school, and from third to 13th for college students. Education technology could reverse this trend-if it is not jinxed by politics, bureaucracy and outdated institutional structures. Countries where it is not now have the chance to race ahead. "

"The National Heritage Board of Singapore is proud to present the "Battle for Singapore" application for self-guided trails. Embark on a journey to experience the Battle for Singapore during World War II, learn more about our local war heroes and relive the painful experience of the Prisoners of War (PoWs) and civilians alike during the Japanese Occupation. Through the incorporation of GPS tracking technology, the "Battle for Singapore" application will offer four different trails and provide a companion guide to 32 different historical World War II sites in Singapore. As you progress through each hotspot, you will discover weapons used by the resistance fighters of Force 136 and get promoted in rank at the completion of each trail. Kindly note that this application will require GPS tracking and internet connection for the downloading of content and the transmission of pictures. Please also note that continued use of GPS running in the background can dramatically decrease battery life so remember to turn-off the Location Services function when you have completed each trail."

The question of how to use technology in the classroom can often divide a school. Some teachers will embrace what's available to them, designing innovative multimedia projects which use all the gadgets at hand. Others, perhaps as a reaction to the first group, will resolve to do things the way they've always done, at best sending students to the computer lab to type up a final paper. Technology is present, but it's tokenized. The digital divide continues to thrive, not just across geographic and socio-economic boundaries, but from one classroom to the next.

Have we given teachers an environment in which they have had an opportunity to continue to grow as professionals? Have we given them the autonomy to expand their knowledge/skills and take risk in the classroom?

We teach children to apologize when something goes wrong, but in the digital world, hurt and humiliation may mean that an apology is only the beginning of a recovery-even  when the mistake is modest. Although childhood is a time for spontaneity, educators must continually identify ways to help students understand the lack of privacy and the need for self-restraint in their digital lives.

School was invented to create a constant stream of compliant factory workers to the growing businesses of the 1900s. It continues to do an excellent job at achieving this goal, but it's not a goal we need to achieve any longer.In this 30,000 word manifesto, I imagine a different set of goals and start (I hope) a discussion about how we can reach them. One thing is certain: if we keep doing what we've been doing, we're going to keep getting what we've been getting.

Classroom Assessment: Minute by Minute, Day by Day In classrooms that use assessment to support learning, teachers continually adapt instruction to meet student needs.

"Digital pedagogy calls for screwing around more than it does systematic study, and in fact screwing around is the more difficult scholarly work. Digital pedagogy is less about knowing and more a rampant process of unlearning, play, and rediscovery. We are not born digital pedagogues, nor do we have to be formally schooled in the ways of digital pedagogy. There's lots to read on the subject, but we can't just read our way into it; there is no essential canon. In fact, expert digital pedagogues learn best by forgetting - through continuous encounters with what is novel, tentative, unmastered, and unresolved."

"That said, even if further evidence backs it up, the idea that the inner core is in a continuous cycle of self recreation probably won't matter that much to the landscapes and ecosystems doing similar things 5,000 kilometres further out. The effect is more one of underlining an aesthetic, or even an ideology, of the planet as an engine of ceaseless self-stabilising change. Such an ideology may serve as a useful guide to dealing with the unavoidable impacts that a large technological civilisation must have on the planet it inhabits: while caution counsels minimising such impacts, a sense of how the planet works suggests that making sure its natural systems can deal with them, that they can become part of the flow, could matter just as much."

"The main YIS website is, and will continue to be, a place to display important information about the school. The learning hub is different, it is a collaborative space intended to host communication and dialogue. Therefore at the centre of the learning hub are the students' own individual websites . These websites are a place for the students to host their projects and ideas. They serve as weblogs (blogs) and digital portfolios. The students will design and adapt their own sites to suit these different functions and will be encouraged to explore and experiment with a variety of digital tools as this project develops."

"Promoting the love of books by children, and the continued reading of children's books by adults."

Blog post from CIS teacher Ben Grundy about handwriting's slow demise. "With the continual development of technology features such as predictive text, autocorrect and speech recognition, along with the rapidly developing field of mobile technology giving us access to these tools whenever we need to 'write', it's safe to say that we no longer need to handwrite. Well, at least not in length."

Interesting article - The age of teaching handwriting is finished!

The head of the IBO has been caught not attributing ideas in a speech which came from Sir Ken Robinson... and has been reprimanded.... Interesting example to show students.