From Legos to Raspberry Pi: The Most Creative Startups in Education Technology

Here is a brief and interesting article that was posted on Huffington Post...

From Legos to Raspberry Pi: The Most Creative Startups in Education Technology

Orangutans use an iPad

Way cool! I would love to see more about them using apps and what they can do with them.

Web 2.0 Tools/Ideas by Grade Level

In a recent Race to the Top training about using technology, the media specialist and I modified a Web 2.0 list created by the tech facilitator over at Adams Elementary. We tweaked the list and added some tools that we use. By no means is this a comprehensive list, but hopefully it will help you get started!

10 Technology Enhanced Alternatives to Book Reports - Teachingcom

10 Technology Enhanced Alternatives to Book Reports - Teachingcom

This article had some fun alternatives to book reports that would be fun to look into. I've done a couple of them, but would like to expand on!

New Livebinder on Useful Sites page about EdTech tools

New Livebinder on Useful Sites page about EdTech tools to use in the classroom. I will be continually adding to it! Enjoy!

Edtech

GoSoapBox.com Overview

It's starting to look like clickers (student response systems), might become a thing of the past. While I totally understand their practical use, they are definitely more to manage and time-consuming to use (assigning remotes to students, batteries, connecting to the receiver, etc.). Just makes you wonder...

Invisible Mercedes

I always love when family, friends and colleagues share YouTube videos with me. Almost always, they end up being a great classroom conversation piece. This really neat Mercedes commercial led us to a discussion about the meaning of emissions, the symbolism in the commercial, and technology overall.

Easy Ed Tech: Explore.com

Easy Ed Tech recently posted Explore.org on their website and I just found it. What a cool site! Their site description? "philanthropic based media to champion the selfless acts of others, create a portal into the soul of humanity and inspire lifelong learning".


A site you must check out!

Infographic of the digital classroom

Interesting infographic of the digital classroom. Definitely makes you think for a minute.



Via: Accredited Online Universities Guide

QR code that a 5th grade student made

Yesterday in technology club our guidance counselor brought in her iPad. The students were tripping over themselves to see it. Before long, the guidance counselor downloaded a QR code creator onto her iPad and handed it over to a 5th grade student. In less than 5 minutes he had created a QR code and e-mailed it to me. It never occurred to me how powerful these could be, but the possibilities are endless! 

Google in Education- For Teachers

Google  recently redesigned their education site and I finally had time to sit down and take a look at it. Overall the site is well organized and is divided into 3 categories: Classroom Tools, Professional Development, and Student Showcase and Opportunities. The Classroom Tools page features Google Apps, Chromebooks, lesson plans, and classroom videos. Each page is laid out in a clear and concise manner, allowing you to easily find what you are looking for. My favorite page is the educator resources page, which plainly displays resources into categories such as "Collaborate and Connect" and "Explore the World".

Pinterest! My newest addiction!

One day a few weeks ago Pinterest was blocked by our school system’s web filter. My head just about popped off! Initially the powers that be labeled it “social networking/online dating” and banned it. There was an immediate outcry from the technology contacts within the county because many of us have become dependent on it. It was promptly unblocked.

I’m sure many of you have heard of Pinterest by now, ranked 5^th in the list of most used social bookmarking tools. Twitter is ranked #1 followed by dig, StumbleUpon, and Reddit. I imagine that Pinterest will rise even higher given time.

So what is Pinterest exactly and how can it possibly be related to education? It’s essentially a virtual pinboard personalized to you based on your likes and interests. You can choose to follow people whose ideas you like, people you work with, or people you have never even met. When you come across an idea that you like you “Pin It” onto one of your pinboards. This is a clever way to organize all of the ideas and resources that you come across. Right now I have hundreds of pins and several education boards, but I imagine as time goes on my boards will become much more specific. Since getting started on Pinterest, I have been able to share so many great ideas and inspirations with my co-workers without having to send an e-mail or schedule in a time. Go ahead and give it a try, it’s FREE!

Black bears in the USA - David Attenborough - BBC wildlife

In the spirit of webcams and watching Jewel, Lily, Faith, Honey & Lucky at the North American Bear Center, I went in search of information about black bears. This video is only 1.5 minutes long but it shows the "magic cam", a video camera on steroids. It looks like a rectangular box (each side has a mirror) on wheels. In the forest, you can't even tell that it's there because of the reflections on the mirror! Really neat to watch!

Exciting find!

I was mulling over what to post this week and came across a really great site! It is a Glogster that features and links a bunch of Web 2.0 tools to use in the classroom. A lot of the tools listed are favorites of mine (i.e. Dropbox, Wallwisher, Voki, Kerpoof and Audacity). I'm really looking forward to finding out what some of these other tools are!

http://karenogen.edu.glogster.com/web-20-tools/

NCDPI's Information Technology Toolkit

I'm not sure what other states started a new information and technology skills curriculum ,but North Carolina transitioned into a new one at the beginning of the 2011-12 year. With this new curriculum comes a deeper responsibility to teachers. Because we are in the day and age of a constant information flow, technology teachers and media specialists can no longer teach all of their curriculum in a "specials" class because there just isn't enough time/resources.

NCDPI has released a new site with plenty of great resources to get started: http://informationtechnologytoolkit.ncdpi.wikispaces.net/home

6th grade iPhone Application Developer

I showed this to my 5th graders and they all wanted to create apps afterwards. This boy is very interesting to watch! I would keep an eye out for him in the coming years. 

Google Chrome: Apps

Google Chrome has quickly become my favorite browser. It is a work in progress and still has some quirks, but overall I LOVE it! Normally when you open it up, the home page shows your recently closed pages (visited websites) OR it does this when you open a new tab.

I love this just because at school, I generally open up the same websites daily and it allows me to quickly open up my sites without wasting time or worrying about the students getting distracted.

Google Chrome's newest feature is the Apps page. You can "go" to the Chrome Web Store and save free apps on the page. There are a ton of different apps that are divided up into categories. I briefly checked out the education category and there is a ton of great stuff!

Can kids teach themselves?

I watched an inspiring 20 minute lecture on TedTalks by Sugata Mitra. His project, named Hole in the Wall, was driven by a main topic/question: Can kids teach themselves? The results were astounding and the video footage was excellent in driving the point home.  Watching this made me wonder, are we teaching kids to learn on their own or are we doing it for them?

Now consider this scenario:

Every day students come into the computer lab and sit on the carpet for an introduction or a lesson. I almost always write step by step directions on the board next to my smartboard, so that the kids have something to refer to later on in class. We go through the lesson and I model what the kids will be doing, we do a practice activity together, and I ask if anyone has questions. I even have students tell me what the step-by-step directions are. Just when I think they can’t take my repetition any more, I send them off to do the task. Almost every time, I have a student come up to me and ask what they are supposed to be doing, as if they just showed up to class. Many students will even readily admit that they were NOT LISTENING during class! At least they’re honest!!

Once they get to work, more questions pop up, and I have found that many students do not try to problem solve on their own. This makes me wonder, how did this happen and what I am I doing to improve this situation? When did our students become reluctant to try new things? And most worrisome of all, does this reluctance spill over into other areas of their lives?

How do I effectively nurture and guide them without simply doing the task for them? 

Dropbox....No more flash drives!

Dropbox's motto is "Simplify your life", and it couldn't be more true. This tool allows you to save and sync your files to multiple computers. For example, I have installed dropbox on my work computer and home computer. Every time I update a file from home, it automatically updates at school.
No more forgetting to attach files, flash drives, or sending files back and forth. You can create folders to organize your documents, and then share those folders with your grade levels or other team members.

It's simple and it's free. Go to www.dropbox.com and create a login. Then download dropbox to your computer and you can start saving immediately!