Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

Here are my weekly blog post picks! Enjoy 🙂

• 5 Free Handwriting Templates for Jamboard – Teacher Tech

  I created some templates for Jamboard that would allow students to practice handwriting if they have an iPad or a touchscreen chromebook or touchscreen PC. These templates are free. This template is 1 inch lines with a half inch dotted line in the m…

• Resource Hub | Connections Academy

  When homeschooling, parents may struggle to keep kids on task. Try these 9 teacher-tested motivation techniques to help students stay focused on learning.

• How to Create Interactive Jamboard – YouTube

  Learn how to create eye-popping, interactive Jamboard. Feel free to use these Jamboard templates: :

• Should You Really Give Fs During A Pandemic? – Smart Classroom Management

  It’s a tough time for many students. But removing the bare minimum standard is a mistake that does a disservice to the very students he’s trying to help.

• Ideas and Resources for Outdoor Learning – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Students spend so much time with their digital devices and indoors. When possible we should provide them opportunities to learn outdoors and play. Moving outdoors uplifts students’ emotions, teaches them how to socialize and problem solve with other…

• Express Yourself! Emoji Resources for Math, Science, English and SEL – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Our learners are communicating on digital devices more than ever. Emojis allow students to express themselves, share their personalities, and add emotion to their messages. Emojis also represent an international language.

• A Conferencing Strategy for Online, Blended, or Concurrent Classes – Dr. Catlin Tucker

  When I began my career in education, I believed the value I brought to the classroom was my subject area expertise cultivated as an English major at UCLA and my pedagogical expertise honed while working on my teaching credential and Masters in Educa…

• Dec. Quest of the Month: Playwriting prompts for drama class – Classcraft Blog

  All the world’s a stage, And all the Classcraft characters merely players; … especially in teacher Chad Schuermeyer’s quest.

• Hubs – Private social VR in your web browser

• Jamboard: How to Set a Custom Background (ex: make a digital worksheet for students to complete) – YouTube

• ARVRinEDU Advent Calendar

  I will share a new tool each day to inspire innovative ways to use augmented and virtual reality with your students. Watch the list grow daily! Print out this pencil to draw in augmented reality.

• This Year Has Taken a Toll on Educators. Let’s Make Sure to Support Them in 2021. | EdSurge News

• What Is Hybrid Learning? Here’s Everything You Need to Know

  With the rise of education technology, schools have adopted teaching methods that diverge from the typical classroom environment. Distance learning is being used at a global scale, and many educational institutions are starting to implement hybrid l…

• 5-things-weve-learned-about-virtual-school-during-the-pandemic

  Deborah Rosenthal starts her virtual kindergarten class on Zoom every morning with a song — today, it’s the Spanish version of “If You’re Happy and You Know It.” Her students clap along.

• How one district helps students stay focused on class – Classcraft Blog

  Learning during the COVID-19 pandemic hasn’t been easy on anyone. Students have had to adjust to a school year of extraordinary change and uncertainty. Between the external stress, social distancing, and new learning models, students are struggling.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Google Made Some Meet Settings Sticky

  Google has steadily added features to Google Meet throughout the fall (spring for my friends in the southern hemisphere). The latest feature is one that should prove to be a time-saver for some teachers. The latest update to Google Meet makes some s…

• Problematic Themes?: Civ VI, Ludonarrative Dissonance, and Colonizer Mentality – Classroom Powerups

  Long write up about weird theory of Ludonarrative Dissonance and Colonizer mentality in Civ VI. The next post will ask questions about implications on Classroom Themes. Back at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic EPIC Games gave away Civilization…

• Thinking Routines Part 2: Driving Deeper Thinking Online – Dr. Catlin Tucker

  In a previous blog, I shared a collection of thinking routines developed and published by Project Zero at Harvard’s Graduate School of Education. These routines are incredibly effective structures to encourage students to think more deeply about ide…

• Mt. Everest Just Got a Little Bit Taller — The Adventure Blog

  The tallest mountain on the planet just got a little bit taller. Or shorter, depending on who you believe. Yesterday, Nepal and China jointly released the findings of two high profile surveys of the Himalayan giant, with the results making headlines…

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Share Books in Google Classroom and Google Sites

  One of my favorite features of Google Books is the option to clip sections of free ebooks to share with students. It’s also possible to share with your students an entire ebook from Google Books. You can then use those clips or full books to spark d…

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Reduce Noise in Zoom Meetings

  On Monday I shared Mike Tholfsen’s tutorial on how to reduce background noise in Microsoft Teams calls. That prompted a few people to ask me if the same thing can be done in Zoom. Yes, you can filter background noise with some tools that are built i…

• Evidence Board Examples – Classroom Powerups

  For a detailed explanation of this project go to Using Crime Scene Evidence Boards: An Investigation into the Death of Reconstruction. This project went amazingly well but I do have a few reflections. The first was that it took a solid hour for stud…

• Level Up Your Virtual Teaching with Screencasting Tools! – Teacher Reboot Camp

  The transformation to virtual learning means teachers now act as the tech support for students and parents who are also new to virtual learning. Screencasting tools are a lifesaver for virtual instruction.

• Improving Quality of Peer Feedback with TAG Feedback – Mari Venturino

  I previously blogged about using Google Forms for peer feedback, and briefly mentioned TAG Feedback. I am excited to share an entire post dedicated to my favorite peer feedback strategy. Early on in my teaching career, I had my students do a project…

• This Is The Text I’ve Been Sending To Students With Spotty Class Attendance | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  As part of my pre-holiday “push” to “stop the bleeding” in my classes (see HERE’S HOW I’M COMMUNICATING WITH STUDENTS ABOUT SHAKING UP OUR CLASSES and I’m Worried About My Students – Very Worried.

• I’m Worried About My Students – Very Worried. And Here Is What I’m Planning To Do About It | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  Earlier this week, I posted FAILING GRADES SKYROCKETING FOR VULNERABLE STUDENT POPULATIONS – OUR SCHOOLS HAVE A HUGE PROBLEM.  In it, I discussed what seems to be happening in many schools – the number of F’s are increasing.

• Create Online Parent’s Field Trip Permission Slips- Free!

  Permission Slips Go Directly To The Parent’s Mobile Phone – Take Kids Out of The Equation! We Survive By Adding A Small Convenience Fee To Parents Who Choose To Pay Through The App.  There Is NEVER a Cost To You.

• Cliff Mass Weather Blog: What are the Secrets to Identifying Clouds? Part I

  I often get emails and questions about clouds. People are particularly interested in learning how to identify clouds and to understand what they imply about upcoming weather. What is meant by the arcane compound names, such as altostratus, cirrostra…

• Get Them Moving with Brain Breaks! – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Sitting in front of the computer for long periods of time is unhealthy for both teachers and students. One quick way to add movement is with a brain break. These breaks last a few minutes and get students and you moving through quick exercises, danc…

• Engaging Students Remotely – The Reflective Educator

  Many teachers have told me that they have difficulty feeling like their students are engaged in their remote classes. They open up their synchronous Zoom sessions and see 20 black squares with the video off. They see 30% of the students completing h…

• Free Technology for Teachers: A Virtual Tour and Videos for Learning About Breaking the Sound Barrier

  Chuck Yeager died yesterday at the age of 97. He was the first person to fly an airplane faster than the speed of sound. The BBC’s article about Chuck Yeager’s passing included some archival footage of his flight in the Bell X-1 that he flew.

• Using Crime Scene Evidence Boards: Planning an Investigation into the Death of Reconstruction – Classroom Powerups

  How did Reconstruction die? Doesn’t that sound like the plot of a procedural TV show? There is a murder and a team of dedicated investigators gather evidence and piece together clues to solve the mystery.

• Make Elephant Toothpaste – Scientific American

• Privacy and equity alternatives to video in online learning

  School districts are being asked to loosen mandatory video requirements for online learning because of privacy and equity concerns.

• Using Pear Deck with a Co-Teacher – YouTube

• Free Technology for Teachers: Five Key Features of Making Comics in Canva

  Last week Canva introduced new comic strip creation templates. There has long been tools for making comics in Canva, but now Canva is offering templates specifically for making comics. Canva’s comic gallery contains templates for making comics in a …

• Free Technology for Teachers: New Shapes and Fonts in Book Creator

  Book Creator is one of my favorite tools for creating ebooks. It’s a versatile tool that can be used to publish multimedia fiction and non-fiction stories. I’ve also recommended using it to have students create portfolios of their best work. Last we…

• What we talk about when we talk about games – Class Roots

  We carry around really idiosyncratic and sometimes competing notions of games. When we hear someone talking about games, some of us think about children’s games. Some of us think about board games. Some of us think about sports. Some of us think abo…

• Thank you, George Takei, for reminding us. The Bill of Rights should not be taken lightly. | History Tech

  Yesterday at the final keynote of the 2020 NCSS national conference, author and actor George Takei shared his experience growing up in what he called an American concentration camp.

• Investigation: Sticklebacks and Gene Regulation

  This investigation was modified from the HHMI Stickleback Modeling activity where students examine two different forms of the the stickleback fish. One form has spines and bony armor and is found in the ocean.

• Fire Up Your Students with a Campaign Project « Cult of Pedagogy

  I opened the envelope, unfolded the letter inside and began to read to my class: “Dear Residents of Alchemy Island, I am writing to inform you that a decision has been made to sell the east of our island to a large development company.

• diversifying-your-classroom-book-collections-avoid-these-7-pitfalls

  As protests against racial injustice spread to communities large and small in this year, many educators have been pushed to examine how systemic racism harms students.

• The Power of Student Check-Ins During Distant Learning and Hybrid Courses – John Spencer

  In my last article, I wrote about ways that we can get to know our students in virtual and hybrid courses. I also did a webinar on building a community online. You can watch it on replay here. One of the best ways to build relationships is through f…

• Brainstorming Voting Tool – Teacher Tech

  Brainstorming is an essential process to many projects. How do you decide on which brainstorm idea to go with? Some people don’t feel comfortable speaking up in opposition or some people feel compelled to go along with the crowd.

• What Teachers Have Learned About Online Classes During COVID-19 : NPR

  Deborah Rosenthal starts her virtual kindergarten class on Zoom every morning with a song — today, it’s the Spanish version of, “If You’re Happy and You Know It.” Her students clap along.

• 10 Ways to Sabotage Your Classroom Management

  You know the basics: Establish clear rules and consequences, be consistent, keep students engaged. But even with all that in place, the small things you do could be wreaking havoc on your whole system.

• A Principal’s Reflections: Feedback is Needed More Than Ever

  I think we can all agree that this school year has been unlike any other and not for the best of reasons. The pandemic has upended the entire education system as schools have moved to remote, then hybrid, and back to remote in some cases with no end…

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

More amazing blog posts from this week on current topics and needs:

• Free Technology for Teachers: Milanote Offers Nice Templates for Creating Multimedia Storyboards

  Milanote is a neat tool that I like to think of as being part storyboarding tool, part bookmarking tool, and part task management tool. For this post I’ll focus on the storyboarding aspect of Milanote. Milanote offers dozens of templates for making …

• Learning from Home – Teaching Matters

  Copyright Teaching Matters, Inc. Our subject-specific experts partner directly with teachers, teacher leaders and school leaders to develop deeper content knowledge and master instructional strategies that lead to better student outcomes.

• Lisa Nielsen: The Innovative Educator: Norms in the Online Classroom

  · 4 #EdTech Blogs to Bookmark · 9 Must Read Blogs for Innovative Teachers · 10 Digital Citizenship Bloggers to Follow · 10 Education blogs worth following – eSchool News · 11 Ed Tech Bloggers to Follow · 20 Best Blogs in Instructional Technology · 2…

• State Of California Releases School ReOpening Guidelines – It’s Going To Be A Hell Of A Fall | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  The State of California just released school re-opening guidelines. Of course, the state is also cutting the education budget by 10-13%.

• Automatically Remove Background from Image – PhotoScissors

  PhotoScissors interactive cutout tool for foreground segmentation enables new smart ways of removing backgrounds from still images. Go to our Tutorials page and see for yourself how easy it is for anyone to do with just a few simple steps.

• Hornets, crabs and rodents: setting traps to locate and contain invasive species | Puget Sound Institute

  While media reports were raising alarms about an invasion of dangerous “murder hornets,” Washington state entomologists were quietly planning a trapping program, which will mark the beginning of a search-and-destroy mission against the Asian giant h…

• I Know Schools Are Facing A Budget Crisis, But It’s A Huge Mistake To Not Have Summer School For Our Most Vulnerable Students | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  As I’ve written earlier, I think most students are going to be fine despite missing the last two or so months of school (see I’M NOT CONVINCED THAT STUDENT LEARNING LOSSES THIS YEAR ARE TRAUMATIC, BUT THEY WILL BE BAD IF WE’RE ONLINE NEXT YEAR).

• If all we offer is uninspiring learning, we’re in trouble | @mcleod | Dangerously Irrelevant

  What about learning? Yes, that’s a reason too… for some. But engagement data show that many/most of our students are not coming to school because their learning is engaging.

• how-nyc-students-and-teachers-are-making-sense-of-george-floyds-killing

  Teachers are creating space for students to talk about protests, anti-Black racism and police violence. They’re also holding space for those who don’t understand Black Lives Matter.

• Classroom Games and Tech – Ed-Tech to Engage and Inspire: 3 Tips for Getting Started With Game Design

  These videos were already shared in previous posts from my game design club series, but I wanted to get them in them one place. (I compiled some related interviews in this post.) My goal with these videos was to concisely state three tips that would…

• Getting Ready to Teach in K-12 Schools Next Year | Edutopia

  • their first foray into online learning raised issues about pacing, structure, and the lack of interactivity and rigor, and the sometimes confusing plethora of communication and instructional channels (Google Classroom, Zoom, YouTube, email, and various apps). Most found the largely asynchronous nature of learning a “lonely” experience.
  • Technology alone cannot make learning engaging, so in developing online systems, schools will need to map out their curricula, ensure articulation and complementarity between face-to-face and online learning, and intentionally design for both these environments, seeking a balance
  • “High touch” learning: involving more collaborative activities and synchronous interaction with teachers and classmates.
  • Greater interactivity: games, web-based simulations, and interactive videos—and fewer worksheets.
  • Personalized learning: a range of activities that address students’ skills, abilities, interests, and home situations—from choice boards to personalized learning pathways to individual projects.
  • More challenging activities: projects and activities that address real-world challenges and involve students creating versus simply consuming information.
  • • Direct instruction: transmitting information about concepts, skills, and procedures via demonstrations, lectures, screencasts, videos, or online presentations.
    • Cognitive models of learning: structured activities that don’t just put information in students’ heads but get knowledge out—inductive reasoning, open-ended questioning, experiments, metacognitive strategies, and problem-solving.
    • Social models of learning: collaborative instructional methods we can still use in online learning—jigsaw approaches, reciprocal teaching, discussions, debates, and peer tutoring
  • one of the most important things we can do is prepare our students to be successful online learners.
  • Personal characteristics related to successful online learning: motivation, time management, digital citizenship, persistence, self-regulation skills, and help seeking.
  • Parents and guardians who don’t speak English and those who lack digital skills, who cannot assist teachers with home instruction, or whose homes may not be conducive to learning online will need additional assistance.

• how-teachers-and-schools-can-help-when-bad-stuff-happens

  “I would recommend that they address issues from the beginning. Talk to the students about: You know, we’ve all been through a difficult experience. I know that some of you may have lost your home. Some of you been in a shelter and been in very unus…

• QuizWhizzer – Fun, gamified quiz races

• Interactive Worksheets | Wizer.me

• Lisa Nielsen: The Innovative Educator: Anti-Racism Lessons & Videos

  Educators who want to engage with students about the death of George Floyd and racism in America, may find helpful these resources compiled by The New York City Department of Education.

• Classroom Games and Tech – Ed-Tech to Engage and Inspire: How to Start Making Games – Advice from Game Designers – Spring 2020

  I already shared three of these four short videos in other posts, but I wanted to collect them in one. The past two months I ran a virtual game design club for middle school students and I interviewed two of my friends. (All posts in this series can…

• Sacramento County Office Of Education Releases Fall Re-Opening Guidelines, Apparently Without Talking To Unions? | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  The Sacramento County Office of Education today released their guidelines for re-opening schools in the fall. You can read about it at the Sacramento Bee article, Sports canceled. Students in masks. Sacramento health officials urge big changes for s…

• Technology Tidbits: Thoughts of a Cyber Hero: 30 Sites/Apps for Digital Storytelling

  Digital Storytelling is the process of telling a story through the use of digital means.  Also, it happens to be one the easiest ways to int…

• Music Synchronizes the Brains of Performers and Their Audience – Scientific American

  When a concert opens with a refrain from your favorite song, you are swept up in the music, happily tapping to the beat and swaying with the melody. All around you, people revel in the same familiar music.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Three Ways to Make Short Audio Recordings – No Accounts Required

  Since late last year when Google finally added native support for audio in Google Slides I’ve fielded a steady stream of questions from readers looking for suggestions on the quickest and easiest ways for kids to record audio on their Chromebooks.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Two New Google Docs Features in G Suite for Education

  Back in February Google added Smart Compose and Autocorrect as new features in Google Docs. However, those features were only available in Google Docs in G Suite for Business accounts.

• Student Self-Assessment: Now More Than Ever | All Things Assessment

  When I wrote my last blog post in January, and made self-assessment my personal learning resolution, I did not know that in a few months my brain would be incredibly tired from learning way too many things in a short amount of time.

• Citizen science games: the ultimate list | Citizen Science Center

• Bad News

• Arcademic Skill Builders – Math Games, Language Arts Games, and much more

• Math Games for Kids | Kidopo | Page 2

• MemoMoti

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Collaborate on a YouTube Channel

  Like many other schools, this spring my school held our awards ceremonies virtually. A colleague and I managed the distribution of the recordings of those ceremonies. We did this by collaborating on one YouTube channel.

• The Best Video Creation Tools for Teachers and Students | Free Video Editing Software and Apps Ranked

  A good video creation tool is a must in every teacher’s toolbox. But what’s the best editor or program to use? This question has plagued me for a long time.

• Transcribe Audio to Text | Transcription Company & Website – Rev

  ServicesTranscription 99% accuracy, by human professionals $1.25 PER MINUTE Rough Draft 80% accuracy, machine generated transcript 25¢ PER MINUTE Captions English captions for videos $1.

• Very Good Interview: “What’s motivating nationwide protests?” | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  GDJ / Pixabay This is a very good ABC News interview with Marc Lamont Hill:

• Free Technology for Teachers: 5 Ways to Edit Images in Google Slides

  A decade+ ago when I started using Google Slides it was a rather bare bones alternative to PowerPoint. That is no longer the case. Today, there are tons neat little features that you can use in Google Slides to improve the appearance of your present…

• New TED-Ed Video & Lesson: “When is a pandemic over?” | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  MirceaIancu / Pixabay I’m adding this new TED-Ed lesson and video to A BEGINNING LIST OF THE BEST RESOURCES FOR LEARNING ABOUT THE CORONAVIRUS:

• Kids will need recess more than ever when returning to school post-coronavirus

  School leaders globally are tasked with the unenviable challenge of planning for school reopenings after COVID-19 pandemic shut downs.

• Yours for the making – Instructables

• ‘You get engagement from everyone’: Mott Haven teacher incorporates baseball in science curriculum – Bronx Times

• ‘Teaching for Black Lives’ — a handbook for educators to fight racism – The Washington Post

  On July 10, 2018, I wrote about a book that had just been published titled “Teaching for Black Lives,” a collection of writings that helps educators humanize blacks in curriculum, teaching and policy and connect lessons to young people’s lives.

• What if we liberated the learning from report cards – What Ed Said

  Every time we’ve thought about how we might improve our reports, we’ve failed. The barriers to major change have somehow seemed insurmountable.

• Lisa Nielsen: The Innovative Educator: Creating Breakout Rooms with Google Meet

  It’s easy to create breakout rooms using Google Meet. Start by creating a hyperdoc agenda that lists each topic and with that topic provide a link to the breakout room agenda. It’s also a good idea to have a main room / lounge where participants can…

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

Here are more great blog posts from this past week:

• • African Elephant – Change Over Time |

    This activity was created for an evolution unit in an intro biology class (1 semester class) where I wanted to include a little bit of ecology and conservation science.

  • How To Handle Students Who Question Your Classroom Management – Smart Classroom Management

    It can feel, depending on their tone of voice, disrespectful. It can feel as if they’re trying to put you on the spot. Or make you squirm.

  • Free Technology for Teachers: Kids US Atlas – Learn About Animals of the United States

    Kids US Atlas is an iPad app that features an interactive map of the United States. On the interactive map you will find twenty-five animals that are indigenous to the United States. Tap on the animals to read about them, to hear about them, and to …

  • Free Technology for Teachers: How to Make Videos Autoplay in Google Slides

    Earlier this week I received an email from a reader who wanted to know if it was possible to make videos automatically play in Google Slides. It is possible to do that if you set the video properties to automatically play when slides advance.

  • Free Technology for Teachers: DIY Emojis

    Emoji Builder is a fun little site for making your own emojis. To design your own emoji on Emoji Builder you simply pick a base face then add on eyes, mouth, and accessories from menus on the site. When you’re done designing your emoji you can downl…

  • Fun Apps for Designing and Printing Characters to Tell Stories

    Years ago I learned about the Foldify iPad app from one of my students who had used to create characters and buildings that he printed on thick paper then folded into shape.

  • Free Technology for Teachers: Math is Visual – Videos Demonstrations and Illustrations

    Math is Visual is a website that features videos and images that are designed to help students understand mathematics concepts. There’s more to the site than just some videos and pictures. With every video you will find written directions for using …

  • Free Technology for Teachers: Introduction to Using Google Expeditions in Your Classroom

    Google Expeditions is one of my favorite virtual reality apps for students and teachers. The app provides hundreds of virtual reality experiences for students. There are VR experiences that can be used in social studies, science, and art classes.

  • Found Data

    However, in 2018 the shirt was kelly green which drew me in, as green is my favourite colour. I read the price tag and learned that “the shirt” is a student initiative and the proceeds go back into student activities and assistance. At $18 USD it wa…

  • Free Technology for Teachers: Reminder – Empty Your Google Drive Trash Bin

    People who use Google Drive through a G Suite for Education account don’t have to worry about running out of storage space as G Suite for Education provides unlimited storage.

  • Respect difficult problems | Seth’s Blog

    They’re difficult because they resist simple solutions. Glib answers and over-simplication have been tried before, and failed. People have tried all of the obvious solutions. They haven’t worked. That’s why we’ve resorted to calling them difficult p…

  • 10 Teacher-Tested Strategies to Engage Reluctant Writers – John Spencer

    A few years ago, my son opened a Google Document and started typing. I asked him about it and his eyes lit up as he described the shared story he was writing with classmates. This was the first day of summer break but he was choosing to write for fu…

  • Free Technology for Teachers: Try Pexels Videos to Find Green Screen Backgrounds

    Making green screen videos can be a fun way for students to share what they’ve learned through research about a place or event. And it’s a great way for kids to make their own weather forecast and newscast videos.

  • Geometric Constructions as puzzles – The Reflective Educator

    Geometric constructions are amongst my favourite things to teach in Geometry. Why? I see each geometric construction as a puzzle to be solved and I love watching children solve puzzles and share their solutions to those puzzles.

  • Free Technology for Teachers: WWF Free Rivers – An Interactive, Augmented Reality Story About Rivers

    WWF Free Rivers is a free augmented reality iPad app produced by the World Wildlife Foundation. The app uses augmented reality to present a story about rivers. In the app students learn about the importance of free-flowing rivers in world.

  • Mo Physics Mo Problems: The Fast & The FabLaburios

    Fighting the Inertia of a Traditional Classroom

  • Free Technology for Teachers: A Couple of Thoughts About Flipgrid Stickers

    A couple of weeks ago I was at a conference to present on the topic of formative assessment. Flipgrid was one of the tools that I mentioned in my presentation. After my presentation a nice woman asked me for my thoughts about the stickers and drawin…

  • Gamification – Integrating Game Mechanics into Your Teaching | CoreyRayJones

    Have you earned Gold status using the Starbucks app? Are you one of the 100 million monthly active users on Waze? Do you have a Fitbit or work towards closing your rings on your Apple Watch? Have you tried to learn a language using an app like Duoli…

  • Free Technology for Teachers: An Update on FormRecycler – And How to Use It

    This morning I received a question from a viewer of my YouTube channel. The question was about the Google Forms add-on called FormRecycler. The viewer was attempting to use the add-on but was repeatedly getting the following error message, “Error: R…

  • Free Technology for Teachers: Try Flipgrid as an Alternative to a Classroom YouTube Channel

    Whenever I lead a workshop or webinar about classroom video projects I always talk about the importance of respectfully sharing students’ videos online. That often leads into discussions about YouTube privacy settings and alternatives to using YouTu…

  • Free Technology for Teachers: Wonderscope – An Interactive Story App for Kids

    Wonderscope is an iPad app that uses augmented reality featuring stories that students interact with through voice and touch. Students position animations and interact with story animations by moving their iPads and reading the lines that appear on …

  • Bridge the Gap: The NCCE ISTE Educator Certification – NCCE’s Tech Savvy Teacher Blog

    “The geography of our organization now depends on where you’re standing,” says Dr. Heidi Rogers. Technology bridges the gap that geography makes wide. When teaching and learning span the world, how do you plan and assess success? That’s where the IS…

  • The Guide to Google Drive Sharing

    Kasey Bell is an award-winning digital learning consultant, speaker and blogger with a passion for technology and learning. Kasey offers engaging staff development for all levels of educators, specializing in training, presentations, keynote speakin…

  • Simplify Technology with Limits : zen habits

    It’s designed to do that: tech companies are motivated to keep our attention in their apps, their websites, their devices.

  • Free Technology for Teachers: A Searchable Index of G Suite Updates

    If you want to keep up with every update that Google makes to G Suite for Education, take a look at the What’s New in G Suite? searchable index. What’s New in G Suite? is a table of recent updates and changes to all of the core G Suite products. You…

  • Free Technology for Teachers: Free Math Lesson Plans from NASA

    Space Math is a NASA website containing space-themed math lessons for students in elementary school through high school. You can search for lessons according to grade level or mathematics topic. The bulk of the materials seem to be PDFs of direction…

  • 7 things our kids should be learning in history class. Or not. | History Tech

    In a couple weeks, me and 18 other social studies teachers, district level curriculum coordinators, state education consultants, and other assorted interested individuals will get together to rewrite the state’s social studies standards. Rewrite is …

  • Free Technology for Teachers: Speakd – Listen to Your Google Docs

    Speakd is a free Google Docs add-on that will read your documents aloud. When you have Speakd installed in Google Docs you can open the add-on and press play at any time to hear your document read aloud.

  • Top Chef: Create a Fun Gamified PD “Event” for Your Teachers

    Allison Starling has an awesome idea for teacher professional development! She creates two “PD Events” at different times during the year and creates a game to encourage learning at her school. I loved this idea so much that I’m using it at my schoo…

  • Control Alt Achieve: Learning Music, Art, Science, Math and more with Chrome Music Lab

    When I used to teach middle school math, one unit I always loved to do each year was my “Music and Math” unit. We explored lots of connections between music and math, while learning about fractions, exponents, prime factorization, and more.

  • Free Technology for Teachers: A Fun App for Learning About Money

    Money Math Duel is an iPad app and Android app designed to help students learn to count currency. The app is unique in that it allows two students to use it at the same time. Students place the iPad between them and each has his or her own end of th…

  • Free Technology for Teachers: Getting Started with G Suite – Mysteries Solved with This New eBook

    This is a guest post from Avra Robinson (@AvraRachel), Director of Online Learning for EdTechTeacher.

  • Free Technology for Teachers: PBS Kids ScratchJr – Scratch With a PBS Twist

    PBS Kids ScratchJr is a PBS Kids-themed version of the popular ScratchJr app. PBS Kids ScratchJr is available as a free iPad app and as a free Android app. The app is designed to help five to eight year old students learn basic programming concepts …

  • Why Engagement is Crucial to Empowerment but Empowerment is Still the Goal – The Principal of Change

    I have written about engagement and empowerment often in the last few years, and it is something that I am passionate about in education.

  • A Principal’s Reflections: The Skinny on Hashtags

    Upon getting on Twitter in 2009, I was not only baffled about how to use the social media site but also about all the symbols associated with it. There was no apparent rhyme or reason to using these in any messages whether long or short. One of them…

  • Reclaiming Handwriting – Pernille Ripp

    Every year it seems as if spelling, punctuation, and capitalization have become a little harder for students to master.  Despite the great lessons they have had before.

  • Lisa Nielsen: The Innovative Educator: Alexa, Google Home, or HomePod: Easy Peasy Guide to Determining What’s Right For You

    If you’re an innovative educator you might be wondering which device is best to set up your smart home or classroom.

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

Here are this past week’s list of great blog posts!

• • Free Technology for Teachers: An Easy Way to Convert PDFs Into Word Documents

    From time to time we all need to convert a document from one format to another. There are lots of online tools that will do that for you. Perhaps the simplest one that I’ve tried is a service called Easy PDF.

  • Technology Tidbits: Thoughts of a Cyber Hero: Extempore

    Extempore is an innovative new app (iOS/Google Play) for Foreign Language instructors. Extempore makes it easy for teachers to manage student’s audio and visual assignments.

  • Control Alt Achieve: Social Studies Links

    As I come across useful tech integration resources each month, I collect them together by subject area. Below is a Google Doc with the latest resources, news, blog posts, links, and other helpful technology integration items collected relevant to So…

  • Manage Multiple Google Accounts – Teacher Tech

    If you are like me, you have more than one Google account. You may have your G Suite account from school plus your personal Gmail account. I was working with a teacher the other day and we were trying to create a TemplateTab.

  • Free Technology for Teachers: Four Podcasting Tutorials – From Basic to Robust

    Earlier this morning I shared news about NPR’s Student Podcast Challenge that starts in January. While NPR does provide some good guides for students and teachers to use to plan podcasts, those guides don’t include tutorials on specific podcast reco…

  • 25 Reasons to Use TED-Ed in Your Classroom – Class Tech Tips

    How do roller coasters affect your body? Why don’t poisonous animals poison themselves? These are the type of questions tackled with the amazing TED-Ed videos for students and teachers!

  • Free Technology for Teachers: How to Use Adobe Spark to Create Videos

    Since the first day that it launched two and a half years ago, I knew that Adobe Spark would be a great tool for students to use to create videos. Like any good product it has evolved over the last couple of years by adding more features without eli…

  • Control Alt Achieve: 10 Writing Prompt Tools for Creative Inspiration

    I love writing… blog posts, stories, poems, and more. As much as I love it though, writing can be a challenge. Often one of the most difficult parts is just getting started. Sometimes we just need a little inspiration, a jump start to get us thinkin…

  • Free Technology for Teachers: How to Edit the Captions on Your YouTube Videos

    This morning on Twitter I was asked about the possibility of editing the captions that are automatically generated by the Google Slides captioning tool.

  • Free Technology for Teachers: Free Environment Data Fact Sheets and Posters from the UN

    The United Nations Environment Program offers a series of free posters based on data from the UNEP’s Geo Data Portal. These posters use charts, graphs, and maps to display information about environmental data.

  • What are the positive effects of video games on students’ academic performance? – Classcraft Blog

    If you’ve heard that video games rot your brain, think again! Video games have many positive effects on students’ academic performance, but some educators are still largely unaware of these awesome outcomes. Guess what? These effects are backed by s…

  • Teachers Urged to Instill Assignments with ‘Choice and Relevancy’ — THE Journal

    A new report from the Education Trust looks at the role of two “powerful levers” — choice and relevancy — in motivating and engaging students. This national nonprofit works on issues that disproportionately affect students from low-income families a…

  • McNeil Island becoming known for fish and wildlife, not just prison | Watching Our Water Ways

    If you’ve heard of McNeil Island, you are probably thinking of a former federal or state prison in South Puget Sound — not the rare and exclusive habitat that has won high praise from fish and wildlife biologists.

  • Real teaching means real learning: Trig Ratios animated

    What do you notice? What do you wonder? After some conversations show them this one, with the side lengths being shown and ask again: What do you notice? What do you wonder? Lastly, show them this image and ask them “How could we analyze this?” Some…

  • Free Technology for Teachers: 120 Free Winter-themed Reading Lesson Plans

    ReadWorks is an excellent service that provides teachers with free reading lesson plans. ReadWorks offers lesson plans that can be used in classrooms from Kindergarten through 12th grade. All of the lessons are standards-aligned.

  • Free Technology for Teachers: How to Add Videos to Google Slides Without Using YouTube

    This morning I received an email from a reader who wanted to know if it was possible for his students to add their personal videos to Google Slides presentations without having to use YouTube.

  • Microsoft OneDrive – Access files anywhere. Create docs with free Office Online.

  • Colleges Seeking Diversity

    Private colleges across the county have embraced this method: Amherst College in Massachusetts hosts job fairs and open houses for community college students; the University of Southern California has one of the largest transfer programs among elite…

  • Our Mock Caldecott List 2019 – Pernille Ripp

    After winter break, we welcome our students back with one of our favorite units of the year; our Mock Caldecott unit.  And while I have blogged about the process before, I see this as a great oppor…

  • Wisconsin Science and STEM Education: An Idea for Standards-Based Grading with 3D Science Standards (Part 4 of a series)

    Continuing with the standards-based grading (SBG) theme, I wanted to share one idea on how I might structure a system and one possible modification to that plan. As I noted before, I haven’t found an SBG system that I feel frames the outcomes quite …

  • Tech Resources for Your Next Science Experiment – Class Tech Tips

    Can an iPad help out with a science experiment? What role does a Chromebook play in the science classroom? Well, this month I hosted a webinar for SimpleK12 that tackled these questions. And I wanted to share all of the favorites from the webinar wi…

  • Free Technology for Teachers: Ten Resources for Teaching and Learning About Pearl Harbor

    This week is the 77th anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. That wasn’t the first military action of the Japanese during WWII. It’s just the event that finally got the U.S. to join the war.

  • Live Long and Prosper…: Listen to This

    Recent quotes and comments… Public schools didn’t cause poverty, but policymakers expect schools to overcome all the out-of-school factors related to living in poverty. When was the last time legislators were graded A-F by the state government?

  • New Climate Change Resources | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

    The United Nations Climate Change conference is going on in Poland this week. Five myths about climate change is from The Washington Post.

  • Hamilton, music, and the power of emotion to engage your learners | History Tech

    Almost exactly three years ago, away back in 2015, I wrote a short post about the Hamilton musical. My kids have a standing order that requires them to keep me updated with the latest pop culture from the youths.

  • When A Student Learns To Code – The Edublogger

    This week, students around the world are participating in ‘Hour of Code‘ as part of Computer Science Education Week (December 3-8). Learning to code can be life changing for students which is why I’d like to introduce you to our colleague who is an …

  • Free Lessons for Teaching Computer Science on Ditch That Textbook

  • Control Alt Achieve: Self-Checking Assessments in Google Sheets with Conditional Formatting

    There are so many excellent tools for online assessment including Google Forms, Quizlet, Kahoot, Flippity, Quizizz, and more. In addition to providing teachers with data on student performance, online quizzes can also be valuable simply for student …

  • Free Technology for Teachers: How to Use Bensound to Download Free Music

    A couple of weeks ago I posted a short review of a site called Bensound that hosts about 175 free instrumental music tracks that you can download for free. You can down the music for free and re-use it in classroom video projects provided that you f…

  •  Why a Hacker Exploited Printers to Make PewDiePie Propaganda | WIRED

    By now, you’ve probably heard of PewDiePie, a Swedish comedian and video game commentator who has been the most followed creator on YouTube for years. But you might not be as familiar with T-Series, an almost equally popular Indian media company.

  • I Am Connected, Therefore I Learn |

    Is it possible to learn without being connected to a network of other people?Click To Tweet Before technology redefined the way information is developed, organized, shared, and archived, it might have been possible for an individual to learn without…

  • Free Technology for Teachers: How to Upload Videos to Reply to Flipgrid Topics

    I love Flipgrid for the ease with which students can record videos with their webcams to reply to prompts that you give them. But not every student likes to appear on camera. And not every Flipgrid topic has to be a free-form response.

  • Innovative Science Teaching in Grades 6-12 @coolcatteacher

    Isabella Liu is a science teacher in Hong Kong who is using technology with her grade 6-12 classrooms. From augmented reality to game-based learning and online portfolios, she has a variety of ideas to share about how she amps up her science teachin…

  • Tom Ultican: An Astonishing $61 Million Spent on Tuck v. Thurmond Race | Diane Ravitch’s blog

    There has never been an election for State Superintendent of Public Instruction like the one recently concluded in California between Marshall Tuck and Tony Thurmond. Tom Ultican says that $61 Million was spent. It might eventually be even more.

  • Wisconsin Science and STEM Education: Why I Wouldn’t Use 3D (NGSS) Performance Expectations for Standards-Based Grading (Part 3 of Series)

    In my last post, I mentioned that I would not use the NGSS Performance Expectations (PEs) as scoring categories for standards-based grading (SBG). The main concern I expressed was about the inconsistencies and confusion that generated in one distric…

  • Alien Earths Online – www.alienearths.org

  • Assessing Learning in Maker Education | Edutopia

  • The Most Important Skills for the 4th Industrial Revolution? Try Ethics and Philosophy. | EdSurge News

  • UKEdMag: Every School needs a School Library by @ElizabetHutch – UKEdChat

  • Math Is Visual | Math Is Visual

    tags:mathematics math maths visuals visualization online edtech

  • Celebrating positives improves classroom behaviour and mental health – UKEdChat

  • Mecabricks.com

    tags:legos lego online edtech

  • This is Your Child’s Brain on Video Games | Psychology Today

  • Video: “Climate Change Explained In 5 Minutes Featuring Al Gore” | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

    geralt / Pixabay I’m adding this new BuzzFeed video to The Best Sites To Learn About Climate Change:

  • How to Build a Trauma Sensitive Classroom

    In this way, teachers are uniquely positioned to ameliorate some of the effects of early trauma. “The adults in the school environment may be the most stable and mentally well people [some children] have contact with,” said Jennings.

  • 50 New Blog Post Ideas For Educators – The Edublogger

    Do you have a professional educator blog? Many teachers start blogs with good intentions but keeping them active long term can be a struggle.

  • Cliff Mass Weather and Climate Blog: Our New Weather Satellite is In Position

    GOES-17, the new National Weather Service weather satellite, is now in position over the eastern Pacific. And you should expect to see substantially improved weather imagery in the future….on this blog and everywhere else.

  • 10 Ways Educators Can Take Action in Pursuit of Equity | Cult of Pedagogy

    With every passing year, it seems that our collective awareness of educational inequity is growing.

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

Here are more great resources from this past week:

• Slime Science Fair Project Ideas: Questions for slime based learning
• Teaching Responsibility or Compliance? – The Principal of Change

• Alcohol and Drug Abuse in College – Substance Addiction Statistics

• Students’ smoking- the earlier you quit smoking, the better

• “Unpaywall” Is New Tool For Accessing Research Papers For Free | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…As anyone who has tried to pursue even a little bit of academic research can attest, publishers charge an arm-and-a-leg to access studies if you are not part of an institution that subscribes to their journals. And the authors of those studies don’t…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Federal Land vs. State LandAs I write this What is Federal Land? is the #49 trending video on YouTube. It’s nice to see an educational video trending that high on YouTube. The video was produced by CGP Grey who has produced some other fantastic educational videos over the yea…

• History Nerdfest 2018: Using Structured Academic Controversy to teach 21st century skills | History TechIt ranks right up there with the Holiday season, KC Chiefs football, and the first weekend of the college basketball tournament. It’s National Council for the Social Studies conference week. I’m lucky enough to get front row seats and am trying to l…

• History Nerdfest 2018: Encouraging Historical Thinking Through Picture Books | History TechIt ranks right up there with the Holiday season, KC Chiefs football, and the first weekend of the college basketball tournament. It’s National Council for the Social Studies conference week. I’m lucky enough to get front row seats and am trying to l…

• A Little-Known Secret To Effective Teaching – Smart Classroom ManagementThere is a secret to effective teaching very few teachers are aware of. It’s so secret, in fact, that I’ve never heard anyone speak of it.

• Classroom Games and Tech: A Simple, Powerful Reflection Activity with Google DrawingsFor some recent professional development I have been focusing on thinking routines from The Visible Thinking website. One particularly powerful reflection routine caught my attention, so I created a related template for it in Google Drawings.

• History Nerdfest 2018: Unpacking color consciousness | History TechIt ranks right up there with the Holiday season, KC Chiefs football, and the first weekend of the college basketball tournament. It’s National Council for the Social Studies conference week. I’m lucky enough to get front row seats and am trying to l…

• Screenplay – Edit video as naturally as textScreenplay gives you an auto-generated transcription of all the speech in your whole video file. All you have to do next is use the familiar text editor interface to trim, cut, and rearrange text to create your brand new video!

• 8 Food Myths You Need To Stop Believing | MyFitnessPalYou can find healthy eating advice on every corner. That doesn’t mean it’s good advice, though. Nutrition research can be confusing, and it’s always changing.

• Hydrophones open a world of underwater sound to people at home | Watching Our Water WaysListening to the sound of whales in Puget Sound from your computer at home is becoming easier than ever, thanks to a new hydrophone on Whidbey Island and its connection to a more sophisticated computer network.

• History Nerdfest 2018: Fostering Civil Dialogue | History TechIt ranks right up there with the Holiday season, KC Chiefs football, and the first weekend of the college basketball tournament. It’s National Council for the Social Studies conference week. I’m lucky enough to get front row seats and am trying to l…

• History Nerdfest 2018: Civic Engagement in actual practice – handouts, resources, and rubrics | History TechIt ranks right up there with the Holiday season, KC Chiefs football, and the first weekend of the college basketball tournament. It’s National Council for the Social Studies conference week. I’m lucky enough to get front row seats and am trying to l…

• Yong Zhao’s Must-Watch Lecture on “Side Effects in Education” | Diane Ravitch’s blogThis is a video of Yong Zhao’s brilliant lecture on education reform at Wellesley College on Bovember 1. He called it “What Works May Hurt. Side Effects in Education.” He recently published a book explains this paradox. I strongly recommend this boo…

• No, Robert Pondiscio, School Choice is Not a “Moral Agenda” | Diane Ravitch’s blogYesterday, I participated in a panel discussion at the Washington Post about national issues in education with Robert Pondiscio of the conservative Thomas B. Fordham Institute and Dean Bridget Terry Long of the Harvard Graduate School of Education.

• Blended Learning: 8 Respectful Routines |I field a lot of questions about classroom management when I work with teachers transitioning to blended learning. Teachers worry about what will happen when they shift from whole group lessons to blended learning models that encourage student agenc…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Teaching the Constitution With Political Cartoons – Webinar RecordingDocsTeach is one of my favorite tools for building history lessons centered around primary source documents, pictures, maps, and drawings. DocsTeach contains an integrated search tool for finding artifacts from the U.S. National Archives. You can us…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Turn Text to Speech With the Voicepods Chrome ExtensionA couple of months ago I discovered a new text to speech tool called Voicepods. When I first tried it and wrote about it Voicepods would only create voice recordings based on text that you wrote.

• 8 Good Sketchnoting Apps for Teachers | Educational Technology and Mobile LearningWe are revisiting the topic of sketchnoting with an updated list of some of the best iPad apps you can use to create visually attractive sketchnotes.

• How to Multitask Like a Pro on Chromebooks: 8 Tips and TricksGoogle wants to replace your computer with an operating system that, on the surface, might seem like just a web browser. But when you want to get work done, you need those desktop-grade multitasking tools, and easily switch between multiple apps and…

• Control Alt Achieve: 8 Ways to Supercharge Google Docs with DrawingsOn the 8th day of Tech-Mas my true love gave to me… 8 Docs Drawings. Note: This post is part of my “12 Days of Tech-Mas” series for 2017. You can see all of the posts for each day as they get released in the main post here: “12 Days of Tech-Mas 2017…

• Development Progress #1Introduction Why, hello! My name is Felpix, and thanks for checking out my first post in my development progress for my own game, titled CrashBound. If you haven’t seen the first post, check it out at the hyperlink.

• Steve Isaacs (stevei2071) on Pinterestclasscraft story : Game in Progress – Reflection 1!Reflection #1 by Stephanie 11/30/2018 Quick Summary: The game I am creating in Minecraft is called Parcore. It is a game where you (the player), goes through a test (or a series of levels) to see if you’re a qualified parkourist.

• History Nerdfest 2018: Helping Teachers Embrace Controversial Issues | History TechI love the National Council for the Social Studies national conference. Who doesn’t? Seriously. Thousands of social studies nerds all in one place? Talking about best practice, resources, tech tools, sharing ideas, getting smarter? What’s not to lik…

• Trump Administration Warning On Climate Change | Diane Ravitch’s blogThe Trump administration released an ominous report on climate change in the middle of the Thanksgiving weekend, on a Friday at 2 pm. It hoped to bury the consensus of 17 federal agencies. But the facts won’t stay buried, no matter how much politici…

• History Nerdfest 2018: Social Studies Inquiry Made Real. Teachers as Designers | History TechI love this stuff! The Inquiry Design Model is a great way to integrate the NCSS Inquiry Arc into actual practice. This is something that we in Kansas have been struggling with since 2013. We created new state standards that focuses on finding a bal…

• Free Technology for Teachers: A New Gradebook for Google Classroom!One of the long-running complaints about Google Classroom that I and many others have had is about the nearly featureless gradebook. It appears that Google has heard those complaints and is taking some steps to improve the Google Classroom gradebook.

• A Professional Development Alternative | My Island ViewI recently attended the annual conference held by , the New York State ISTE affiliate organization. It is a favorite conference of mine, since I served as a board member of that organization for about six years. It is also both comprehensive and pro…

• History Nerdfest 2018: Spatial Analogies and Learning Geography | History TechDr. Phil Gersmehl is rocking the room with brain science and maps. His basic point: He’s using brain research to show how our brains unconsciously encode maps differently. What we remember depends on how we encode it. He highlighted some ways that t…

• Room Escape Maker – Create Escape The Room Games For FreeROOM ESCAPE MAKER is a free online application to create Escape The Room games. Build challenging casual point and click games with puzzles, hidden objects, safes with combination locks, and much more. YOU are game designer. And for free 🙂

• Great Books for Dystopian Book Clubs – Pernille RippOne choice can transform you. Beatrice Prior’s society is divided into five factions—Candor (the honest), Abnegation (the selfless), Dauntless (the brave), Amity (the peaceful), and Erudite (the intelligent).

• Control Alt Achieve: Google Tools for English Language LearnersGoogle Docs translate add-on Instead of translating an entire document, sometimes you may just need to translate a phrase or sentence. For those occasions you can use the Google Translate add-on for Docs.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Google is Removing Annotations from YouTube VideosEighteen months ago Google removed the annotations editor from YouTube. Today, I logged into the YouTube editor and saw an announcement that Google is going to remove all existing annotations from YouTube videos on January 15th.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Sites in VR – The VR App for Those Without VR HeadsetsSites in VR is a free Android and iOS app that provides a 1700 virtual reality views of significant landmarks around the world. The app is a good one for those who would like to experience a bit of virtual reality without having to use a virtual rea…

• My Own Game: The Minecraft Olympics Name (s): John, Zayan, Ben, Charlie Game Title: Minecraft Olympics Genre: Action/Adventure Tool / platform you think you will use to create the game: Minecraft Storyline: In the city of Gome the Olympics have been going on for a hundred years with c…

• Homework did not prepare my daughter for college.“I give homework to my students to prepare them for college” is a common statement made by teachers that I work with and throughout the country.  According to Bill Gates’ Blog, (cnbc.

• Real teaching means real learning: Area and perimeter of a triangleAsk, “What do you notice? What do you wonder?”. After some discussion pose, if not already asked, the following questions:

• 5 Resources to Find Tons of Free Fun Unplugged Coding Activities! – Teacher Reboot CampPart of the series, Hour of Code Ideas! In a previous post I described why all students should participate in the upcoming Hour of Code event, which takes place December 3rd to 9th.

• [Mailbag] What Do You Do with the Ideas You Used to Call “Mistakes” – dy/danGuillaume Paré, in the very interesting comments of my last post where I urged us to reconsider mistakes: I do agree with what is written, but I am still wondering what I’m supposed to do with that information and the student’s copy.

• Guest Blogger: Mary Gross – Anger and Hope | CUNY Games NetworkToday we wrap up the four-part series from guest blogger Mary Gross. In this final entry, Mary describes a game in which students participate in strategic gambles that result in reallocation of resources represented by chips.

• How to build an integrated STEM lesson using Minecraft – Monash EducationAnd it all starts with searching for action verbs, write Monash’s Gillian Kidman, Roland Gesthusizen and Hazel Tan. Within the Australian curriculum, there are a number of specific cognitive skills that need to be developed in science, technology an…

• Sketchnoting How-to Sylvia DuckworthThe perfect combination of pedagogy and practice, Sylvia’s new book begins with an overview of why doodling is not just okay, it’s beneficial to the learning process.

• Lisa Nielsen: The Innovative Educator: Technology Use Is A Right, Not A PrivilegeSome traditional educators may still view student access to technology as a privilege, but it is not. Today, technology is necessary for learning to be accessible, real, and relevant in the modern world.

• A Big Reward for Writing this Blog | Diane Ravitch’s blogSeveral weeks ago, I told the story of Arnold and Carol Hillman, who retired as educators in Pennsylvania and moved to South Carolina.

• Paymon Rouhanifard: I Was Wrong About Standardized Testing and Accountability | Diane Ravitch’s blogPayman Rouhanifard was in charge of Joel Klein’s “Office of Portfolio Management” in New York City. He was appointed as superintendent of schools in Camden, New Jersey, by Chris Christie.

• ditchthattextbook.comSketchnoting in the Classroom: A Beginner’s Guide – Class Tech TipsAre you ready to try something new? Sketchnoting isn’t a new concept, but it’s gaining traction throughout education communities. Educators and students are exploring ways to capture their learning. It’s been very exciting to see the excitement arou…

• Get Started with Augmented + Virtual Reality | ARVRinEDU | Jaime Donally | Professional DevelopmentFree Technology for Teachers: Nearly 900 Free Art History Books – And an Art LessonAround this time five years ago I discovered that the Metropolitan Museum of Art hosts free online art history texts. A recent Tweet from Open Culture reminded me of that collection. Today, I revisited that collection and discovered that it has expa…

• Collection: Persuasive Maps: PJ Mode Collection – Cornell University Library Digital Collections Search ResultsStart Over Collection Persuasive Maps: PJ Mode Collection Cornell University Library Digital Collections Persuasive Maps: PJ Mode Collection About the collection Skip filters Cornell University Library Web Accessibility Assistance Library Resources:…

• Badass Teachers Association: BATs Statement on US Attack on Asylum SeekersThe directors of the Badass Teachers Association condemn U.S. border agent’s unjustified use of tear gas on asylum seekers this weekend in Tijuana, Mexico.

• 50 New Blog Post Ideas For Students – The EdubloggerDo your students have blogs? Or perhaps they contribute to a class blog? Enthusiasm is typically high when blogs are first set up but students may need some assistance to keep the momentum going.

• Are Rubrics Counterproductive and Limiting? | All Things AssessmentA few months ago, a young teacher, Maggie, asked me what I thought of the use of rubrics. I thought it a curious question, so I asked her why she was asking.

• A Side Quest about Side Quests! – Classroom PowerupsPlease leave me a comment so that I know you found this side quest! If you aren’t actually at my FETC Session this is going to be a side quest participants will be able to go on as I am playing a dice game with the group.

• 8 Wonderful Websites for Easy Coding Activities for Any Age or Level! – Teacher Reboot CampFirst in the series, Hour of Code Ideas! Throughout my 20 plus years of teaching I’ve integrated technology in the various subjects I’ve taught because the world needs all our learners to gain the digital skills needed to thrive, connect, and contri…

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

Check out these great blog posts:

• Teach Better by Doing Less – The Reflective Educator

  There are two common activities teachers do that have either little to no impact on student learning but which do take teachers a tremendous amount of time, time that could be better spent on other activities.

• NV Math Team | Math

  What is the New Visions Mathematics Curriculum?

• Augmented Reality | Hide messages in the real world | WallaMe

• Audiotool

• Timeblocks | A quick and easy Agenda Timer

• 10 Tips to Keep Pupils’ Attention – UKEdChat

• Why is Maths a Big Deal? – UKEdChat

• 10 Easy Ways to Motivate Your Students by @RichardJARogers – UKEdChat

• Insufficient sleep in children associated with poor diet, obesity and more screen time – UKEdChat

• Brickapic – Turn your pic into a brick mosaic

  tags:lego brick picture photo

• PBS LearningMedia

  tags:math maths real world resource

• Cliff Mass Weather and Climate Blog: Fog and Roadway Icing: The Warning of the Husky Bus Crash

  Yesterday, a bus with a number of students of the Husky Band overturned on Interstate 90 just west of the town of George, Washington (see map below) as they headed to the Apple Cup game in Pullman. A number of students sustained injuries, but thankf…

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Access and Use the Blurring Tools in YouTube’s Video Editor

  This is the time of year for winter concerts and plays at schools. If the ones at your are anything like the one I attended last week, there will be plenty of parents recording the performances. And I’d guess that you or someone from your school wil…

• How Technology Helps In The Education Of Special-Needs Students – e-Learning Infographics

  Special-needs students who have, in the past, faced particular learning challenges in the classroom have benefited from the introduction of technology.

• Free Technology for Teachers: How Frost Appears on Plants – A Science Lesson

  Here in Maine we’re way past worrying about frost in the morning. That’s because we’ve already had a few snow storms. But some of you may have frost on plants in the morning. SciShow Kids has a new video all about what causes frost to appear on plan…

• Filling a Makerspace Room – Classroom Snapshots

  Wondering what to start collecting and purchasing for your STEM/STEAM makerspace room?  I started this growing list to help guide what’s added to our elementary STEAM makerspace. Do you have any additions I could make to this list?  Comment below or…

• Low streamflows have constrained the salmon migration this fall | Watching Our Water Ways

  If you are hosting out-of-town visitors this Thanksgiving weekend, it might be a good time to take them salmon-watching — or go by yourself if you get the urge to see one of nature’s marvelous phenomena.

• John Thompson: Goliath, King of the Zombies | Diane Ravitch’s blog

  John Thompson here writes about his reaction to the annual conference of the Network for Public Education, where the implicit theme was that David is beating Goliath, but Goliath just keeps stumbling forward, crushing public schools and advancing pr…

• Ditch Summit 2018 PD on Your Couch

• Free Technology for Teachers: Wakelet Now Lets You Copy and Build Upon Collections

  Wakelet is free bookmarking and note-taking service that I’ve been using since April when I started looking for alternatives to Padlet. On Wakelet you can create collection and sub-collections of notes, bookmarks, and pictures.

• Royalty Free Music by Bensound

  You can use this music for free in your multimedia project (online videos (Youtube, Facebook,…), websites, animations, etc.) as long as you credit Bensound.com (in the description for a video). For example: Music: https://ift.tt/1R9NTfT

• Free Technology for Teachers: Bensound – Free Music for Video Projects

  On Tuesday I wrote about the impending closure of the Free Music Archive. In that post I shared some other sites to find free music to use in your multimedia projects. Thanks to an email from Kari Kakeh I’ve learned about another good site to find f…

• 7 geography tools that mess with your head. Cause that’s a good thing | History Tech

  We all know that I spent a significant amount of my formative years digging through old National Geographic maps. You know the ones I’m talking about. They got slipped into the middle of the magazine and unfolded into poster size after you discovere…

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Make a QR Code for Just About Anything

  This fall there seems to be a renewed interest in QR codes, at least amongst readers of this blog. In just the last two weeks I’ve answered a half dozen emails with questions related to QR codes.

• Using Technology to Humanize – The Principal of Change

  I have been an advocate of technology in education for a long time. But I have been an advocate of “people” for my entire career.

• That Isn’t a Mistake – dy/dan

  I’ve seen this particular incorrect answer from dozens of students over the last several weeks. The work for 10 and 15 marbles is incorrect, but it isn’t a mistake.

• Tweens are smart about smartphones: Study – NetFamilyNews.org | NetFamilyNews.org

  Everything about this study is smart — the 10-14 year-old respondents (average age 11), what the authors are modeling for pediatricians and parents, and the tweens’ answers. For example, when asked what age kids should be given mobile phones, one an…

• Technology Tidbits: Thoughts of a Cyber Hero: Answerables

  Answerables the innovative educational tool that combines the best features of game based learning w/ a learning management system has just released their free iPad app.

• Free Technology for Teachers: The Free Music Archive is Closing – But Not All is Lost

  For the better part of the last decade the Free Music Archive has been one of my go-to places to find free music to use video projects. Unfortunately, the end is near for the Free Music Archive.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Change Coming to Your Google Account’s Sign-in Screen

  Starting next Tuesday you might notice a small change to the sign-in screen for your Google account. The change is that you will see a box around the “email or phone number” field on the sign-in page instead of just a single line.

• what giving students choice looks like

  1. People to Work With. Give students the chance to choose whether to work independently or with another student(s). As a teacher, you can still maintain some control by giving students input.

• Three Ways You Can Improve Your Math Textbook Tomorrow – Achieve the Core Aligned Materials

  In my work as a Mathematics Specialist at Student Achievement Partners, I get the opportunity to talk to and work with educators from around the country. Often, especially in conversations with elementary school teachers, we talk about challenges wi…

• Teach Students How to Give Peer Feedback – Teacher Tech

  Peer feedback can be powerful for learning, but only if students do a good job at it. Analyze and critique can be higher critical thinking levels than doing the task in the first place. I guarantee if you ask students to give peer feedback the quali…

• Gamification, part 2

  In the previous article, I wrote about the basic motivation principles for setting up a great gamification model. In this one, I would like to tell you what I learned about failing and why it is a critical element in gamification.

• The Benefits of Gamification for Call Center Managers | Fonolo

  Attention all call center managers: It’s time to talk about you. Picture it: You are the fearless leader of a call center team in 2018.

• 20 ways to celebrate hour of code in any class

• The Nerdy Teacher: What I Learned About Literacy After I Left The English Classroom #EngChat #Literacy

  Making the decision to move from my high school English Literature and Composition job after 15 years to build a makerspace and support tech integration for teachers, was very tough. I loved working with students and helping them read and evaluate t…

• Nobody Knows Anything: Why Skipping Playtesting Is Inconceivable | David Mullich

  Last week plagued us with at least three deaths of figures in the entertainment industry.  The death of beloved Marvel Comics editor and Marvel film cameo star Stan Lee made front page news around the world.

• Atlas Obscura Shares Your D&D Maps – The Map Room

  Remember how Atlas Obscura put out a call for Dungeons & Dragons maps? They’ve received a pile of entries and are featuring two dozen of them: “[Y]our D&D maps are more incredible than we could have imagined. Every single one calls out for explorati…

• Where Apple Maps and Google Street View Will Be Driving (or Walking) Next – The Map Room

  Apple now has a fleet of cars collecting data for Apple Maps. Since they’ve been making a point about consumer privacy lately, this page lists where their cars are going to be in the coming weeks. (AppleInsider notes that some of that data collectio…

• Amusing Monday: New satellite enhances images of East Pacific region | Watching Our Water Ways

  An amazing new satellite, designed to peer down on the West Coast and Hawaii, started transmitting stunning images last week, when heavy snows blanketed parts of Alaska while California wildfires sent plumes of smoke into the air. The satellite is c…

• Showcasing Class Blogs! – The Edublogger

  Do you enjoy seeing what’s happening in other classrooms to get new perspectives and ideas? Or maybe you’re looking for other classes around the globe that your students can connect with? We’ve just updated our list of class blogs!

• Another Test? How to Plan Assessments So Students Can Learn | All Things Assessment

  Ever feel like you are giving assessments all the time? Between the pretest, post-test, quizzes, district benchmarks, state interim assessments, or other nationally normed progress monitoring assessments, when is a student supposed to learn? When is…

• Why choice matters to student learning?

  Student choice builds ownership in the learning. Student choice allows students to display their learning in the way that they feel best represents their knowledge.

• Control Alt Achieve: Adding and Using Comments on Screencastify Videos

  There are many excellent screen recording tools available, but one of my favorites is the Screencastify Chrome extension. It is simple to use, has lots of nice features, works on Chromebooks, and is free for videos up to 10 minutes long.

• Classroom Games and Tech: A Quick, Simple Google Chrome Extension for Student Video Responses

  Here’s the most popular tool I showed at the miGoogle conference recently. It’s a simple Chrome extension from Alice Keeler called Webcam Record.

• Welcome to Discovery Education Canada – Total Education Solution in Canada

  In case you missed it, check out our monthly Newsletter. We have included timely content, resources, and events to engage your students inside and outside of the classroom.

• Gamification can help education — here’s how | VentureBeat

  Teachers and parents hear it over and over again: “make learning fun” to keep kids engaged. Gamified education apps for use outside of the classroom have proliferated, leading students to expect gamification when they’re back inside of the classroom…

• A Student’s Guide to Using Google Sheets – Teacher Tech

  Using a spreadsheet is a life skill. In the real world, successful people use spreadsheets. I have created a Google Doc with 4 essential skills that if students can do just these 4 things they can use spreadsheets for assignments.

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

Here are some amazing blog posts from this past week:

• 6 ways ordinary people can prevent climate change, according to researchers and advocates

  Worried about the environment? Scientists, researchers and advocates share the top changes we can make to be part of the climate change solution. In October, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a leading international body on climate chan…

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Create a QR Code for a Voice Recording

  Just a few minutes ago I answered an email from a reader named Chris who wanted a recommendation on how to have students create voice recordings that play back when a QR code is scanned. My recommendation was to try Vocaroo.

• ditchthattextbook.com

• Badass Teachers Association: Linda Darling-Hammond vs. Linda-Darling Hammond – How a Once Great Educator Got Lost Among the Corporate Stooges by Steven Singer

  Linda Darling-Hammond is one of my education heroes. Perhaps that’s why her recent article in the Washington Post hurts so much.

• Different Definitions of Personalized Learning Conflict Cause Confusion

  It’s a concept grounded in the psychology of motivation, learning science and growing technologies like artificial intelligence (AI). And the hype around it is blowing up. Personalized learning is the No.

• How PortfolioGen Helps Students Create Free Portfolios – Class Tech Tips

  Do your students have fantastic work to share this school year? If your students have a wide range of creations, they can help their work shine with an online portfolio. A digital space to showcase student work opens the possibilities for a wider au…

• Mo Physics Mo Problems: UDL Smackdown

  Fighting the Inertia of a Traditional Classroom

• A Grading Strategy that Puts the Focs on Learning From Mistakes

  The students get their grade a day later on PowerSchool, and they’re given opportunities to retake the test after they’ve digested their mistakes. Alcala also projects “favorite mistakes” on the board that they talk about as a class.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Three Tools for Creating Custom Maps Without a Google Account

  Google’s My Maps is a great tool for designing custom maps. The problem with it is that students can only save their work if they have Google accounts. If your school uses G Suite for Education that’s probably not a problem, but it is a problem for …

• Powercards: Unit 3 Items – Classroom Powerups

  For the 2018-19 School Year I have completely revamped my Power Card Items. This year I have tied the Items to my narrative. The story concept is that the students’ powers are based on the manipulation of “Primary Source Energy” and each items is ba…

• Technology Tidbits: Thoughts of a Cyber Hero: 10 Sites for Checking Plagiarism

  “Plagiarism is the “wrongful appropriation” and “stealing and publication” of another author’s “language, thoughts, ideas, or expressions” and the representation of them as one’s own original work. (wikipedia)”.

• A Supreme Court Justice’s Legacy in Edtech | EdSurge News

• Pear Deck for You! – Teacher Tech

  It’s pretty universal, seeing Pear Deck and falling in love. It allows for making interactive lessons. Not only do they have really cute pear drawings, but their interface is super easy to use.

• The Future Of Education With AR – e-Learning Infographics

  Technology in education has made it possible to add a layer of enhanced reality and interactivity, this gives Teachers/tutors opportunity to make learning more realistic and immersive improving retention and deep learning.

• 3 Ways to Make Literature Real and Relevant – Class Tech Tips

  How can you make curriculum content real, relevant, and approachable? Making student-centered instruction a priority is an important place to start.

• Free Technology for Teachers: CoRubrics – An Add-on to Facilitate Assessment Among Students

  This week I am hosting guest posts. This one was authored by Jaume Feliu at the Salas i Xandri High School in Sant Quirze del Vallès, near Barcelona. More and more rubrics are coming into the classroom for assessment.

• The Importance of Definitions (and Why They Don’t Matter) – Gamified UK – #Gamification Expert

  Yep, paradoxical title alert! Recently I got into a very interesting debate on LinkedIn about the definition of Gamification. Now, I have long had my definition of gamification, one that doesn’t stray too far from the closest thing we have to a “pro…

• Mercedes Schneider: Letter Grades for Schools Are a Measure of the Families’ Income Level | Diane Ravitch’s blog

  Jeb Bush had this big idea about how to hold schools accountable: Give them a letter grade based mostly on their test scores.

• What it’s Like to Teach When You Don’t Have Parent Support

  Not all of us are dealing with lawnmower parents. Maybe you read this viral article on lawnmower parents and nodded in agreement. Or maybe, like me, you read the piece and sighed ruefully, thinking, “Champagne problems.

• changing how educators see negative experiences in the classroom

  For example, a fourth-grade teacher I’ll call Jane had been teaching for nine years and was on the verge of dropping out of the profession from exhaustion. She told me, “I just don’t think I can keep this up another year.

• Google Slides Sticky Note Brainstorming Powerful Planning

• Video: “The science behind California’s surging wildfires” | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  Our discomfort is obviously infinitesimal compared to those who lost their homes – and their lives – due to the Camp Fire. But I have to say the constant hazardous smoke in Northern California is pretty bad, and most schools have prohibited all outd…

• Peers are Powerful

  Since the #MeToo movement, six states have introduced or passed bills to require the teaching of consent in their sex ed classes in K-12. But there’s not yet much research on what kind of education actually works to shift teens’ attitudes and action…

• Important New Video: “The Science of Racism” | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  The Science of Racism is a new video from YouTube’s “Creators for Change” program. I’m adding it to Revised & Updated: Useful Resources For Learning About Race & Racism.

• 25 incredibly useful things you didn’t know Google Docs could do

  tags:google docs tips shortcuts googledocs

• 7 Questions To Guide Your PBL Implementation Plan –

  tags:pbl questions guide implement implementation plan

• CPU VLOG: 11-13 Ranking Up – Classroom Powerups

  Mr. Powley is a 14 year teaching veteran and is currently the dual enrollment American History teacher at the #1 ranked high school in South Carolina. For the last several years he has transformed his classroom based on the principles of game inspir…

• Just a Little Push: Five Ideas for Intervention and Feedback | All Things Assessment

  When you are unsure, not feeling confident, and scared no one will like you, it can be hard to get started. My son, Chase, is a fifth grader, and we signed him up for a basketball camp. He went alone and didn’t know anyone. As can be predicted, he w…

• Celebrate Geography Awareness Week with Augmented Reality Scavenger Hunts – Class Tech Tips

  It’s here! This week is Geography Awareness Week, and I’m excited to share some tech-friendly ideas for exploring the world with your students. Augmented reality scavenger hunts can get your kids moving both inside and outside the classroom.

• The Nerdy Teacher: Adventures in Icelandic Schools #MakerEd #MakerMentality

  The nice part about all of this is that these skills are all transferable to all of the other classes the students attend. Maths, English, Science, etc. are all using Project Based Learning to explore ideas and the students have the skills to create…

• 25 Coding Apps For Kids Under 8 – e-Learning Infographics

  Did you know that coding can help kids develop their problem-solving and critical thinking skills? Did you know that you can introduce them to programming at a very early age? Maybe you are looking for a way to make the kids’ screen time a bit more …

• A Guide to Gamification

• Linda Darling-Hammond Vs. Ravitch and Burris on School Choice | Diane Ravitch’s blog

  Carol Burris and I wrote a critique of that report, because it seems to endorse the reformers’ idea of a portfolio of charters, public schools, and other choices.

• 10 Ways To Instantly Make Your Blog Better! – The Edublogger

  Your blog might be full of inspiring ideas but are people reading your posts? Are they sticking around and returning when you publish new content? I have the pleasure of reading a lot of blogs as part of my role with Edublogs.

• Cliff Mass Weather and Climate Blog: Why did the Catastrophic Camp Fire Start Where it Did?

  The tragic Camp Fire of northern California has killed at least 31 people, destroyed approximately 7000 structures, and basically leveled the retirement community of Paradise, California.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Edji – A Great Tool for Literacy and Critical Thinking

  This week I am welcoming some guest bloggers. This one is from Eric Hills. As a tech coach, I love spending time trying to find tools that are easy to use, can enhance student learning, and are engaging for students. Edji checks all three of those b…

• 4 Skills and Traits Great Schools Teach That Will Always be Essential – The Principal of Change

  Most educators are aware of the “Four C’s” (Critical thinking, Creativity, Collaboration and Communication) and their importance in schools for ensuring the development of today’s skills in our students ().

• Lisa Nielsen: The Innovative Educator: Presentation Trick Innovative Educators Will Love

  · 4 #EdTech Blogs to Bookmark · 9 Must Read Blogs for Innovative Teachers · 10 Digital Citizenship Bloggers to Follow · 10 Education blogs worth following – eSchool News · 11 Ed Tech Bloggers to Follow · 20 Best Blogs in Instructional Technology · 2…

• A Principal’s Reflections: 3 Shifts to Make Learning Personal

  In education, a lesson makes or breaks a learner’s experience in a classroom. Planning takes time.

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

Here are some amazing blog posts from last week:

• Math Journals: Pairing a Metacognitive Practice with Adaptive Software |

  An increasing number of school districts are investing in adaptive software to allow students to engage in personalized math practice. I often see students at the elementary level rotate through a station rotation lesson like the one pictured below.

• When Games about the Past Trouble the Present: Games and History, Accuracy, Equity, Representation, and Reality | Gaming the Past

  Over the past few months I have been mulling over some ideas for a set of talks I’m giving in the winter and spring for students, teachers, and parents on historical video games and gameplay as historying, the ways they represent the past, and the i…

• How To Avoid Losing Your Students’ Attention – Smart Classroom Management

  There is a phenomenon I see again and again in the classrooms I visit. They’ll talk and move faster as if trying to finish before completely losing the class.

• Quick Start Guide for Adobe Spark for Education – Class Tech Tips

  Creativity in the classroom is essential across grade levels and subject areas. Students can demonstrate what they’ve learned about a topic, synthesize information, and create a shareable movie, website or graphic with Adobe Spark.

• Getting Started with Applied Digital Skills – Mari Venturino

  Raise your hand if you use any Google Apps (search, Docs, Sheets, Slides, Forms, etc.) in your personal life? It’s as simple as this blog post, which I drafted on Google Docs, and inserted images and links.

• 6 Appetite-Control Strategies that Helped Me Stop Overeating | MyFitnessPal

  It can be hard not to overeat. You eat a healthy meal at home, think you’re doing well, then you head out (to almost any destination) and are surrounded by junk food. You get hungry, and pretty soon you’re at the local burger joint, diet forgotten.

• 30 ways to make your lessons interactive

• The Changing Roles of Educators – Reading By Example

  My son did not want to practice his trumpet. He was finding anything else to do to avoid this daily task. To be honest, I felt the same way when I was in 6th grade and the novelty of playing the trumpet had worn off after about two weeks.

• GBD Compare | IHME Viz Hub

• Chart Maker for busy people | Chartify

  Chartify’s chart creator currently only supports desktop browsers.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Is Your Feedback Really Effective? – This Google Docs Add-on Will Tell You

  Anyone who has ever spent a Sunday afternoon grading essay after essay has at some point wondered, “did anyone listen when I explained homophones?” This usually happened to me around the 27th essay of the day.

• A Spelling, Grammar and Word Checker for Students – Class Tech Tips

  One of the great things about education technology is how when it is used strategically, it can provide an extra layer of support to students. If you’ve worked with students of any age, you’ve probably heard the same, “How do you spell this?” questi…

• Live Long and Prosper…: Still Teaching From the Grave

  Last month I reread Carl Sagan’s Billions and Billions: Thoughts on Life and Death at the brink of the Millenium. It is Sagan’s last book, published in 1997, the year after he died from the rare bone-marrow disease myelodysplasia.

• Linda Darling-Hammond vs Diane Ravitch and Carol Burris

  I recently published a post by Diane Ravitch and Carol Burris titled “Why It Matters Who Governs America’s Public Schools,” which took issue with some parts of a new report — “The Tapestry of American Public Education: How Can We Create a System of …

• Free Technology for Teachers: A Handful of Resources for Learning About Veterans Day

  This Sunday is Veterans Day (many places will observe it on Monday). The following resources can help students understand the origins and meaning of Veterans Day including how it is different from Memorial Day. Bet You Didn’t Know: Veterans Day.

• Free Technology for Teachers: The Origins of Ingredients in Thanksgiving Meals

  Last week I shared three Thanksgiving-themed projects that you can do this month. Of course, I have many more Thanksgiving resources bookmarked to share with you. One of those is an interesting video from It’s Okay to be Smart titled The Surprising …

• World War I Ended On Nov. 11th One Hundred Years Ago – Here Are Related Resources | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  The centennial of the end of World War I is this weekend. You might be interested in The Best Resources For Learning About World War I.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Build a Body – An Interactive Biology Lesson

  Spend a few minutes using Build a Body and it is easy to understand why it was recognized by the National Science Foundation. In Sponge Lab Biology’s Build a Body students construct a human body system-by-system. To build a body students drag and dr…

• Free Technology for Teachers: A Good Tool for Writing Reflections on Stories

  Scholastic’s Character Scrapbook offers a good template that elementary school students can use to write about and reflect on the characters in their favorite stories. The template is quite simple to use. Students enter the name of a story and the n…

• Tech Transformation: Sleep and school start times

  Since moving back to the UK I’ve been living in a village. It’s stating the obvious, I think, to say that village life is very different from living in Mumbai, a city of 22 million people. For me one of the biggest differences I’ve noticed is in the…

• 5 mistakes your kids make while thinking historically. (And how you can fix them.) | History Tech

  A big part of what I do every week involves spending time with teachers, especially social studies teachers, leading and having conversations around best practice, instruction, and assessment. And it’s almost always the best part of the week. Think …

• Personalizing the Journey for Our Students – The Principal of Change

  The key to this question is not thinking like you but thinking about your students and their point of view.

• Using Book Creator for Formative Assessment – Class Tech Tips

  What does it look like to check for understanding with digital tools? This is a question I’ve posed to teachers from different corners of the country. When speaking about the use of technology in the classroom, formative assessment is a hot topic.

• Larry Cuban: Who Says Classrooms Never Change? | Diane Ravitch’s blog

  One of the favorite lines of Faux Reformers like Bill Gates, Lauren Powell Jobs, Michelle Rhee, etc. is that American schools haven’t changed in a century, maybe two centuries.

• 3 Types Of Motivation – e-Learning Infographics

  Whether its getting to the gym, writing that personal blog post, networking with professionals developing your app and more, we always need motivation to get these things done. Sometimes it’s tough to understand what motivates us best.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Visme – Great Tools for Making Flowcharts and Mind Maps

  Visme is a graphic design tool that I’ve been using off and on for the last five years. Back when I started using Visme it was known as EWC Presenter and it was a good tool for designing slides and infographics. Recently, Visme added new flowchart d…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Knoema – Huge Collections of Data Maps and Charts

  Knoema is a service that offers a huge collection of data sets and maps for public use. Knoema offers data maps and charts for almost every country in the world. There are dozens of data categories to pick from.

• Free Technology for Teachers: How GPS Works

  From finding a place to eat in a new city to navigating a detour to geocaching, GPS is an amazing technology. But just how does GPS work? NASA’s eClips channel on YouTube has a good student-friendly explanation of how GPS works.

• Video: “World’s oldest cave paintings from 40,000 years ago discovered in Indonesia” | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  I’m adding this new video (it may look like there’s nothing there, but click on it and it will play) from The Telegraph to The Best Sites For Learning About Prehistoric Cave Paintings:

• Windy: Wind map & weather forecast

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• earth :: a global map of wind, weather, and ocean conditions

  community EarthWindMap earth ≡ Date | Data | Scale | Source | Control | Now « – ‹ – › – » ⊕Grid▷HD Mode | Air – Ocean – Chem – Particulates – Space Height | Sfc – 1000 – 850 – 700 – 500 – 250 – 70 – 10 hPa Overlay | Wind – Temp – RH –

• Why teachers should embrace digital devices in the classroom – UKEdChat

  France’s recent decision to pass a law banning the use of cell phones, tablets and smartwatches at school for children under 15 is just the latest example of moral panic around new digital technologies, according to a University of Alberta education…

• Best Website Builders 2018 – Lab Tested Reviews by PCMag.com

  Getting your message out these days requires good helpings of Facebook and Twitter, with maybe a dash of Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, and Tumblr. But that’s not enough: if you want an internet presence that truly represents you or your organizati…

• Shakespeare Unlimited | Folger Shakespeare Library

• Gender myths dispelled by major new maths study – UKEdChat

  A major study into maths attainment has found that boys and girls perform equally in the subject, dispelling long-held myths around gender and education.

• A Strategy for Effective Student Collaboration | Edutopia

  To address the problem of group learning, a team must develop the ability to reflect on itself. Without intentional reflection, members of a team are unlikely to develop a collective sense of what is working and what is not, making improvement unlik…

• Microsoft MakeCode

• ‘Geek Girl’ gamers are more likely to study science and technology degrees – UKEdChat

  Girls who play video games are three times more likely to choose physical science, technology, engineering or maths (PSTEM) degrees compared to their non-gaming counterparts, according to new research from the University of Surrey Girls who play vid…

• NonExamples.com

  A B C Topic:

• All About Explorers

  © 2006–2017 All About Explorers. All rights reserved. Powered by WordPress. Designed by

• Quotes and Descriptions to Inspire Creative Writing | Discover, Share, Connect

  We are the kids nobody knows We are the kids nobody hears We are the kids nobody listens to. With tears streaming down my face, I could do nothing but sit cross-legged on the sandy shore and stare at the horizon in front of me.

• Silk – Interactive Generative Art

  To save, right click the thumbnail and choose Save Image As…. Silk was made by Yuri Vishnevsky, with music and sound crafted by Mat Jarvis.

• Ba Ba Dum

• IT IS BACK!! To-Do in Google Classroom – Teacher Tech

  One thing that has been driving me bonkers about the new design in Google Classroom is the lack of ability to see if students have submitted work. The Classwork page does not indicate that students have completed work unless I click on the assignmen…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Parts of Speech Quest

  ABCya offers hundreds of fun and educational games for elementary school kids. Parts of Speech Quest is one of the games that was recently featured on ABCya’s homepage. Parts of Speech Quest is a series of nine games that, depending upon your age, w…

• 9 Scientific Reasons Reading Makes You Smarter – e-Learning Infographics

  Other Infographics 9 Scientific Reasons Reading Makes You Smarter Infographic Be more empathetic Once in a while, readers will experience a deep sense of empathy towards fictional characters.

• Getting Into Gamification – Gamified UK – #Gamification Expert

  First off, don’t go my route – it was long and painful! However, there are things I did that will help you to get into it all and get a great understanding of what gamification is all about.

• What The Election Results May Mean For Education | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  Yesterday’s election will have a huge impact on education throughout the United States.

• English Learners in STEM Subjects | Science for All

  Overview: The National Academies just released a new consensus study report titled English Learners in STEM Subjects: Transforming Classrooms, Schools and Lives. Like other reports from The National Academies this report is free as a pdf or to read …

• NGSS Science Assessment Task Screeners | Science for All

  Overview: Achieve recently released two tools for screening and reviewing science assessment tasks- the Science Task Prescreen and the Science Task Screener. These tools will be necessary additions to your toolbox of NGSS assessment resources.

• Tip of the Week: How not to teach the Holocaust & resources for doing it right | History Tech

  Let’s be clear from the get go. It happened. We have hundreds of thousands, millions, of primary sources. We have photos. Government documents. Train timetables. Movies. We’ve got oral histories. Diaries. Letters. Court transcripts. There are prison…

• XP and Spreadsheet Pacer: CPU Vlog 11-5 – Classroom Powerups

  My class just finished up our 2nd unit and students are starting to have some clarification questions about the XP Grading System. I am going on year 5 and thankfully I have some answers! One of their biggest concerns is knowing their “grade”.

• The Dangers Of “Choose Your Own Adventure” Genre For Real & Painful Stories | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  I’m a big fan of Choose Your Own Adventure Games – both having students play them, and having them create ones. That’s why I have The Best Places To Read & Write “Choose Your Own Adventure” Stories.

• 7 Ways You Can Make Outdoor Activities Fun For Your Kids – e-Learning Infographics

  Certain lifestyle changes in recent years have influenced the way parents are raising their kids. Back in the day, children would beg their parents to go out in the yard or the playground so that they could play with their friends.

• New Report Says Corporal Punishment Doesn’t Work | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  It’s always a big mind-boggling to me when I share a new resource on corporal punishment – either at school or at home. It is 2018….

• Free Technology for Teachers: A New and Easy ClassDojo Login for Students

  Earlier this fall ClassDojo added new features to their digital portfolio tools for students and teachers. The highlight of those was the option for students to select the items that they want included in their portfolios. ClassDojo calls these stud…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Five Places to Find Free Music and Sounds for Multimedia Projects

  From adding music to a slideshow to adding sound effects to videos to bumper music for podcasts, there are plenty of classroom projects that require free audio files.

• Free Technology for Teachers: MyBib is Back

  The last time that I wrote about MyBib it was to report that I didn’t have any information about when it would be back online, if ever. That was exactly one month ago.

• Free Technology for Teachers: WWF Together – Revisiting a Favorite App

  The World Wildlife Fund’s Together app has been one of my favorite iPad apps since the first day that I saw it more than five years ago. The app is beautifully designed to show the stories of endangered or threatened animals around the world.

• Civic Responsibility – Reading By Example

  This post is a newsletter I am sending home to our elementary school families. Let me know what you think in the comments! -Matt

• Some Different Ideas to Increase School Sport Participation |

  If I wanted to grow my blog audience, I could probably just write about youth sports, they are typically my most popular posts with anywhere from 2X to 10X the audience as when I write about other topics.

• Cliff Mass Weather and Climate Blog: A Stunning Video of Arizona Monsoon Thunderstorms

  Rarely does one see a weather video so stunning, so poetic, with music and imagery so in sync, and that vividly communicates the beauty and grandeur of the atmosphere . But this week I was privileged to view such a video of southwest U.S. thundersto…

• Gamification has a dark side

  Deep under the Disneyland Resort Hotel in California, far from the throngs of happy tourists, laundry workers clean thousands of sheets, blankets, towels and comforters every day.

• Steps Teachers Can Take to Enhance Learning With Technology – Class Tech Tips

  If you’ve ever walked across a conference expo hall or scrolled through your Pinterest feed, bright and shiny technology can instantly grab your attention. Making sure a new piece of technology or compelling digital resource is a good fit for your s…

• 5 ideas for creating an interactive classroom

• Creating An Exhibition Of Learning: Sparks & Stories – The Edublogger

  All children have extraordinary stories to tell if we take the time to listen. All children have gifts and talents. Our job is to create opportunities and experiences that allow children to find themselves.

• Yes, I’m Telling You to Be Grateful for Stress – Technology Pursuit

  It’s been a stressful past two weeks. I was senior sponsor for Homecoming. We’ve had daily rehearsals for our one-act play.

• 3 Ways to Develop Leaders in Your School or Classroom – The Principal of Change

  I used to get teased mercilessly by some saying that everyone in education can be a “leader.” If you think of leadership in the traditional context, it is more about positions of authority than it is about ability.

• A Principal’s Reflections: What Learners Really Need

  A great deal has changed since I began writing this blog back in 2009. For starters, my primary device to connect on Twitter was a Blackberry. I didn’t even have a Facebook page until a year later.

• To Learn, Students Need to DO Something | Cult of Pedagogy

  I first became aware that there might be a problem a few years ago, when one of my kids was studying weather systems: high- and low-pressure systems, cold fronts and warm fronts. We were trying to help her prepare for a test and also do some sort of…

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.