Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

Here are this past week’s selection of amazing posts:

• Should instructors disclose their own use of AI in teaching? (opinion)

• The integration of Artificial Intelligence (AI) into nearly all aspects of daily life has sparked numerous debates as to the efficacy of using AI tools and whether doing so is cheating. Sports Illustrated was recently challenged for publishing AI-ge…

• Can’t Dance, Won’t Dance? Better Learn How to Dance

• Baruti Kafele, a school principal turned inspirational speaker with whom I’ve worked several times, used to love quoting an Ashanti proverb to throw cold water on teachers’ complaints about all the things allegedly standing between them and good ins…

• Why I Care About Authentic Writing : Metawriting

• Can You Really Run on Top of a Train, Like in the Movies? | WIRED

• Just because you see something done in a movie, that doesn’t mean you should try it yourself. Take, for example, a human running on top of a moving train. For starters, you can’t be sure it’s real. In early Westerns, they used moving backdrops to ma…

• SpeechTechie- Technology, Apps and Lessons for SLPs and Teachers who like Words: Create songs on a topic

• Suno AI is a fun tool which will generate a song for you if you provide a simple prompt, such as a genre and topic. Sign in with your Google account and you can create a number of songs for free, and they are easily sharable by link.

• It’s Time to Ditch the Idea of Edtech Disruption. But What Comes Next? | EdSurge News

• COVID-19 was edtech’s big moment, and while digital tools kept learning going for many families and schools, they also faltered. A great deal of edtech purchases went unused, equity gaps widened, and teachers and students were burned out.

• Using tech to drive innovation in early care and education

• Fasten your seatbelts. The past few years in the early care and education (ECE) space have been a figurative roller coaster ride of ups and downs when it comes to the availability and distribution of public funds.

• CoSN2024: Should K-12 Leaders Make AI Education Mandatory in Schools? | EdTech Magazine

• According to Partovi, making AI a foundational part of the K–12 curriculum could help fix such issues. As an immigrant whose family fled Iran as refugees, he said he knew firsthand how learning computer science as a child can impact opportunities la…

• Professional Development Around The Toilet To In The Classroom: What Does Informal PD Look Like For You? | Living Avivaloca

• One of my jobs as a Reading Specialist is to help build capacity. I know that this is often done through more formal ways, such as professional development sessions, but I think that it can also be done in some informal ways.

• The Truth Behind The Politicized Attacks On The California Math Framework: Keep Mathematics As Currency/Status For The Privileged | by Sunil Singh | Apr, 2024 | Medium

• You know when Ted Cruz and FOX News jump in on the math wars happening in California — mostly around the almost cartoonish misrepresentations of the California Math Framework — you know the whole debate/discourse has jumped the shark.

• Microsoft Designer – Stunning designs in a flash

• Microsoft Designer – Stunning designs in a flash

• A new solution proposed for drought-stricken Panama Canal goes around it | Popular Science

• As droughts continue to deplete the Panama Canal’s water levels, the maritime trading hub’s operators are planning a workaround.

• SearchReSearch: Gemini has serious hallucinations (at least when you ask about composers!)

• Asking an LLM for facts isn’t great… The easy example is Richard Wagner. Immensely famous in his lifetime, his legacy gave rise to the adjective Wagnerian, to describe fans who are enthralled with his work.

• Co-Intelligence: Living and Working with AI

• As a writer, eighth grade history teacher and school administrator, I’m as curious as anyone about what will happen when the robots eventually take over (more on that later).

• How to Use Bloom’s Taxonomy AI Prompts for Lesson Design – EdTechTeacher

• Of all the challenges that AI tools can help teachers address, differentiation and lesson design is at (or at least near) the top of the list!  During all of my recent AI-themed professional development workshops, teachers are impressed with how sim…

• Can you take algebra in eighth grade? In many cases, the answer is no

• This story was originally published by Chalkbeat. Sign up for their newsletters at ckbe.at/newsletters. If you’re an eighth grader who wants to take algebra, can you even take the class?

• URGENT: deepfakes-time-to-create-policies-and-crisis-plans

• Teenage girls are struggling with having their faces put on nude bodies in deepfake nudes.

• NEPC: There Is No “Science” in the “Science of Reading” | Diane Ravitch’s blog

• The National Education Policy Center at the University of Colorado posted a summary of research about the current “Science of Reading” fad, which finds that the “science” is missing.

• Researchers find a new organelle evolving | Ars Technica

• The complex cells that underlie animals and plants have a large collection of what are called organelles—compartments surrounded by membranes that perform specialized functions.

• Using AI in classrooms to support learning

• In education right now, the potential of artificial intelligence (AI) is no longer a dream of the future — it’s a full reality. Educators have a chance to begin integrating AI into everyday student learning experiences, giving students access to ass…

• AI and Academic Integrity: Striking the Right Balance | by Andrew Marcinek | Apr, 2024 | Medium

• At the outset of the generative AI blitz in early 2023, one of the primary concerns within the education space focused on the ethical use of AI.

• A Map of Generative AI for Education | by Laurence Holt | Mar, 2024 | Medium

• For this major update to our map, first published in June 2023, we have added over 90 new logos and 11 new areas. Many previously gray areas (meaning we have yet to see a real-world example) are now yellow (we have).

• Minecraft as a Counselling Tool

• Minecraft has developed a strong reputation throughout the world as an imaginative, innovative, and entertaining virtual environment. At its core, Minecraft enables individuals to express themselves creatively in a digital world.

• The Art of Prompt Craft

• A ‘male’ octopus surprised its keepers with a cloud of 10,000 babies

• When the University of Georgia’s Marine Education Center and Aquarium acquired a common octopus recently, they got somewhat more than they bargained for. Thinking the individual was a male, they named it Octavius and stuck “him” in a tank of his own.

• Ready or not, AI is in our schools | Popular Science

• Students worldwide are using generative AI tools to write papers and complete assignments. Teachers are using similar tools to grade tests. What exactly is going on here? Where is all of this heading? Can education return to a world before artificia…

• How AI could transform the way schools test kids – The Hechinger Report

• Imagine interacting with an avatar that dissolves into tears – and being assessed on how intelligently and empathetically you respond to its emotional display.

• Cloud Upload and Download – Minecraft Education

• Download the Minecraft Education Preview to use the new cloud storage feature. Worlds are automatically saved to OneDrive upon closing the world as a backup. When the first world is uploaded, a new folder in the user’s OneDrive is created called “Mi…

• Minecraft Education Cloud Download Preview Release – YouTube

• Download the Minecraft Education Preview version 12.20.70 to try the cloud feature.

• You can install this application side-by-side with the main Minecraft Education application. This preview version adds the ability to upload and download worlds to…

• Why do worms come out after it rains?

• “Why do worms come out after it rains?”

• Pedagogy And The AI Guest Speaker Or What Teachers Should Know About The Eliza Effect – Tom Mullaney

• One popular AI in the classroom idea is using ChatGPT or Google Gemini as an AI guest speaker with students.1 The idea is that students ask questions the teacher types into an AI Large Language Model (LLM) chatbot, asking the chatbot to answer as a …

• Teachers: Follow These Experts To Learn AI – Tom Mullaney

• Before using AI in K-12 classrooms, teachers, administrators, and district leaders should understand what AI is and is not. Implementing AI apps without a solid foundational understanding does not serve students. But who to turn to for critical anal…

• Toxic Masculinity in Schools is a Problem. Teachers Can Help.

• Note: This article contains references to suicide and mass shootings. If it’s better for you to avoid those topics right now, check out one of our other articles. I was on a walk last weekend and stopped to chat with a neighbor.

• Microsoft Designer Templates – Wakelet

• Items

• This newly spotted massive alien planet is confusing astronomers

• Astronomers have discovered a massive exoplanet orbiting around the binary star system b Centauri. The two stars are so hot and huge that researchers previously thought that no planet could exist around them. 

• 6 tips to help educators support young readers

• In school, many kindergarten and first-grade students are asked to memorize lists of common words, which are sometimes called “sight words.” This practice skips important steps. The idea that children learn to read by memorizing whole words is a mis…

• How VR Can Be an ‘Empathy Machine’ for Education | EdSurge News

• A VR experience created by students at The New School in New York City is designed to take viewers to an almond farm in California and illustrate the effects of pesticides on bee colonies.

• 4 Innovative Ways to Enhance Reading Comprehension with AI Tools

• I’m excited about this post from the Ask a Tech Teacher crew–AI Tools for reading comprehension. There are so many directions this could go!

• Control Alt Achieve: Rubric for Evaluating AI Tools for Schools

• Team Collaboration: Evaluation is most effective when conducted collaboratively.

• Teacher, I’m done… – Pdubya Tech

• From the dawn of education, teachers have always been plagued with the dreaded statement/question: “Teacher, I’m done. What do I do now?”

• Generative AI and K-12 Education: An MIT Perspective · From Novel Chemicals to Opera

• In November of 2022, a Silicon Valley company launched an invention that could complete students’ homework for them. Available only to subscribers at first, by the spring of 2023 OpenAI’s ChatGPT-3.5 was available to millions of students.

• Engaging Parents in the AI Conversation | by Andrew Marcinek | Mar, 2024 | Medium

• Over the past year, the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) into our daily lives has increased significantly. AI stands as a pivotal force with the potential to revolutionize various aspects of human life, including education.

• The Eureka Experience #03 – Behavioral Science & Other Shenanigans

• Ever wondered what happens in our brains when we dive into those mind-bending technical texts? Buckle up, because we’re about to take a journey into the labyrinth of comprehension and cognition!

• What a total solar eclipse looks like from space | Popular Science

• Darkness, slivers of sunshine, and crescent shadows: The 2024 total solar eclipse put on quite a show. Down here on Earth, millions of people witnessed the fascinating sight of the moon passing in front of the sun.

• Here Are What I Think Are Seven Elements You Can Find In A Great School – Where Am I Wrong Or What Am I Missing? | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

• Earlier today, an old organizer friend from my previous life (I was a community organizer for nineteen years prior to becoming a high school teacher twenty-two years ago) asked me to share what I thought were urban districts doing great work.

• Integrating AI Literacy into Earth Day Celebrations – The Thinking Stick

• Imagine students grappling with AI-crafted ethical dilemmas. They’re not just learning about sustainability – they’re learning how to question, research, and discern credible information.

• Recommendations for Supporting Safe Teacher Exploration of AI and New Technologies – Digital Promise

• At the second session of our Age of AI webinar series, we asked educators, researchers, and school and district leaders to answer a question that is top of mind for all of us in education: how can we support safe teacher exploration of artificial in…

• Using AI in Universal Design for Learning | Edutopia

• Generative AI can make educational content and instruction more accessible, helping teachers meet a breadth of student needs. Universal Design for Learning (UDL), an essential framework for enhancing accessibility, helps teachers design inclusive in…

• Minecraft Education Build Tips: Combining behavior and resource packs into an addon – YouTube

• Tired of having to install behavior packs and resource packs separately and wish you could install both with one click? Wish no more! In this video, I walk T…

• Combine your separate Minecraft Resource & Behaviour pack files into a single .mcaddon pack! – YouTube

• In this video, my friend from Fantasia Techcraft (@FantasiaTC) walks me through the process of combining my separate resource and behaviour pack files from m…

• 2024 eclipse photos: The sun and moon put on a spectacular show | Popular Science

• Today was one for the history books as a total solar eclipse crossed North America. The sky first darkened in Mazatlán, Mexico on the country’s Pacific Coast. Torreón, Mexico saw the longest totality at 4 minutes and 28 seconds.

• STUDENT VOICE: Breaking walls, building bridges: A call for restorative justice in school discipline – The Hechinger Report

• Imagine waking up each morning with no hope for the day ahead, navigating a minefield of potential conflicts with your body on high alert. That was my reality as a marginalized youth — misunderstood, labeled as a troublemaker and cast out without a …

• Shark skin and owl feathers could inspire quieter underwater sonar | Popular Science

• Sharks and owls are evolutionarily optimized in surprisingly similar ways. When it comes to the ocean’s apex predator, their skin’s textured patterns, known as riblets, help cut down on drag. With owls, their tiny feather ridges called serrations al…

• New Eclipse Map Claims Narrower Path of Totality – The Map Room

• CNN: “New map calculations have raised some concerns that the path of totality—where it’s possible to see the moon completely block out the sun—is slightly narrower than NASA calculated.

• Cliff Mass Weather Blog: The “Hail Mary” Strategy for Texas Eclipse Watchers

• The forecasts have not been favorable for the many total eclipse seekers in Texas, with considerable clouds forecast for tomorrow morning.

• A Principal’s Reflections: 11 Artificial Intelligence (AI) Tools to Support Effective Teaching and Leadership

• It goes without saying that AI is a hot topic of conversation in education circles and beyond. In the beginning, I was a skeptic myself, but now I use it to support my professional work, especially when I coach leaders.

• Maurice Cunningham: Reporters Should Raise These Questions With the “National Parents Union” | Diane Ravitch’s blog

• Maurice Cunningham is a retired professor of political science at the University of Massachusetts. He became expert on the subject of Dark Money in education while covering a state referendum on charter school expansion in Massachusetts in 2016.

• Play and Create Games on Rosebud — AI-Powered Game Development

• Book Creator | EduGuardians

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

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

More great posts to check out!

• 30 Effective Classroom Attention Getters with Examples – Educators Technology

• In the dynamic world of education, keeping students engaged and attentive is a challenge every educator faces. Classrooms, the breeding grounds for future thinkers and innovators, can sometimes become arenas of boredom and disengagement. Boredom, as…

• 5 major education trends in 2023

• Each year, we share our 10 most-read stories. Not surprisingly, many of this year’s Top 10 focused on equity, edtech innovation, immersive learning, and the science of reading. This year’s no. 1 most-read story focuses on some of the biggest educati…

• 20 Best TED Talks on AI – Educators Technology

• With the AI revolution unfolding before our eyes, its waves are inevitably reaching the shores of our educational institutions, touching the lives of our students and reshaping the landscape of our professional and personal lives.

• Best TED Talks on the Dangers of AI – Educators Technology

• In our previous exploration, we delved into the immense potential of Artificial Intelligence through a series of enlightening AI TED Talks. However, with great potential comes great responsibility — and a need for caution.

• Know Your Why!: One Word to Rule Them All – Welcome to 2024 Student Activity

• Success and failure should never be an endpoint. The best learning happens when we build on what we know and reflect on what we need to know better. I always like to welcome my students back after the holiday break with a bit of reflection on the ye…

• A Primer on The Lost Cause for Nikki Haley | Diane Ravitch’s blog

• Karen L. Cox wrote “Five Myths About the Lost Cause” in The Washington Post. For those who have not studied American history or don’t remember what they should have learned, this summary should be useful. Cox is a professor of history at the Univers…

• AI in the Classroom Today Tomorrow and Beyond

• transformer-architecture-explained

• A Transformer is a type of neural network architecture designed for handling sequences of data, such as sentences, paragraphs, or time series.

• What the New GPT-4 AI Can Do | Scientific American

• Tech research company OpenAI has just released an updated version of its text-generating artificial intelligence program, called GPT-4, and demonstrated some of the language model’s new abilities.

• How Some Experts See The Future Of AI In 2024

• With a rash of artificial intelligence (AI) news making the rounds in the last month of 2023, opinions widely differ on how governments, companies and consumers will use the technology.

• Blended Learning Hype or Taking Us to New Heights?

• No, blended learning is NOT hype, at least not in my experience. However, I will say that I have seen people say that they are blending learning when it is not blended learning at all.

• ISTE | Teaching Kids What AI Is (and Isn’t) | ISTE

• Today’s students are the first generation to grow up in a world with artificial intelligence. But many don’t realize it. Designed to blend seamlessly with other technologies, AI operates invisibly in the background of their lives.

• Embracing AI in the classroom: ChatGPT, an Enriching Learning Tool – Ecmtutors

• As a geography teacher, I recently embarked on an experiment with my year 8 class, an experiment that was met with equal parts laughter, curiosity, and apprehension.

• Humanity Amplified: The Fusion of Deep Learning and Human Insight to Shape the Future of Innovation

• Ethics of Artificial Intelligence | UNESCO

• Unesco.org Explore UNESCO Unesco.

• AI Detection or AI Proofing? | Mr. Gonzalez’s Classroom

• In a recent post by Larry Ferlazzo, Yet Another Nail-In-The-Coffin of AI Writing Detectors, he offers even more evidence dispelling the myth that AI detection software work.

• The science of reading, beyond phonics

• Key points: When it comes to reading skills, we should provide students with explicit literacy instruction and foundational skills like decoding and building content knowledge See article: Excite, expand, equitize: Using data to support reading See …

• 18 Effective Classroom Motivation Strategies – Educators Technology

• Motivation is one of the key concept in psychology. It is mainly concerned with the why and how humans think and behave as they do. Its significance is particularly pronounced in the realm of classroom learning, where it’s often invoked to explain t…

• D2L and Unity Partner to Help Revolutionize Education with Immersive Real-Time 3D

• D2L, a global learning technology company, today announced a new partnership with Unity, the world’s leading platform for creating and operating interactive, real-time 3D (RT3D) content with a goal to transform the education landscape through classr…

• What is A Portfolio Assessment? – Educators Technology

• In the ever-evolving landscape of education, the concepts of portfolio and portfolio assessment have garnered significant attention as comprehensive tools for evaluating student growth.

• 10 Great TED Talks on Autism – Educators Technology

• Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a complex, multifaceted condition that touches the lives of many individuals and families around the world. It’s a topic rich with narratives of challenge, triumph, and profound insight into the human experience.

• A Note on Nikki Haley, Slavery, and Teacher Professionalism | The Jose Vilson

• There are complex answers that deserve interrogation through all their interwoven facets and there are complex answers that converge toward a simple response. The cause of the American Civil War is the latter.

• How To Turn Around Difficult Students With A Simple Psychological Trick Smart Classroom Management

• No, you’re not going to trick your students. Here at SCM, we oppose all manipulative practices of classroom management, which are unfortunately common in this day and age. (Think PBIS).

• Useful Artificial Intelligence Resources For People Like Me Who Plan To Write Novels Someday | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

• I’ve written or edited thirteen books on education, plus second editions. Plus, I probably have a couple of more in me before I retire in a few years. The advent of Artificial Intelligence has over the past year has disrupted many things in society,…

• Universal Screeners for Number Sense – Forefront Education

• Interview-based and pencil and paper K-6 math screeners designed by teachers to assess for students’ number sense. This open-source project provides free, high-quality assessment tools to over 9,000 schools in the US and internationally.

• Sustainable Technologies Evaluation Program (STEP) – Compost Biofilters for Stormwater Management

• Compost biofilters are a promising, low cost erosion and sediment control technology with the potential to serve various functions based on placement and configuration of the product.

• AI Advisory Boards

• What if there was an AI advisory board at every high school? AI advisory boards might be a new way for students to have a voice in their education.

• I’m Presenting at #NCCE24! | Mr. Gonzalez’s Classroom

• Tammie Schrader, with whom I’ve been co-presenting for many years now, and I submitted four proposals to the upcoming 2024 NCCE Conference, the Northwest USA’s premier educational technology conference and we got three of our proposals accepted! The…

• Awesome Human Anatomy Websites – Educators Technology

• Don’t Miss a Post! Subscribe Gone are the days when students and educators solely relied on textbooks and static diagrams to understand the complexities of the human body.

• Helpful Science Resources for Teachers – Educators Technology

• As a former classroom teacher, I understand the importance of having a diverse toolbox to engage and inspire students. In this post, I’m excited to share with you a curated list of resources that I’ve found particularly valuable for science teachers…

• Encouraging Student Voice in the Classroom | Edutopia

• Students may become reluctant to share their thoughts if their teacher and peers don’t seem to listen. These strategies make the value of their thoughts clear. Two students sit in class together, peer-reviewing one another’s work.

• Classroom Tools That Use AI | Common Sense Education

• When used carefully, educational tools that utilize artificial intelligence can be time-saving and help teachers and students to create materials and presentations and even self-assess their own work. It is also the case that AI in the classroom can…

• 8 Ways to Infuse Movement into Math Class   | Edutopia

• These research-backed, teacher-approved activities can help early math learners engage physically with abstract concepts. If you think about it, movement is present in our earliest forays into math.

• Is Video Gaming An Addiction? | Uncover Counseling

• In the landscape of entertainment and technology, video gaming has risen as a significant force, capturing the interest of millions worldwide.

• Controversy on whether growth mindset works will strengthen the theory – Christensen Institute : Christensen Institute

• All too often, education research falls short of giving educators on-the-ground actionable advice. However, a recent controversy around Carol Dweck’s well-known growth mindset gives me hope that we can move forward with research that can better info…

• 10 Characteristics of 21st Century Learners – Educators Technology

• Welcome to the latest installment in our series on 21st-century education. Throughout this series, we have delved into the characteristics of 21st-century teachers, students, classrooms, and the very nature of learning itself.

• Where does blended learning fit in post-pandemic classrooms?

• Each year, we share our 10 most-read stories. Not surprisingly, many of this year’s Top 10 focused on equity, edtech innovation, immersive learning, and the science of reading. This year’s 4th most-read story focuses on blended learning’s role in th…

• 6 Major K-12 Education Predictions for 2024 – Education Elements

• Take a casual stroll through the past predictions I made about education, leading up to 2024. You’ll see they were pretty spot-on. Over the last few years, I’ve called several major trends in education that hit the nail on the head.

• Larry Ferlazzo’s 9 Education Predictions for 2024 (Opinion)

• I’ve been publishing annual education-related predictions for over a decade now, usually in The Washington Post. Let’s just say that no one would have become rich by betting on my past predictions.

• 9 Classroom Management Tips for Blended Learning – Class Tech Tips

• Discover nine essential classroom management tips for blended learning. Learn to integrate technology and keep everyone organized. Explore engaging winter activity ideas that you can tailor to a variety of learning environments and subject areas thi…

• Yet Another Nail-In-The-Coffin Of AI Writing Detectors | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

• As I’ve previously shared, AI has reached a point where AI detectors are pretty useless – multiple studies have confirmed that fact, and English Language Learners get particularly “dinged” by the unfairly.

• 100% Undetectable AI – Bypass AI Detection | BypassGPT

• BypassGPT is here to ensure your content is not flagged by AI checkers. Our content can pass AI detection, giving you the best chance of maintaining your rankings while providing informative, engaging content for your readers.

• MyLens

• MyLens Optimal for popular topics. Add details for better timeline. May be off-topic or inaccurate. Supports multiple languages.

• Learning enters the metaverse with “Mission: Mars” Roblox experience

• Each year, we share our 10 most-read stories. Not surprisingly, many of this year’s Top 10 focused on equity, edtech innovation, immersive learning, and the science of reading. This year’s 3rd most-read story focuses on immersive and interactive lea…

• AI to Make ‘Seismic Change’ in All Industries Within Four Years

• Aidan Meller predicts AI’s “seismic change” by 2024, citing Chat GPT advancements and Ai-Da’s role as a robot artist.

• Plants may fight mold with molecules and bubbles | Popular Science

• While refrigerators store food at safe temperatures and keep it fresh, they can also be a breeding ground for fuzzy gray mold that spoils fruit. Most molds thrive in warm temperatures, but many can grow in the refrigerator by producing spores.

• This tiny ‘leaf-nester’ is the smallest known fanged frog | Popular Science

• Frogs are well known for their sticky, whip-like tongues, lumpy warts, and the colorful, poisonous skin covering some species. One group of frogs in Southeast Asia has another distinguishing feature–fangs.

• AI Literacy Experiments for the Family – The Thinking Stick

• In this episode, Jeff and Tricia discuss their favorite holiday food, introduce a new free guide on experimenting with AI for families, announce an upcoming series on mental health, promote an AI literacy cohort for PLCs and committees, highlight Je…

• 11 Best Math Manipulatives Every Child Should Have in 2023

• Math can be tough, but it shouldn’t be boring or confusing. That’s where math manipulatives come in – helpful tools that make learning math more hands-on and fun. According to a study on EdTechBooks.

• How did edtech impact learning in 2023?

• Each year, we share our 10 most-read stories. Not surprisingly, many of this year’s Top 10 focused on equity, edtech innovation, immersive learning, and the science of reading. This year’s 5th most-read story focuses on expert predictions for edtech.

• Curipod – How to add a genially project to a Curipod lesson

• The first step is to open your Genially Panel and click share on the project you’d like to add. Click Copy. In Curipod,find the page on which you’d like to add the project and then Click Media. Click the genially button. Click Paste the link from ge…

• The 3 Most Important AI Innovations of 2023 | TIME

• In many ways, 2023 was the year that people began to understand what AI really is—and what it can do. It was the year that chatbots first went truly viral, and the year that governments began taking AI risk seriously.

• Sept 11, 2001 Class Book Published | Mr. Gonzalez’s Classroom

• After working this class book in my Monday/Friday writing class since September 11 of this year, we finally finished it! You can snap a pic or click on the QR code below or click here to read our book online:

• Supermassive black hole seen in Milky Way’s center | Popular Science

• Astronomers have just revealed the first image of Sagittarius A*, a supermassive black hole in the center of our Milky Way galaxy—so heavy that it warps spacetime such that even light can’t escape.

• Control Alt Achieve: EdTech Cool Tool – Enlighten AI

• See below for details, directions, uses, and links for this artificial intelligence resource. If you have used this tool, please consider sharing your experiences, how you have used it, tips, tricks, and more.

• Watch an AI-leveraging robot beat humans in this classic maze puzzle game | Popular Science

• Artificial intelligence programs easily and consistently outplay human competitors in cognitively intensive games like chess, poker, and Go—but it’s much harder for robots to beat their biological rivals in games requiring physical dexterity.

• AI School Policy to Provide Guidance | Mr. Gonzalez’s Classroom

• Here’s what I’ve shared: A summary of AI in Teaching and Learning from the Office of Educational Technology: https://ift.tt/W6K2BpY.

• These fingernail-sized jellyfish can regenerate tentacles—but how? | Popular Science

• An unusual jellyfish species found in the eastern Pacific Ocean called Cladonema pacificum is only about the size of a pinkie nail, but it can regenerate an amputated tentacle in just two or three days.

• NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter set a new flight distance record on Mars | Popular Science

• NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter (technically a rotorcraft) has made dozens of tiny aerial jaunts across Mars since first arriving on the planet in February 2021, but its latest flight set a new record for the tiny aircraft.

• More AI Tools for Math Support for Students | Mr. Gonzalez’s Classroom

• I have been looking for tools that my students can use in class if they need help with Math and I am busy with another student and their peers are busy working on different tasks.

• why-you-should-incorporate-gamification-into-your-l-and-d-programs

• Excellent YouTube Channels for Learning Math – Educators Technology

• Delving into the world of YouTube for math education offers a treasure trove of resources.

• Best Online Brainstorming Tools – Educators Technology

• In the ever-evolving landscape of education and collaborative work, the need for effective brainstorming tools has never been greater.

• Best Online Visual Dictionaries – Educators Technology

• A visual dictionary is a unique and innovative educational tool that presents information through a combination of images and words.

• FTC’s Newly Proposed Privacy Rules Could Bring “Substantial Changes” to Ed-Tech Industry – Market Brief

• The Federal Trade Commission rolled out proposed changes to the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act this week that seek to impose stronger regulations on the collection and use of student data and bring major changes to how ed-tech companies bu…

• What Is Prior Knowledge and Why it Matters? – Educators Technology

• Prior knowledge is one of the key concept in educational research that fundamentally reshape our understanding of how learning occurs.

• Control Alt Achieve: EdTech Cool Tool – Edpuzzle Teacher Assist

• See below for details, directions, uses, and links for this artificial intelligence resource. If you have used this tool, please consider sharing your experiences, how you have used it, tips, tricks, and more.

• Is 2024 a special number? – Yummy Math

• Students are introduced to some esoteric number categories as they check out the various descriptors of this year’s date.  What’s a Harshad number?  What’s a Pernicious number? What’s a tetrahedral number?

• Reducing AI Anxiety Starts by Talking with Students  | Faculty Focus

• Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) is consuming a growing share of our collective consciousness.

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

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

Here are more amazing blog posts from this past week:

• Gaming takes over everything

  Hollywood and Big Tech are both turning to gaming for new ideas.

• 10 Outdated Teaching Techniques – Teacher Tech

  The goal of education today is to … probably not everyone would agree on how to finish that sentence. The original goals of public education should have shifted since the society that existed at the time has dramatically changed. Every year educatio…

• Inside the new middle school math crisis

  ROANOKE COUNTY, Va. — It was a Thursday morning in November, a few minutes into Ruby Voss’ and Amber Benson’s eighth grade math class at Northside Middle School just outside Roanoke, a city of roughly 100,000 in the Blue Ridge Mountains.

• New school year shows continued signs of academic rebounding

  Post-pandemic academic achievement is showing encouraging signs of improvement, although not evenly across school years, according to NWEA, a nonprofit, research and educational services organization serving K-12 students.

• Learning needs joy and civility

  Each year, we share our 10 most-read stories. Not surprisingly, many of this year’s Top 10 focused on innovative ways to engage students, digital resources, and online and hybrid learning strategies related to post-pandemic teaching.

• Beyond Land Acknowledgment: A Guide – Native Governance Center

  Native Governance Center held an event on moving beyond land acknowledgment on August 25, 2021.

• What are the benefits of esports? Let’s start counting

  Higher attendance, deeper engagement and better mental health are just three of the benefits of esports to students. So, do you want to know how some early adopters of esports—also known as scholastic gaming—launched one of the first high school pro…

• 6 tips to help start an elementary esports program in your school

  Each year, we share our 10 most-read stories. Not surprisingly, many of this year’s Top 10 focused on innovative ways to engage students, digital resources, and online and hybrid learning strategies related to post-pandemic teaching.

• 18 Best Holiday Movies for Kids and Family | Educational Technology and Mobile Learning

  When the eternally optimistic Poppy, queen of the Trolls, learns that the Bergens no longer have any holidays on their calendar, she enlists the help of Branch and the rest of the gang on a delightfully quirky mission to fix something that the Berge…

• Stanford faculty weigh in on ChatGPT’s shake-up in education | Stanford Graduate School of Education

  The recent release of ChatGPT — a new natural language processor that can write essays, spit out a Haiku, and even produce computer code — has prompted more questions about what this means for the future of society than even it can answer, despite e…

• 7 Unique New Year’s Traditions from Around the World | Educational Technology and Mobile Learning

  He then smashes the pomegranate either in front of the door or against the door, and he makes a wish that the juicy, bounteous ruby-like segments of the fruit flood the home with good health and happiness — and as many joys as the pomegranate has ar…

• Computer science classes have an equity issue–some NYC educators are trying to change that

  This story was originally published by Chalkbeat. Sign up for their newsletters at ckbe.at/newsletters. Computer science teacher Shanua Newton-Rodriguez is hoping to lead by example.

• Insightful data is called information | Seth’s Blog

  Data is everywhere around us, and most of it is simply noise. The purpose of information is to inform, to help us change our minds. Information has a point of view, it’s useful. It turns data into actionable truth.

• 5 Quick Classroom Activities With Comics – Class Tech Tips

  Graphic novels and comics are a fun and engaging way to incorporate reading and visual literacy into your next classroom activity. But what exactly are graphic novels? How can you actually use comics in your classroom? There are lots of ways to use …

• Kansas: Former Legislator Who Sponsored “In God We Trust“ Bill Convicted of Fraud | Diane Ravitch’s blog

  During the Trump administration, Congress appropriated billions of dollars for COVID relief, mostly to help small businesses survive by paying their employees. The main relief was the Payroll Protection Program, which dispersed nearly $800 billion.

• My Top 10 Science Picture Books of 2022 | Science for All

  As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, I have a deep love of all things picture books. I used picture books as an elementary teacher to teach multiple content areas and I’ve continued to use picture books in my work with preservice and inservice teach…

• Robots x Humans – Dagan.Blog

• encouraging-independent-learning

  “I can’t learn from my current teacher! They don’t teach like you.” Earlier in my career, past students would come back to my class to share this sentiment with me, and initially this brought me a sense of pride.

• pbl-maintaining-student-engagement

  Taking students’ interests into account when designing project-based learning helps ensure that they stay engaged throughout the unit.

• Does AI writing threaten academic integrity? | PlagiarismCheck.org

  ChatGPT’s release stirred the internet community in general and educators in particular. Actually, the technology behind it, GPT-3, isn’t brand new. But the fact of how easily it empowers a chatbot to answer and write like a human is astounding.

• 5 ways to create a stellar online elementary learning program

  Each year, we share our 10 most-read stories. Not surprisingly, many of this year’s Top 10 focused on innovative ways to engage students, digital resources, and online and hybrid learning strategies related to post-pandemic teaching.

• Prioritizing teacher well-being can help schools retain talent

  As a school administrator, you’re faced with a range of challenges every day. One of the most common at the moment is mitigating the negative impacts of teacher shortages. After all, without a consistent and functional faculty, the quality of studen…

• NAACP targets a new civil rights issue—reading

  FAIRFAX, Va. — For years, the Fairfax County NAACP’s small education committee devoted itself mostly to fights over Confederate school names and acts of racism against individual students.

• How to Lock Areas of a Google Doc – Teacher Tech

  You want to restrict editing on PART of a Google Doc. This step by step guide will show you a hack for how to lock areas of a google doc. Many teachers love using Bitmoji, it makes your digital interactions more personal.

• How Music Changes Learning | EdNews Daily

  Music can provoke deep emotions while taking us back in time. Given this trajectory, it also has the power to help us learn and retain information. Emotions and learning go hand-in-hand.

• Reaching every student with Equatio | Texthelp

  Are you curious how Equatio could help you incorporate the UDL framework in your teaching? Check out the handy toolmatcher guide below to discover how different features of Equatio align to CAST’s UDL guidelines.

• Top 10 Tech Tools for 2023

  It’s that time of year again: time for our annual list of tech tools and tips to launch you into the new year with renewed inspiration for teaching and learning.

• All Ditch Summit Videos | Ditch That Textbook Digital Summit

• Mr. Piercey’s Website

• ChatGPT, Chatbots and Artificial Intelligence in Education – Ditch That Textbook

• ADHD A Difference in Cognition not Simply A Disorder, Stephen Tonti TED Talk | Educational Technology and Mobile Learning

  Stephen is a Senior Directing major at Carnegie Mellon. He is also the current President of Carnegie Mellon’s Film Club. He recently completed his Thesis Project within the School of Drama: a production of Mac Wellman’s “A Murder of Crows.

• What Does ADHD Iceberg Mean? ADHD Resources for Teachers and Parents | Educational Technology and Mobile Learning

  ADHD is one of the most common neurodevelopment disorders. People with ADHD find it hard to concentrate on a single chore at a time, however, though they are strong symptoms of ADHD, lack of inattention or focus alone is not enough to diagnose someb…

• 242: Student-led podcasting for sustained learning – The Thinking Stick

  On this special episode, Jeff and Tricia sit down with a listener of the show: Joe Taranto. Joe reached out to Jeff and Tricia about his experience podcasting with students. Joe shares what he has learned over the years of launching and sustaining a…

• What SEL teaches us about safety

  According to a Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) study, the number of children aged 3 to 17 diagnosed with anxiety increased by 29 percent between 2016 and 2020, while those diagnosed with depression increased by 27 percent. The si…

• Should the term “special education” be retired? | National Center on Disability and Journalism

  When covering school board meetings, I often heard terminology that contributed to feeling “different” and not smart enough during my years as a disabled K-12 student.

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

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

Great blog posts from this past week:

• Cliff Mass Weather Blog: The Tonga Volcano Affects the Weather and Water of the Pacific Northwest

  Yesterday, around 0400 UTC 15 January (8 PM PST 14 January), there was a massive, explosive eruption near Tonga, in the southern tropical Pacific, about 5642 miles from Seattle (see map). Local barometers indicated a well-defined pressure wave passi…

• TESOLgraphics – Home

  ​Secondary research, or (systematic) evidence synthesis, refers to academic publications which summarise research findings from numerous (ranging from a dozen to many more) primary studies on the same topic.

• Redirecting to /blog/7-doodling-games-using-paper-peardeck-canva

  One of my favorite things about my role as a Student Engagement & Professional Development Specialist is bringing new ideas and strategies into classrooms. Every year I visit high school AVID classes and teach them one of my favorite note taking str…

• 30 Hilarious Scientific Jokes That Will Test Your Intelligence to the Limits | by David Graham | The Knowledge Of Freedom | Jan, 2022 | Medium

  Think yourself to be a genius and a science type? Here is your chance to find out, because if you get these 30 hilarious jokes then you are probably a genius or at least super intelligent! What did one tectonic plate say when it bumped into the othe…

• Day 14 – CellulAR

  A few years back when all the independent Merge Cube apps were being released, I came across the CellulAR app. My interest was piqued because my husband teaches middle school science and this is a concept that many students struggle to remember.

• 2021 Global Build Challenge: Peace with Nature Finalists – YouTube

• unesco-gbc-winners

  Our planet is in crisis. Climate change, biodiversity loss, pollution of air, water, and land are impacting every corner of the globe. We all need to act and change our ways of living. This was the theme of the 2021 Global Build Challenge hosted in …

• Camp Culture – Creating an Ideal Learning Environment – PART I

  Before your dive into this blog post let’s take a pause and grab yourself some writing tools. Take just a few minutes and reflect on the following prompt;

• Winter Science Lessons and Activities | Science Buddies Blog

  Warm up with hands-on science and engineering! Match winter’s cold weather, snow, and ice with these free lessons and activities for engaging hands-on STEM.

• Control Alt Achieve: Google Tools for Speech to Text

  Our students have so many amazing ideas in their minds, and we want to make sure they are able to get those words from their heads into writing. However if a student struggles with typing or spelling they may take those big awesome ideas and shrink …

• Game On: How to Empower Students to Learn and Play through Gaming – Digital Promise

  Educators embracing video games as a media format on par with books and film has opened up countless opportunities to meaningfully address learner variability while creating authentic design opportunities.

• Slide – Organize around the opportunity to contribute | @mcleod

  Vander Ark & Liebtag, Difference Making at the Heart of Learning, 2021 (p. 80) Download this file. See also my other slides.

• Control Alt Achieve: My OETC 2022 Sessions

  My Sessions: Beyond the Slideshow: Google Slides Activities for all Subjects Time: 10:30 AM – 12:00 PM Session Resources: https://bit.ly/curts-slides Description: We all know Google Slides is a great tool for making multimedia slideshows.

• Control Alt Achieve: Tools to Support Learners: Texthelp and Don Johnston Join Forces

  Out of all the trainings, videos, and posts I share, one of the most popular topics is how to use technology tools to support learners. Everyone learns differently, and we all struggle in our learning in one way or another at one time or another.

• How to Ride a Pterosaur, According to Science | Open Culture

  This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the…

• Interstellar Travel is Hard | NeuroLogica Blog

  The Fermi Paradox points to an apparent contradiction – the universe is a big place, and the laws of physics that have allowed life to evolve on Earth are the same everywhere. Therefore, the universe must be humming with life. Yet, we have not detec…

• Cows Strapped Into VR Headsets To Make Them Produce More Milk

  In Turkey, a rancher has begun putting virtual reality headsets on some of his cattle to see if the animals produce more milk when they believe they are outside in a nice, sunny field.

• Just a moment…

• Debunking Common Myths about UDL e-Learning Infographics –

  Debunking the common myths and misconceptions about Universal Design for Learning (UDL). Separating UDL fact from fiction. You may know of UDL as a framework to improve and optimize teaching and learning for all people based on scientific insights i…

• Why Are They So Angry…About Masks, Vaccines, CRT, Voting, and More? | Diane Ravitch’s blog

  Marty Levine used to write regularly for the Nonprofit Quarterly, and he seemed to be the only person writing about philanthropy who understood the danger of the billionaire foundations’ disparagement of public schools and their love of privatizatio…

• Cliff Mass Weather Blog: Does the Massive Cascade Snowpack Mean We Don’t Have to Worry About Global Warming?

  The answer is no. Similarly, a single weather event (e.g, the summer heatwave in June or the heavy rains in December) does not mean much about global warming.

• OneNote Student Guides | Nathan Richards

  Access our comprehensive range of student OneNotes designed to assist both students and teacher in using the many features of OneNote Class Notebook. Download the appropriate OneNote then distribute the pages to your students in their Class Notebook.

• The Overlooked Skill That No One Is Talking About in Education

  Without this tool firmly in the tool belt, many adults struggle to participate in today’s economy. Think for a moment.

• Schools Matter: New Year’s Resolution: Eliminate “Rigor” from Education Lexicon

  If there is a single word that comes close to capturing the zeitgeist of corporate education austerity policies that have metastasized since the Reagan era (among both Democrats and Republicans), it would be a five-letter signifier that has done mor…

• Critical – & I Mean CRITICAL – Point About “Learning Loss” That Is Being…..Lost | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  Much of the public date about in-person versus virtual instruction attributes reduced test scores to distance learning.

• When Project Teams Don’t Get Along! | Mike Kaechele

• Getting Started with Teaching with Minecraft on the Chromebook – Google Slides

• A Principal’s Reflections: Tips for an Abrupt Shift to Remote or Hybrid Learning

  The other day I was with one of my partner districts as part of ongoing longitudinal work that will last at least two years.

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

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

ICYMI – Here are great posts from last week:

• Why Study English? Responses from Professionals

  Why Study English? I am a law enforcement officer with the Idaho Department of Corrections. I legitimately have to use report writing EVERY DAY. If you don’t like writing reports, DO NOT join law enforcement. Luckily, I’m good at it AND I like it.

• If I ever have to teach via Zoom again, what will I do differently? | How I see it now

  The first thing that comes to mind here is the workspace. It may seem superficial and quite unimportant given the seriousness of the circumstances we found ourselves in, but to me, it was one of the crucial aspects.

• Retrieval Practice: The Most Powerful Learning Strategy You’re Not Using | Cult of Pedagogy

  We’ve talked about retrieval practice two other times on this site: First in 2015, when we read the book Make it Stick. Then in 2016, I interviewed cognitive psychologists Megan Smith and Yana Weinstein about the Six Powerful Learning Strategies You…

• What Mindfulness Brings to an Elementary School Classroom – Mindful

  In her role as Mindfulness Director at a US elementary school, Erica Marcus is helping students and teachers honor the difficulties of learning in the era of COVID, while also savoring the joys.

• Politico: Climate Change Threatens Us All | Diane Ravitch’s blog

  This is a realistic and frightening analysis of the paralysis in Washington, D.C. on climate change. President Biden proposed an ambitious agenda to act against the pernicious causes abd effects of climate change.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Two Great Ways to Quickly Create Animations

  A couple of weeks ago in my weekly newsletter I explained why I value having students create simple animations. The short version of the explanation is that I agree with the premise of Dan Roam’s Back of the Napkin.

• How to Handle A Bully Parent – Smart Classroom Management

  I’ve written about angry parents, complaining parents, uncaring parents, and overly chatty parents—and how best to deal with each. But never bully parents.

• 16 Ways to Own Your Professional Learning – John Spencer

  This year has been a marathon for teachers. They’ve faced constant changes and big challenges at every turn.

• Stay Calm, Play On: Video Games for Relaxing & Better Mental Health

  You know what you could probably use right now? A break. Seriously, we don’t take enough of them. A break can sometimes be something we need to remind ourselves to do and is a skill we need to develop. It’s good for our work and, more importantly, o…

• A Beginning List Sharing The Best Advice For Working With A Classroom Aide/Paraprofessional | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  Teacher aides/paraprofessionals/teaching assistants can be invaluable in the classroom and it’s possible that with COVID-19 funding, many more will be hired. MY LATEST BAM! RADIO SHOW IS ON EFFECTIVE WAYS TO WORK WITH AIDES/PARAPROFESSIONALS

• Shift Away from Learning Loss and Focus on Relevant Assessments that Emphasize Creativity and Critical Thinking | All Things Assessment

  There is a buzz in education circles and districts raising concerns about the significant learning loss affecting students after the absence of in-person learning and the multiple shifts between learning models.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Book Creator Offers New Digital Citizenship eBooks

  Book Creator recently announced the launch of a series of digital citizenship ebooks developed by Common Sense Education. The new ebooks contain activities for students to learn how to become responsible digital citizens.

• If anything needs to go viral, it’s this… – NetFamilyNews.org

  …the message, “Report it. Don’t share it.”  The “it” in this public awareness campaign Facebook just launched is child sexual abuse material (CSAM), the accurate term for what is typically called “child pornography” in the United States.

• Reading Remedies Now Available Online

  Reading Remedies, the iOS app I created in 2011 to help teachers and parents diagnose potential reading difficulties and support students with fluency development is no longer available in the app store. However, I’ve made the app available online a…

• Could You Teach Without Grades? | Cult of Pedagogy

  A few months ago, I started hearing about a new movement, where teachers were giving up traditional grading and finding new ways to measure student learning.

• Progression Videos | Questioning My Metacognition

  Early Number & Counting Addition & Subtraction Progression of Division Progression of Multiplication  Fractions: The Meaning, Equivalence, & Comparison

• When It Comes to Critical Race Theory, Teachers ‘Should Go on Offense With Inquiry’ (Opinion)

  A number of states have either passed or are considering legislation that would ban critical race theory and, in some cases, many types of lessons that teach about systemic racism. How should educators respond to these efforts?

• Free Technology for Teachers: All Paygrade Features are Now Free

  How PayGrade Works Last year I wrote this detailed overview of how PayGrade works. The following is a condensed version of that overview. PayGrade lets you create an online classroom space in which students have to complete jobs to earn virtual curr…

• Young orcas appear to develop friendships, not unlike primates — including humans | Puget Sound Institute

  Captured on video from drone (2019): A 4-year-old female orca named Kiki (J53) slowly circles and weaves through the water as a younger female, Tofino (J56), swims closely behind her and then alongside her before gliding up face-to-face.

• Lessons in Empathy and Proactivity: Two Great Summer Reads for Upper Elementary Students and Middle Schoolers – Teacher Created Tips

  For those of us parenting through these uncertain times, one thing has felt absolutely certain: our children have not been getting all the education they have needed or would normally receive. And now summer is here.

• Schools Matter: CRT: Who Needs a Theory When the Historical Facts Say It All, Part 1

  1607: Jamestown, the first British North American settlement, was founded in Virginia. 1619: The first African Americans arrived in Jamestown, Virginia. 1640: Virginia courts sentenced a black run away servant, John Punch, to “serve his said master …

• 2021-22 Theme: Superheroes and Multi-Verses – Classroom Powerups

  Every year I get sucked into a more and more complex theme! That is because I find myself reusing bits and pieces of previous themes and systems that really worked well and it all sort of… fits.

• Google Docs – create and edit documents online, for free.

  Sign in with a different account Create account One Google Account for everything Google

• Handout – Common Formative Assessment Pretest

  Assessments are only formative if teachers and students take action/ change course after the assessment is given.

• PLC – ADE – Summer Workshop – Google Slides

• Slides – PLC Quotes with Covers – Google Slides

• Teaching in the age of a pandemic – part 4b: Hacking Google Slides to foster interaction with content and with each other – TOWARD PROFICIENCY

  I have so much to say about the HyFlex model that I decided to split my post into two posts. For set-up and expectations, click here. For hacking Google Slides, keep reading: As a teacher, I rely essentially on relationships, stories, and reading to…

• Teaching Memo: My EdWeek Opinion Article – Hybrid Teaching Dos and Don’ts | #CaponeTeaches

  Recently, a staff writer and educator from Education Week / EdWeek Magazine asked me to write an opinion article aimed at helping teachers who are teaching concurrently online and in-person (we call this a “hybrid model” at my institution) think abo…

• This Is How to use Creative Commons and Royalty Free Content in Education | Educational Technology and Mobile Learning

  What is Royalty Free Content? Royalty free content has two distinct differences from CC licenses. The first is that attribution is not generally required on royalty-free works.

• The Best Educational Game Websites for Elementary School Students | Common Sense Education

  After dozens of hours testing gaming sites, we recommend PBS Kids for students and teachers. Games are the undisputed queens of classroom fun, but they can also be exceptional tools for learning. Great educational games get students to think critica…

• Relationships Between HEXAD Types – Gamified UK – #Gamification Expert

  It’s been a while since I wrote about the HEXAD user types, but the world does not stand still and I keep seeing them turning up in academic papers – which is amazing, so I thought it time to say a few words on things that have repeatedly come up!

• New Hampshire: Majority of Governor’s Diversity Council Resigns in Protest | Diane Ravitch’s blog

  New Hampshire’s Republican legislature passed a bill banning teaching about racism, and Governor Chris Sununu signed it. The bill also included funding for vouchers and cuts for public schools. Ten of the 17 members of the governor’s Diversity Counc…

• Dana Milbank: Republicans—Not Democrats— Have Voted to Defund the Police | Diane Ravitch’s blog

  Dana Milbank is a regular columnist for the Washington Post and one of my favorites. Republican leaders have developed a new strategy for ousting Democrats from their majority in Congress: Blue Lies Matter.

• Gary Rubinstein: Is Stuyvesant High School–One of the Most Selective in the Nation–a “Good School”? | Diane Ravitch’s blog

  Gary Rubinstein teaches mathematics at Stuyvesant High School in New York City. Stuy is a selective admissions school. It accepts only the students with the highest score on a standardized test of math and reading that is offered on one day only. Bu…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Narakeet – Quickly Turn Slides into Narrated Video Lessons

  A reader recently emailed me looking for advice on how to create narrated video based on slides made in Canva. She didn’t want to record her own voiceover audio. My suggestion was to try using Narakeet to have the slides converted into a narrated vi…

• Blurry Bitmoji? Upscale It! — Learning in Hand with Tony Vincent

  Bitmoji is a way to make your own personal cartoon avatar. You need to use the Bitmoji app for Android or iOS to assemble your character. Your character can be inserted into a huge library of digital stickers.

• Our Reading Conferring Sheet – Pernille Ripp

  One of my most successful ways in establishing trust and urgency with my 7th grade students and their reading choices is through our one-one-one conferring time.

• Quick Science Idea : Make Food Chains With Stackable Cups – Danny Nic’s Science Fix

  Here’s a quick idea for teaching food chains with stackable cups. All you need to do is stick or draw images of animals and plants onto stackable cups, and write the name around the edge. The children can then stack them to show the food chain build…

• vicskeptics.files.wordpress.com

• Remote Learning Opens Forums for Student Participation | Inspired Ideas

  I think we are all very ready to call this school year a wrap. Taking time to rest and restore this summer is critical. But I first want to take a brief pause to reflect on this year while all of the emotions are still raw and fresh.

• 20 tips to use Google Classroom effectively and efficiently – Ditch That Textbook

• Tapping gamification to track student progress | SmartBrief

  Sign up for our daily edtech news briefing today, free. Consider this: More than 18 months of disrupted, choppy schooling during the COVID-19 pandemic has left teachers and districts with less formative and summative data on students than at any tim…

• ncwit_btn_03252021_fullsize.pdf

• acquainted – Create free conversational polls and surveys

  Make chatbot polls. Fast. Surveys suck. Plug in our widget or send out a link to surveys that people will actually want to complete. Get started Rethink surveys. Use natural language to engage users. Our chat interface is instantly familiar to users…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Create Your Own Chatbot for Surveys and Quiz Practice

  Acquainted is a free polling tool that has been around for a few years. It recently reappeared on my radar when a reader sent me a question asking for help creating a chatbot for her website. Acquainted is a conversational polling tool.

• Upgrade Stations: Delivering the Marvel Power Grid System – Classroom Powerups

  As part of my Marvel Power Grid System students will be able to “test” in order to earn upgrades to there “Super Powers”. An overview can be found Here but essentially this is like a voluntary badging system modeled on a karate belt system.

• Cliff Mass Weather Blog: The Big Heat Post Mortem and the Next Few Days

  It’s over. Throughout the region, all-time temperature records have been broken, if not smashed. Just to name a few:

• Digital Games Foster Inclusion • Teched Up Teacher

  We piloted The Majesti in a fifth-grade class one period each week for about half the year. Students who were usually pulled for ELA instruction were included.

• MARBLE RUN

• Computer and Information Technology Occupations : Occupational Outlook Handbook: : U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics

• China Requires Patriotic Education, Like GOP Governors and Legislators | Diane Ravitch’s blog

  On June 4, 1989, thousands of Chinese people peacefully protested in Tiananmen Square in Beijing, demanding democratic reforms. The uprising was brutally suppressed. Since then, the Chinese government has effectively obliterated the events of 30 yea…

• iCivics just added something new. Yup. Primary Sources. | History Tech

  We’re all familiar with iCivics, right? The government / civics centric website created with the encouragement and support of former Supreme Court justice Sandra Day O’Conner? The site with remote learning resources for parents and teachers?

• 5 Traits Student-Centered Classrooms Have In Common – Teacher Tech

  Join Alice on June 24th as she talks about Student-Centered Classrooms in a FREE Webinar sponsored by Otis For Educators! Free registration requires signing up for a free OTIS account. Register to attend live or to access the recording after the eve…

• Scientists convert used plastic bottles into vanilla flavouring | Plastics | The Guardian

  Plastic bottles have been converted into vanilla flavouring using genetically engineered bacteria, the first time a valuable chemical has been brewed from waste plastic. Upcycling plastic bottles into more lucrative materials could make the recyclin…

• Mathigon – Textbook of the Future

  Our unique content format makes learning more interactive than ever before. Students can explore, discover and actively engage in problem solving and creativity. The content can seamlessly adapt to different students, allowing everyone to achieve ma…

• How to learn pure mathematics on your own: a complete self-study guide – YouTube

  This video has a list of books, videos, and exercises that goes through the American undergraduate pure mathematics curriculum from start to finish. — LINKS: Watch this for a flavor of what pure mathematics is like: (Fredrich Schuller’s Lectures o…

• Redirecting to /blog

  Scientists are now using drones to help reduce the growing issue of plastic spreading across the ocean. People produce about 300 million tons of plastic every year, and at least 8 million of this ends up in our oceans.

• Nik’s QuickShout: Create Video Word Clouds with Quillionz Skimthru

  If you’ve read my QuickShout blog before then you probably already know a little about Quillionz and their awesome AI based app that analyses text and creates comprehension questions in minutes. Well now they have a new tool for us to enjoy.

• Skimthru – Hit the High Spots in Videos Quickly

  AI-powered Skimthru generates easy-to-comprehend word clouds from YouTube videos. Skimthru word clouds highlight parts of the video that matter the most enabling quick absorption of key information in the videos. Navigate through videos smartly with…

• A Principal’s Reflections: The Many Faces of Student Voice

  There are many ways to both engage and empower students that lead to ownership of learning. Creating what I call a “free-range” experience that replicates real-world contexts and develops critical competencies while tapping into passions might be th…

• Astronomers estimate 29 potentially habitable exoplanets may have received signals from Earth | CBC News

  The Milky Way is a big place. There are an estimated 200 billion stars, most of them with one or more planets. As a result, in the search for extraterrestrial life, it’s like looking for a needle in a haystack.

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

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

More and more amazing blog posts from this past week (in case you missed some):

• Delight 17: New Tech – Ideas and Thoughts

• Biden Chooses Ex-Obama Official for Key Position in Department of Education | Diane Ravitch’s blog

  During the Obama administration, Roberto Rodriguez was the White House advisor on education. He vigorously supported the Race to the Top program, the Common Core standards, and high-stakes testing. All of these initiatives failed to improve student …

• Some Favorite Picture Books to Discuss Our Perception of Others – Pernille Ripp

  I love using picture books to help my students relate to the world and grow as thinkers and humans and recognizing that our perception of others greatly influences how we treat them as is a great discussion to have repeatedly. So why not offer up a …

• Watching a coral reef die as climate change devastates one of the most pristine tropical island areas on Earth

  The Chagos Archipelago is one of the most remote, seemingly idyllic places on Earth. Coconut-covered sandy beaches with incredible bird life rim tropical islands in the Indian Ocean, hundreds of miles from any continent.

• Researchers create an effective RNA vaccine for malaria

  Malaria remains a significant problem facing Africa. Of the 409,000 worldwide malaria deaths estimated by the WHO in 2019, 94 percent of all cases occurred in Africa.

• Could VR Be the Missing Piece in Meaningful Language Instruction? | EdSurge News

• Qualcomm and VictoryXR collaborate on game-changing VR education program | Qualcomm

• blendEDTECHlearning – Minecraft

  All Minecraft Sessions require participants to have a Windows 10 device, MAC, Chromebook (that supports Android apps), or iPad. Minecraft Immersion, from crafting your first blocks to multiplayer games to learning how to use across any subject or gr…

• Oculus will sell you a Quest 2 headset that doesn’t need Facebook for an extra $500 | PC Gamer

  The Oculus Quest 2 is a hell of a lot of hardware for $299. In fact, we’re convinced that Facebook is making a loss on each unit sold. Even so, that pricing is one of the main reasons it’s the most popular headset on Steam and our pick as the best V…

• stemteachingtools.org

• I’ve Begun Having Students Play This Game In My Concurrent Classroom & It’s Been Working Well! | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  We’ve recently begun concurrent teaching and, as anyone who’s been doing it can tell you, it’s tough.

• Free Technology for Teachers: What is Hotlinking? – Why You Should Avoid It

  This morning I had a chat with a colleague who was having a little issue with his website not displaying the images that he was inserting into blog posts. The problem was that he was trying to insert images via URL instead of uploading images to hos…

• Structure Strips: Training wheels for making claims with evidence | History Tech

  Sure. There are probably some of you bike riding savants who had no need for them. You just hopped on and started riding, jumping ramps, and weaving through traffic – no problem. But most of us needed them to get started.

• Fortnite Messed Up and Failed Forward – Classroom Powerups

  The most recent season of Fortnite opened with a cool cut scene introducing the new PRIMAL theme. Players were then dropped into a new map and a whole slew of new game mechanics. It’s one of the things that I am most inspired by when making class co…

• Free Technology for Teachers: 7 Interesting Features You Can Add to Google Sites

  Once you’ve made the switch to the current version of Google Sites, you might want to go beyond the basics to add some interesting features to your site to make it a one-stop shop for all of your students’ and parents’ needs.

• How to Create an SEL Choice Board [+ Template and Activities]

  Over the last year, teachers and staff have heroically adjusted instruction to meet the needs of at-home learners.

• Star Wars STEM Activities for May the 4th Be With You Science | Science Buddies Blog

  May the 4th be with you! Tie simple science explorations in with Star Wars for Star Wars Day. Great STEM ideas for the classroom or for family science with kids at home. Connect favorite characters, epic movie scenes, Star Wars lore, and more with h…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Sherlock Bones – A Virtual Owl Pellet Dissection Activity

  One of the great things about living where I do is that a walk in the woods is always just a few steps away. One of my favorite things about walking in the woods is finding all kinds of neat, natural things including dropped moose and deer antlers.

• Free Technology for Teachers: New Map-based History Lessons from DocsTeach

  DocsTeach is one of my go-to resources for history teachers. I like it so much that I feature it in my Teaching History With Technology course.

• On Teaching Reading, Spelling, and Related Subjects – Alfie Kohn

  Half Truths About Whole Language “Kids aren’t learning how to read these days because ivory-tower ideologues have eliminated the teaching of necessary basic skills in favor of feel-good, PC fads like Whole Language.

• www.washingtonpost.com

  Is teaching reading really a one-size-fits-all endeavor?

• link.springer.com

  There is a widespread consensus in the research community that reading instruction in English should first focus on teaching letter (grapheme) to sound (phoneme) correspondences rather than adopt meaning-based reading approaches such as whole langua…

• Dyslexia

• The Role of Stories in Beginning Reading – Language Magazine

  The goal of beginning reading instruction is to help students develop a pleasure-reading habit.

• Literacy Research Association Releases Dyslexia Research Report

  Dyslexia is the currently popular explanation for the fact that some children experience much more difficulty than others in becoming literate. The explanation hypothesizes a neurological difference that also confers a range of benefits and necessit…

• Peer Feedback: Making It Meaningful – Dr. Catlin Tucker

  Choice is a powerful motivator. Giving students meaningful choices can help them to successfully complete tasks. So, why not use this format for peer editing? Building student agency into the peer feedback process removes barriers and encourages stu…

• Using Future Goals – Hockey Scholar to Teach STEM Concepts

• 1500 Drones in Shanghai form a QR code in the sky to promote a Game – Fan Engagement and Gaming Experience Platform

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Add Voice Recordings to Google Forms

  Earlier this year I shared a series of videos about how to add voice comments to Google Documents, Google Slides, and Google Classroom. All of those videos featured the use of a free Chrome extension called Mote. Over the weekend Mote added support …

• What’s to be Proud of? LGBTQ Pride Month

  How does one even begin to justify pride, the first of the Seven Deadly Sins? Then, to compound the challenge, how to write about LGBTQ Pride, when same-sex love and transgender self-expression are still considered “sinful” by so many around the wor…

• Choose Your Own Adventure Professional Development

  Professional Development can be an adventure! Yes, you can create fun, exciting learning. In this show, learn how Laurie Guyon uses hyperdocs and a “choose your own adventure” format.

• Barriers to purchasing education technology — ICT & Computing in Education

  Notwithstanding those figures, the points made below still obtain. Indeed, in a way the stats serve to highlight the fact that it takes an out-of-the ordinary set of circumstances to make people change their default behaviour.

• We’re Not Even At Equality Yet | The Jose Vilson

  A jury of Derek Chauvin’s “peers” found him guilty on all counts of murder: unintentional second-degree murder, third-degree murder, and second-degree manslaughter.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Ten Google Workspaces Features for Teachers You Might Be Overlooking

  Google Workspaces (formerly known as G Suite, Google Apps, and just plain Google Drive) has a lot of great features for teachers and students. Some of them are obvious while others might be considered “hidden” features.

• SEL Leaders, not Heroes | Mike Kaechele

  This past Thursday was Earth Day and I came across two inspiring stories. The first was Mari Copeny, “Little Miss Flint” and “Future President.” Mari is 13 years old, but has been an advocate for clean water in Flint, Michigan and against environmen…

• better-breakout-room-experience-students

  Five strategies that help middle and high school students form a community of learners in the virtual classroom. The pandemic has completely transformed the way we teach and the way students interact.

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

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

Here are more amazing blog posts from last week:

• Longer growing seasons have a limited effect on combating climate change

  Climate warming is leading to early springs and delayed autumns in colder environments, allowing plants to grow for a longer period of time during each growing season. Plants are absorbing more carbon dioxide (CO2) as a result of this longer growing…

• The science of melting chocolate | Feature | RSC Education

  Share this infographic with your students, download the poster for your classroom and get students developing their knowledge of changes of state and mixtures Download this This infographic is designed to be displayed as a poster in the classroom, a…

• Creativity App Database | Educopilot

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Change Your Mouse Pointer Size and Color

  Earlier this week I looked at one of my students’ computers and noticed that he had made his mouse pointer red and about three times its normal size. When I asked him why he changed it his answer was, “it’s easier to see.” I suppose that I should ha…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Enable Audio and Video Captions on Any Page in Chrome

  This week Google rolled-out the latest update to Chrome. In the latest version there is now support for automatic captioning of audio and video on any web page that you visit in the Chrome web browser. The captions will work whether or not the audio…

• cdc-says-schools-can-now-space-students-3-feet-apart-rather-than-6

  The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has updated its guidance for schools. On Friday, the agency announced it “now recommends that, with universal masking, students should maintain a distance of at least 3 feet in classroom settings.”

• Adobe Education Exchange

• Mission Punch Cards (Or, How Just About Every One of My Students is Independently Motivated)

  Yep, you read that right. Almost all of my students are independently motivated. They line up, begging to retake skills to demonstrate mastery. Even when the grading period is long closed and I can’t change their grade.

• Lesson: Impossible

  Your lesson, should you choose to accept it, is to listen to interviews with educators who are on the forefront of innovative pedagogy or making effective changes to old practices.

• 3 Reasons You Should Bring Games Into Your Classroom – Metawriting

  Anyone who knows me, in real life or online, knows that this semester I built my general education writing class (Writing II at my institution) around games.

• Game On? Brain On! — Designed To Learn

  Ready to level up learning? With educators being continually pushed toward canned curriculums and standardized testing, Lindsay Portnoy reminds teachers, parents, and all those invested in education that there’s a better way to learn: through play.

• The Emergence of Eugenics | Genome: Unlocking Life’s Code

  Eugenics attempts to use social sanction or state policy to improve the “hereditary character” of a specific population by preventing those deemed “inferior” from reproducing and encouraging those deemed “superior” to bear children.

• How to Quickly Turn a Lecture into a Game – Best Class Ever

  Love teaching? Love games? Ever wanted to bring the magic of learning into the magic circle of a game, or bring the magic of a game into the classroom? Me too. That’s why I create educational board games.

• G4C & Minecraft Education Edition Game Jam Tickets, Sat, Mar 20, 2021 at 1:00 PM | Eventbrite

  CALLING ALL MIDDLE/HIGH SCHOOL GAMES ENTHUSIASTS! Do you like to play video games? Have you ever wanted to make one? If you answered yes, then this event is for YOU!

• For the First Time, Paleontologists Unearth Fossil of Non-Avian Dinosaur Incubating a Nest of Eggs |Smart News Science | Smithsonian Magazine

  Within 70-million-year-old rock deposits located in southern China’s Jiangxi Province, researchers unearthed a preserved fossil of an oviraptorosaur crouched over a nest of 24 eggs, reports Alaa Elassar for CNN.

• Playing with Plexi: the Air Mail Game – Classroom Powerups

  This week my school had Plexiglass Barriers installed. The district has decided that this will facilitate safe full 5 day in person meetings.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Live Transcription in Zoom – Free for All Who Need It

  About six weeks ago I published a video about how to enable automatic captions in Zoom. At the time, that feature was only available in the paid versions of Zoom. Since then Zoom has made two updates to their policy about access to live captioning.

• Is There Any Teacher Who Would NOT Want To Participate In “The Imagining September Project”? | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  In it, she shared several powerful responses to questions she posed to them about this pandemic year and the future. Just last week, I borrowed several of her questions and did a similar activity with several of my classes.

• Remote Learning Isn’t the Only Problem With School – The Atlantic

  The litany of tragedies and inconveniences visited upon Americans by COVID-19 is long, but one of the more pronounced sources of misery for parents has been pandemic schooling.

• Control Alt Achieve: 18 Free Image Sites and Tools for Schools

  A picture is worth a thousand words, but it might also be worth a thousand dollars if your school gets hit with a copyright violation claim. This happens to schools every year as students or teachers inappropriately use an image that they do not hav…

• 5 Google Jamboard features you (probably) don’t know – Ditch That Textbook

  Jamboard is Google’s digital white board tool. Educators have flocked to it because it’s very visual, it’s easy to use, and it’s highly collaborative. Teachers are using it in so many ways …

• Humble Alternatives to Daylight Savings Time – Math with Bad Drawings

  Math 1 Minute Published March 17, 2021

• Network for Public Education: The Scandal of For-Profit Charter Schools | Diane Ravitch’s blog

  Carol Burris, executive director of the Network for Public Education, authored this powerful exposé of for-profit charter schools.

• Free Technology for Teachers: A New Look for Presenting With Google Slides

  On Monday Google announced a change to the presentation menu in Google Slides. Yesterday afternoon I got to try it for the first time. The new Google Slides presentation menu is a great improvement over the old one! Just like before you still need t…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Webinar Recording – Copyright & Creative Commons for K-12 Educators

  Free Technology for Teachers

• Free Technology for Teachers: PayGrade.io Now Offers Google SSO

  PayGrade is a classroom economy simulation that you can use all year. As I wrote last year, unlike some mock economy activities PayGrade can be used in just about any classroom setting. Recently, PayGrade added the option to use your school-issued G…

• Google Workspace Updates: Snooze Google Calendar desktop notifications

  In the Cloud Connect Community, discuss the latest features with Googlers and other Google Workspace admins like you. Learn tips and tricks that will make your work and life easier. Be the first to know what’s happening with Google Workspace.

• Cliff Mass Weather Blog: Why the Strange Radar Echo over the Pacific Ocean?

  I have gotten quite a few emails asking about a strange radar echo off the Washington Coast, including a few claiming a secret military operation and one suggesting an alien presence. Here is an example, showing the Langley Hill radar on March 15th …

• Science

• 50 Physics Lesson Plans for Middle school Students — Innovative Teaching Ideas | Teaching Resources

• Project-Based Learning: Teaching Newton’s Laws with Broomball

• Fastballs, Free Throws and Physics | Creative Educator

• Free Technology for Teachers: Create Infinitely Recurring Zoom Meetings

  Last week one of my colleagues asked me for help setting up some Zoom meetings. He needed to hold a series of meetings that were not going to be held at the same time each day. He could have set a series of individual meetings.

• Technology Tidbits: Thoughts of a Cyber Hero: Cloud Stop Motion

  Cloud Stop Motion is an innovative site for creating and storing stop motion video projects. This is ideal for educators looking to integrate technology into the classroom and can be used for project based learning, digital storytelling, and more.

• Free Technology for Teachers: City Guesser 2.0 – Guess City Locations from Video Clips

  For years City Guesser has been a popular geography game in which players have to guess the identity and location of a city based on Google Street View imagery. The new version of City Guesser replaces Google Street View imagery with street level vi…

• Building Relationships With Students: What Brain Science Says | Understood – For learning and thinking differences

  Understood’s resources for educators are backed by research, vetted by experts, and reviewed by classroom teachers. Understood’s resources for educators are backed by research, vetted by experts, and reviewed by classroom teachers.

• Never Have I Ever for Educators share copy – Google Slides

• Control Alt Achieve: My NEOTech 2021 Sessions

  Below is a list of sessions I will be presenting live and pre-recorded for NEOTech 2021, along with any associated resources. Please feel free to join me for any of these sessions, or watch the recorded sessions.

• Why Zip Codes Matter | Diane Ravitch’s blog

  From the earliest days of corporate reform, which is now generally recognized to have been a failed effort to “reform”schools by privatizing them and by making standardized testing the focal point of education, we heard again and again that a child’…

• Private Schools Are Indefensible – The Atlantic

  Elite schools breed entitlement, entrench inequality—and then pretend to be engines of social change. This article was published online on March 11, 2021.

• The Key to Better Student Engagement Is Letting Them Show You How They Learn | EdSurge News

• Escape Rooms Made Easy: Tips to Save Your Sanity and Your Time – Not So Wimpy Teacher

  For a long time, I was reluctant to try escape rooms. I loved the idea of using an escape room in my classroom, but I was overwhelmed by the process. Escape rooms have become a popular review strategy.

• I Still Can’t Believe We Have To Make Standardized Test Plans The Same Time We’re Planning A Return To The Physical Classroom | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  I’ve already shared many resources explaining why the decision to require standardized testing this year makes very little sense (see Why Is The Biden Administration Decision To Have Standardized Tests This Year An Extremely Unwise One? Let Me Count…

• A Principal’s Reflections: 8 Elements of Effective Coaching

  I absolutely love coaching educators in small groups. During these sessions, I get to see firsthand how they are implementing ideas and strategies into practice to grow.

• become-the-wolves-part-1-florida

  Here are four basic facts about public education in Florida — and its political importance — that you probably don’t know.

• Students Have Tips for Teachers to Improve Hybrid Classrooms

  Since August, my students have attended school in a hybrid A/B day model where one group attends school every Monday and Wednesday and the other group attends school every Tuesday and Thursday, and then they alternate Fridays.

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

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

Last week’s pics of amazing blog posts:

• Teaching in the Concurrent Classroom: Four Strategies to Make it Work – Dr. Catlin Tucker

  On Thursday night, I presented a 30-minute webinar with AJ Juliani for educators focused on the concurrent classroom.

• Control Alt Achieve: 8 Ambient Sound Websites to Help Students Focus

  What helps you focus when reading, writing, or getting work done? Do you need a totally silent room, or does some amount of ambient noise help you? For some people, students included, having sound in the background can actually help them focus bette…

• Voice Notes & Feedback: Mote vs. Talk & Comment – i ❤ edu

  Greetings friends! I know I have been terrible over the last month about creating new content. I can break down my struggle into two main reasons: 1.) I have struggled to find my creativity during the pandemic and 2.

• (PDF) Can PBIS Build Justice Rather Than Merely Restore Order?

  ChapterPDF Available Can PBIS Build Justice Rather Than Merely Restore Order? Authors: Download full-text PDF In a multicase qualitative study, inclusive school leaders attempted to move their schools from the excessive use of suspension; they emplo…

• earths-oldest-rock-found-on-moon-get-facts-apollo-14-zircons

  Scientists may have just found the oldest intact Earth rock—on the moon. A study published Thursday in Earth and Planetary Science Letters makes the case that one of the rocks collected by Apollo 14 astronauts in 1971 contains a fragment of Earth’s …

• Wisconsin Science and STEM Education: Supporting Students in Asking Questions in Science and STEM

  What do you notice and wonder about the phenomenon represented by this graph? This lack of students’ questions not only misses a critical area of science, it’s also an equity issue.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Type Studio – A Truly Unique Way to Edit Your Videos

  Type Studio is a new video editing tool. When I used it for the first time yesterday I actually said aloud, “Whoa! That’s Awesome!” What made me say that was using the editor to clip a section of video.

• Classroom Consent – Classroom Powerups

  Voice and Choice is an entirely overused phrase in the modern classroom. This not a subtweet of anyone in particular but there is definitely some ‘buzziness’ factor in the phrase. The original intent, I believe, was to indicate some personalization …

• didnt-get-enough-financial-aid-for-college-you-can-ask-for-more-money

  Last spring, the pandemic stole Maddie Harvey’s job on campus in the Dean of Students office. She was finishing up her senior year at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minn., and without the income from her job, she wasn’t going to have enou…

• Lesson Plan: Discuss 22-year-old Amanda Gorman’s inaugural poem “The Hill We Climb” | Lesson Plan | PBS NewsHour Extra

  For a Google doc version of this lesson, click here. You will need to make a copy of the Google doc for a version you can edit. In this lesson, students examine the poetry of Amanda Gorman, who was chosen to read her poem “The Hill We Climb” at Pres…

• Teaching Inauguration Poetry – Pernille Ripp

  We have been sinking into poetry the last few weeks, discovering found word poetry and trying to decide what poetry really is. We have read and listened to poetry.

• How to use anything on the web as an LMS assignment – Ditch That Textbook

  Lots of apps, websites, and digital tools around the Internet let students answer questions or leave responses directly on their app. After they do, you’re able to view their responses, leave feedback, grade them, etc. Some examples:

• Let’s be honest. None of us are Amanda Gorman. But your students should be. | History Tech

  Let’s be honest. Very few of us are poets. Very few of us probably even read a lot of poetry.

• New CNN Video: “‘Overjoyed’: Hear from poet who stole the show at inauguration” | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  You’ll want to watch tonight’s CNN interview with Amanda Gorman. You might also be interested in HERE ARE FIVE LESSON PLANS ABOUT AMANDA GORMAN’S INAUGURATION POEM- SHARE OTHERS.

• Free Technology for Teachers: ReadWorks Adds an Offline Mode for Students

  ReadWorks is a non-profit service that I’ve been recommending for years. It is a free service that provides high-quality fiction and non-fiction articles and lesson plans for K-12 ELA teachers. Every article on ReadWorks is accompanied by a Lexile s…

• JAM: Giant Transparent Blank Rectangle – Teacher Tech

  I am writing a book with Kim Mattina on Google Jamboard. She has a tip to add a giant textbox over the frame to prevent students from accidentally moving objects on the frame.

• To A Greater Glory [National Catholic Reporter] | The Jose Vilson

  In my latest op-ed, I wrote an article as an open letter to the Biden administration that harkened back to my Jesuit education (Nativity Mission, Xavier High). Here’s a little bit: In this way, I’m asking us to live out our stated values politically…

• Video: Acapella Science- Vaccine Wellerman Let’s Go | Science for All

  File this under fun, trendy and topical. Acapellascience is back with a (too) short music video about the COVID vaccine in the tradition of a sea shanty. If you loop the video it aligns perfectly and you can just listen non-stop all day. Enjoy.

• Road of Trials – Hero’s Journey Lesson Planning – Civil Rights Quest – Classroom Powerups

  Link to Civil Rights Quest Google Site with a full YouTube walkthrough below.

• How to Make Classroom Games with Easy, Awesome Educaplay

  This week, I began using Educaplay to make fun classroom learning games for my students. In addition to easy game creation, sending the games to Google Classroom was easy, as was student work, automatic grading, and engagement. Many of us who have b…

• GamiLab

• What does it take to reintroduce and contain a herd of bison to a national park? | CBC News

  Years of planning, meticulous tracking — and a really cool fence. With one year left in the Banff Bison Reintroduction Project, facilitators say it has been going well.

• A Fun and Free Inauguration Day Resource – Not So Wimpy Teacher

  On Wednesday, January 20, 2021 Joe Biden will be sworn in as the 46th President of the U.S. Inauguration Day, which only happens once every four years, is a special opportunity to teach students about history in real time.

• Election 2.0 Project | Mike Kaechele

  Something a little different this week. A project idea for the social studies classroom. How would you modify the election process in the United States?

• Tips for Creating a Virtual Classroom Library for Students

  Once upon a time, schools and classrooms offered libraries with a variety of books for students to borrow. Today, due to the pandemic, in most schools borrowing physical books has been put on hold for the foreseeable future.

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

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

Here are last week’s selection of blog posts worth reading:

• Reach Out and Uplift Students with Check-Ins! – Teacher Reboot Camp

  A student check-in in a physical classroom takes place daily usually before the student walks in the door or at the beginning of the period. Students share a greeting and how they are feeling through a handshake, high five, or other method.

• Tools to Inspire Students to Map Out the Brilliance in Their Minds – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Imagine, plan, and design are important steps in the Engineering Design Process. After presenting problems for students to solve, they need the opportunity to brainstorm then draft a blueprint, model, or design of their ideas.

• I’ve Got an Idea

  My students love doing any learning when they get to brainstorm on their desks with a dry erase marker. Brainstorming on a canvas with words, symbols, icons, lines, stylized font, shapes, frames, and color is a fun way for the brain to make connecti…

• Jamboard Menu – Google Slides

• School Employees May Get Early COVID-19 Vaccinations. Here’s How States Will Decide When

  As the United States rolls out the first doses of coronavirus vaccines, state leaders and federal public health officials generally agree that teachers and school employees should get their shots before there are enough doses for the general public.

• Testing Disconnect – Classroom Powerups

  As progressive as I try to be in my classroom there are still district and state requirements that need to be fulfilled. One of them is mandatory “Common Assessment” testing that is aligned to the state standards.

• Schools aren’t failing, grades are. | Stories From School

  Oh, the headlines. The numbers of students who are failing is “off the rails.” Others talk of COVID wreaking havoc on grades. And there are occasional wonderings if just maybe grades during a pandemic aren’t fair. The panic: What ever will we do abo…

• Google Apps for Education: 8 Best Practices

• Teacher Explains Why We Need to Challenge Education System | POPSUGAR Family

  The fact that we keep buying the “Kids are falling behind academically” narrative of this pandemic is the grossest… Leland Schipper, a high-school math teacher from Iowa, is challenging the structure of the American education system.

• Essay on Through the Darkest of Times up on Play the Past | Gaming the Past

  My two-part essay on Paintbucket Games Through the Darkest of Times is now published on Play the Past. This essay uses the historical problem space framework to analyze the game. Let me know what you think.

• My Top 5 Science Picture Books for 2020 | Science for All

  I’m a former elementary teacher- therefore I love picture books. But to be honest I feel like I’ve always loved picture books. I loved them myself as a kid and have so many great memories of reading them to my own two kids.

• WA STATE: Climate Justice League Workshop Series | Science for All

  Here in Washington the state K-12 teachers have a cool opportunity to join an ongoing workshop series on Climate Justice. Plus you get to join a group that sounds like a combination of the Justice League and Captain Planet and the Planeteers… The …

• Free Technology for Teachers: Fifteen New Primary Source-based Lessons from Docs Teach

  DocsTeach has been one of my go-to resources for U.S. History lessons for many years. DocsTeach offers more than 1,500 primary source activities to use in elementary, middle, and high school history lessons.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Save the Captions from Your Google Meet Calls

  CaptionSaver Pro for Google Meet is a new Chrome extension that launched on Product Hunt earlier this week. CaptionSaver Pro does two important things for Google Meet users. First, it will automatically turn on captions when you start or join a Goog…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Three Ways to Create Year-in-Review Videos

  This is the time of year when just about every media company is publishing some kind of year-in-review video. Asking students to create year-in-review videos can be a good way for them to recall their best moments of the year or to recall the most i…

• College Isn’t For Every Young Adult–And It’s Time Parents Accept It

  Ten years ago, one of my friends opened a hair salon, employing two other stylists. She sets her own schedule, usually only working three days a week and leaving time to chaperone her kids’ field trips and take care of household errands. Weekends an…

• It’s not production quality that counts in educational videos – here’s what students value most

  The use of educational videos in schools and universities was on the rise before COVID-19. Now, with continuing disruption by the pandemic, more educators are developing educational videos to support student learning.

• Educational Materials – CHANEABOND.COM

  If you have any technical/access issues, please email heymrsbond@gmail.com Click image for document access.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Quickly Create Polls and Quizzes in Google Meet With Edu-pal

  Edu-pal is a new Chrome extension developed by students for teachers and students to use with Google Meet. The extension was recently featured on Product Hunt and I gave it a try earlier this week.

• Free Technology for Teachers: My Current Hybrid Classroom Arrangement and Equipment

  Last Friday I posted this picture on Instagram. It prompted a few questions on Instagram and in my inbox. The picture is of my current hybrid classroom equipment arrangement. Back in August I published a rundown of my hybrid classroom arrangement.

• An Introduction to Blended Learning with CommonLit: Part 1 – ATLAS ABE

  If you had asked me for a definition of Blended Learning and how that might look in an ABE classroom just nine months ago, I might have produced a somewhat vague response, based on theory or research from a journal, but definitely not in practice.

• Shut the Box Game – Google Slides – Teacher Tech

  If you are looking for something fun for your students to do during class time try the Shut the Box game. Traditionally this game is played with 2 players, a pair of dice, and 9 tiles. To play this virtually, or digitally, try my Google Slides versi…

• Teaching During A Pandemic Is Hard — Parents, Please Give Us A Break

  Being a teacher in 2020 is a lot like riding a roller coaster. You can’t blink without missing a hairpin turn, a nausea-inducing drop, or a crazy twist. Back in the spring, I was a hero. We’d been doing remote learning for about a month when I gave …

• Lesson Plans – Unreal Engine

• Learn how to code with Unreal Engine – Unreal Engine

• Engaging with Students Long-Distance | Stories From School

  For the last month, the number one topic in our staff meetings has been student engagement. Meanwhile, I have a 10-year-old student who wrote a personal narrative about how he got his first car, a 1971 VW Beetle. He plans to convert it to an electri…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Make Offline Copies of Important Files in Your Google Drive

  Monday’s little Google services outage was a bit of an “oh, crap!” moment for many people who have come to rely on Google to create, store, and access all kinds of important files.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Book Creator Has a New Color Selection Tool

  Book Creator now offers the option to use color hex codes to choose colors instead of just selecting a color from a paint palette. Using a hex code gives you the finest level of control over color selection.

• 4 distance learning activities to engage students – Classcraft Blog

  Keeping students interested in learning can be hard enough when you’re in a classroom, but when you’re teaching them remotely it’s even more difficult. We’ve put together four engaging ways to teach students in your online classroom that can help ke…

• It’s Bill of Rights Day! “. . . a fairer and more just world.” | History Tech

  The Constitution and its amendments seem pretty straight forward. The old girl is over 200 years old and has, for the most part, held up well. But helping kids understand the fragile nature of the ideas and practices embedded in the document can be …

• Free Technology for Teachers: Five Ideas for Online Breakout Room Activities

  Breakout rooms in Zoom, Microsoft Teams, or Google Meet provide a good way to get students talking and working in small groups. For some students, talking to a couple of classmates in a small breakout room is a lot less intimidating that talking to …

• Free Technology for Teachers: When Will It End?

  I’m tired, you’re tired, our students are tired, we’re all tired.

• Family Fun Science Activity for the Holidays – Teacher Created Tips

  Looking for a fun, easy craft to do with your kiddos this season? Here is a super simple activity that parents can do with materials that are most likely already around the house.

• Wisconsin Science and STEM Education: Effective Virtual (and In-Person) Learning in Science (part 2)

  Based on current research, effective science instruction looks a bit different than what I often did as a teacher. In fact, there is more to it than having students engage in the three dimensions of the Wisconsin Standards for Science (or NGSS).

• Computer Feedback That Helps Kids Learn About Math and About Themselves – dy/dan

  Students are receiving more feedback from computers this year than ever before. What does that feedback look like, and what does it teach students about mathematics and about themselves as mathematicians? Here is a question we might ask math student…

• Problematic Themes: Classroom Questions – Classroom Powerups

  Last week I contemplated Civilization VI and its problematic game play mechanics. A couple weeks ago Charlie Mirus (@ATeachersTeach) posted this really amazing collection of Space Themed Visual Effect GIFs. My mind immediately jumped to creating Spa…

• 3 Tools to Amplify Your Video Conferences – Teacher Reboot Camp

  This year video conferencing has been the way many teachers deliver instruction. This is very different than in class instruction. If you miss the level of engagement and presence in your physical classes, then you will love using the three tools be…

• Tips, Tools and Resources for Awesome Student Video Projects – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Students enjoy producing their own videos. This year make a goal of motivating students to share their knowledge through a video project. In my books find lesson plans, handouts and rubrics for creating video projects. Below is a free slide presenta…

• NASA Space Safety Handbook

• Create a progress report per student in Google Classroom – YouTube

  Google Classroom does not have an easy way to get a progress report per student all at once. Use the score export option in Google Classroom along with https://ift.tt/3r1IGfC to create a progress report per student on different tabs in a spreadsheet.

• how-ending-behavior-rewards-helped-one-school-focus-on-student-motivation-and-character

  Handing out colored bracelets and upbeat stickers when students behave well seems like an effective strategy for encouraging civility.

• 20 Free Ways to Download Any Video From the Internet

• Seeing Possibility: Using Learning Progressions to Help Students Climb toward Mastery | All Things Assessment

  Over these past few months, I have come to embrace one distinct truth: things are predictably unpredictable right now.

• Attitude of Gratitude | Erik Francis | Repacking Standards | Tom Schimmer

  In Don’t @ Me (4:48), Tom explores the feeling of gratitude and how it can actually impact you and your brain; he also expresses his gratitude for you, the listening audience.

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Find “Lost” Items in Google Drive

  In this short video I demonstrate how I use the search functions in Google Drive to find files whose names I can’t remember ten years after I created them.

• Digital Research and Curation with Social Bookmarking Tools – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Social bookmarking apps have leveled up research. With social bookmarking tools students can collect, categorize, curate, and tag resources. Many are free! I have listed some of my favorites for students and teachers below. Social bookmarking makes …

• Fight Racism with VR – Copy / Paste

  These virtual and augmented reality programs allow the user to shift their point of view and experience the legacy of segregation in America. Students and teachers can “step inside” these immersive environments and feel the weight of systemic racism.

• End the Semester on a Creative Note – John Spencer

  Let’s just put it out there. December is exhausting for teachers. The days are shorter. The weather grows colder and (at least here in Oregon) wetter.

• 24 primary source archives you might have missed | History Tech

  Sure. We’ve all been to the Library of Congress digital archives. We all use the super handy National Archives’ Teaching With Documents section that shares lesson plans explaining historical events through primary documents.

• Save the Date: CUNY Games Conference 2021 | CUNY Games Network

  We hope you are well. 2020 has thrown some curveballs, but that will not stop the CUNY Games Network from hosting its annual conference in January 2021. Please see below for details. Stay healthy, enjoy the holidays, and we hope to see you online on…

• My Favorite Reads of 2020 – Pernille Ripp

  While 2020 was a year of great loss, of feeling lost at times, and being distanced, within the pages of books I found hope, refuge, solace, anger to push me further in action, and love.

• When Our Students’ Annotated Texts Are a Hot Mess

  Are your students’ annotated texts hard to make sense of? Do they underline entire sections of a source?  And write very few comments? This kind of annotating can be a waste of time and a huge impediment to meaningful learning for some of our learne…

• A Principal’s Reflections: Finding Balance in Today’s Classroom

  Balance has always been a challenge for teachers. I vividly remember this during my early years as a teacher. Each night I came home exhausted. Maybe the 45-minute commute had a little to do with it, but the main culprit was how I used available tim…

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

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)

Here are more amazing blog posts from last week:

• Asynchronous Remote Learning Is The Most Humane Way To Teach This School Year

  I keep hearing the same complaint from parents: “I don’t want my children on these long videoconference calls. It is making them miserable.

• How To Limit Your Students’ Screen Time – Smart Classroom Management

  According to the American Heart Association, children ages 8-18 spend an average of more than 7 hours a day on their phones, playing video games, or watching TV. It’s a staggering statistic.

• Feedback Frames.pdf – Google Drive

• Back-to-School: An Open Letter to Families and Educators

  As a parent, spouse of an educator, and former teacher myself, I could never have imagined a school year starting like this one. None of us could. We never expected masks to cover up smiles behind first-day-of-school photos.

• Two More Important Remote Teaching Tips | THE TEMPERED RADICAL

  Did you miss me?! It’s been a while since I’ve last written. I’ve been slammed with pandemic teaching, finishing a new book, and supporting teachers who are working to figure out how to create meaningful remote learning spaces for their students. Oh.

• Student-Made E-Books: A Beautiful Way to Demonstrate Learning | Cult of Pedagogy

  You’ve reached the end of a unit or year, and you want students to demonstrate their learning in a way that requires them to synthesize information, apply it in new ways, and reflect on how they have grown. To achieve any of these goals, an end-of-u…

• Using Icons to Assist in Routines, Organization & Formative Assessment With @MsBDuncan – Teacher Tech

  You see them in coffee shops, stores, and supermarkets.  And now you can use them in your online digital classroom! What are these icons and why use them? Icons have been used in many public spaces, and they are quite functional, as you can say so m…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Google Adds More Teacher Controls for Google Meet – Yay!

  In terms of meeting controls Google Meet has lagged behind Zoom all year. Google is making efforts to close that gap. Last month they introduced some new controls and yesterday they introduced another control option for teachers.

• How to use Jamboard in the classroom: 20+ tips and ideas – Ditch That Textbook

  Jamboard is a collaborative online whiteboard. It gives students lots of creative work space. How do you use Google Jamboard in the classroom? Check out these ideas! Whiteboards and chalkboards have been a fixture in classrooms for ages.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Add Science & Math Simulations to Google Sites

  In the latest episode of Two Ed Tech Guys Take Questions & Share Cool Stuff I shared an update about a favorite math and science resource. That resource is PhET. PhET offers more than 150 online, interactive science and math simulations.

• Captioning in Zoom

  Last year when we went 100% virtual virtual learning, my district was using Google Meet. This year, students have the option to attend face to face or virtually. To support those students who have chosen the virtual option, teachers are using the Pr…

• G Suite Updates Blog: Adding present and chat Meet moderator capabilities for education users

  Who’s impactedTo control who can share their screen in a meeting, hosts can turn “Share their screen” on or off. By default, this setting will be on.When “Share their screen” is on, participants will see the option to share their screen to all meeti…

• 5 Ways to Use Newsletters This School Year – Class Tech Tips

  Email newsletters help you get a round up of all of the things someone or some organization is excited about. You probably get newsletters from a few different people. I send out newsletters for teachers every Monday.

• Free Technology for Teachers: An Overview of the New Google Images Search Options

  Earlier this week Google updated and simplified the way in which you can find Creative Common licensed images through Google Images. I wrote an overview of those changes yesterday. A few years ago Dr.

• Willpower Is Not Going to Be Enough – The Atlantic

  The pandemic has stripped education of its social context, and schools aren’t reckoning with the psychological tax on students. College students are being invited back onto campus after a summer of isolation and confinement, with strict instructions…

• Wisconsin Science and STEM Education: “Essential” Standards in Science

  As students head back to school this fall, many teachers and administrators have realized that teaching all of the topics from previous years may not be possible. There is a desire to pare down the standards into what is “essential” or “priority.

• 8 Ideas to Consider for Remote Learning (Part 2) – George Couros

  In my newly released, self-paced course, “Developing the Innovator’s Mindset Through Remote, Face-to-Face, and Blended Learning,” I have been sharing ideas and strategies that you can use in a remote, blended, or face-to-face setting.

• Customizable Student HQs: Bitmoji Classrooms, Fortnite and Google Slides – Classroom Powerups

  What does Fortnite have in common with a Bitmoji? My two sons, 10 and 7, are addicted to Fortnite. I have several posts kicking around in my head about the game mechanics and how to apply them to the classroom.

• YouTube

  Learn the 5 basic steps on creating a class Google Site. Follow this PD presentation deck for links to templates and video tutorials: https://ift.tt/32SwPp0 Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/MrsParkShine Follow me on

• Build Your Class Google Site – Google Slides

• A small school district in Eastern Washington goes back to school in-person | The Seattle Times

• The Concurrent Classroom: Using Blended Learning Models to Teach Students In-person and Online Simultaneously |

  Teachers all over the country are being asked to teach “concurrent classrooms” in which some students attend class in person and others attend virtually. The teacher in a concurrent classroom attempts to meet the needs of the students in class and o…

• 4 tips for building Peloton style choice boards – Ditch That Textbook

• Introducing the Student Standards for Distance Learning

  Following the outbreak of Covid-19, educators worldwide turned to distance learning to continue educating students without exposing them or their communities to the virus. In the spring, educators made this shift almost overnight, as an emergency re…

• YouTube

  Learn some tips and tricks to create breakout room Google Meet links and monitor group work. Download Chrome Extension “Tab Resize”: https://ift.tt/1ePn1es Download Chrome Extension “Mute Tab”: https://ift.tt/qcVPTu

• SEL Integrated Sample Lesson Plans (OST) – Casel Schoolguide

• Free Mindfulness, SEL, and Yoga Resources for Educators, Students, & Parents During School Closures – Students and Parents

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Use Google Drive to Comment on Videos

  One of the great “hidden” features of Google Drive that is often overlooked is that you can comment on almost any file that you upload to your Google Drive. This includes videos that you upload to Google Drive. That’s exactly what I demonstrate in t…

• Episode 24 | Blended and online learning with Catlin Tucker | Silver Lining for Learning

  Over the spring and summer there was one name I heard on the lips of P-12 educators more than any other. On August 29 at 5:30pm Eastern (USA), we are delighted to have Dr. Catlin Tucker as our guest on Silver Lining for Learning. Hope you can join u…

• Remote learning exacerbates inequality for students

  My son finished elementary school at our local, Title 1 public school this spring. Distance learning under emergency conditions was a challenge. For some it was especially tough. Some kids never made it to class meetings. Other students shared one d…

• building-critical-thinkers-combining-stem-history

  One innovative way to foster critical thinking in STEM is to add a bit of history. STEM was born from the desire to emulate how life actually operates by merging four core disciplines: science, technology, engineering, and math.

• FREE

• 5 Social Distancing Group Work Strategies | Mike Kaechele

  Many teachers and students have or are returning to face-to-face classrooms with Covid social distancing rules in effect. Wearing a face mask, staying six feet apart, and not sharing materials makes group work and collaboration seem impossible.

• Virtual Robotics Competition for Students from CoderZ – Class Tech Tips

  This post is sponsored by CoderZ. All opinions are my own.

• 5 Ways That Teachers Are Using Breakout Rooms to Create More Learner-Centered Experiences in Distance Learning – KATIE MARTIN

  I have talked with many educators who are anxious about creating breakout rooms for fear of inappropriate interactions, bullying, and being off task in breakout rooms. Although these behaviors are not only possible in breakout rooms, many feel less …

• Lisa Nielsen: The Innovative Educator: Some Thoughts on Hybrid Teaching

  Districts around the globe are talking about having a hybrid model when returning to school. In a hybrid model, students attend school 1 – 3 days a week.

• CER and Data Analysis

  In this CER introduction, the first page explain scientific argumentation (claim, evidence, reasoning), and then asks them to practice by analyzing a graph that compares the number of ACE2 receptors in cells by age group.

• Differentiation – Strategy Checklist

  Teachers “differentiate instruction” any time that they consider the unique needs and interests of their students when developing instructional materials.  Differentiation usually involves making modifications to:

• A Principal’s Reflections: Avoiding Synchronous Video Fatigue During Remote Learning

  The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in some monumental shifts to practice. Educators have taken a critical lens as to why they teach the way they do and how it can be done more effectively.

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

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

Another batch of amazing blog posts from this past week:

• Free Technology for Teachers: AudioMass – A Free, Registration-free Audio Editor

  AudioMass is a new online audio editing tool that I recently learned about on Product Hunt. AudioMass doesn’t require any registration in order to use it. In fact, there isn’t even an option to register.

• Classroom Games and Tech – Ed-Tech to Engage and Inspire: Game Design Tip and Activities – Game Design Club 2020

  This week I posted my final game design tip to the club and I posted a couple game design activities. The tip as shown in the video lends itself toward board and card games, though I have read the same advice given to designers of digital games.

• ‘Days on the Hill’ will go online this year, widening audience for Puget Sound talks | Puget Sound Institute

  Folks who care about salmon, killer whales and the Puget Sound ecosystem will get a chance to participate in the annual discussion known as Puget Sound Day on the Hill. But this year the event will be called “2020 Virtual Puget Sound Days on the Hil…

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Create Whiteboard Videos With Zoom

  One of the things that I often mention in my webinars and workshops is the idea of getting to know an instructional technology tool well so that you can use it in many ways. A good example of that is found when dive into all of the ways that you can…

• 10 Key Education Recommendations for Reopening the K-12 Classroom

  Homeroom has taken on a literal meaning over the past two months. Parents, while always their children’s first and foremost educators, have had to fully embrace homeschooling as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.

• Learning Through Video Games Doesn’t Have To Be Dull : NPR

  When I was in high school, the best way I could describe myself was as a parent’s worst nightmare: I didn’t care about my education, didn’t do homework, and was known to sleep in class. My SAT score was so bad that I still don’t know how I did! My v…

• Technology In Education – e-Learning Infographics

  Educational technology comes in many forms including websites, apps, and online courses, and is effective when used both inside the classroom alongside other teaching methods and at home for self-study.

• The Best Books for Middle School According to My Students 2020 – Pernille Ripp

  I didn’t want to let a global pandemic stand in the way of gathering the titles of the amazing books my 7th graders loved this year. This is the fifth year that my students have gathered what they deem the very best books that they read this year an…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Five Screencastify Settings You Should Know How to Use

  Screencastify is an excellent tool for creating instructional videos on your Chromebook, Mac, or Windows computer.

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Create Whiteboard Videos in Seesaw

  Seesaw is my go-to tool for making digital portfolios. I like it because it’s a versatile platform that can be used for more than just portfolio creation.

• Technology Tidbits: Thoughts of a Cyber Hero: HeadUP

  HeadUp is a excellent new site for digital storytelling that I just found out about. Once a user signs up they can create dynamic looking stories that contains, images, videos, links, and more.

• How to Quickly Create, Send, & Translate a Parent Newsletter – Teacher Reboot Camp

  “At the end of the day, the most overwhelming key to a child’s success is the positive involvement of parents.” – Jane D. Hull A few weeks ago I sent my first parent newsletter to 400+ parents.

• 5 Resources to Find Tons of Free Fun Unplugged Coding Activities! – Teacher Reboot Camp

  “Falling in love with code means falling in love with problem solving and being a part of a forever ongoing conversation.” – Kathryn Barrett In a previous post I described why all students should participate in the upcoming Hour of Code event, which…

• 8 Top Tips and Tons of Resources for Supporting English Learners with Technology – Teacher Reboot Camp

  I’ve worked with language learners in over 20 countries. I’ve seen first hand how technology can be used in incredible ways to motivate and engage language learners of any age.

• 7 great reads that are gonna make my brain bigger | History Tech

  Most of you already know about the History Tech summer reading program. If you just starting hanging around, a quick recap. For years, I’ve been making a list of books that I plan to read between the end of school in May and back to school in August.

• 12 Awesome Ideas for Ending the School Year – Teacher Reboot Camp

  The end of the school year is approaching fast! Before the year ends I aim to get students to review, reflect, and connect. Some of your students are probably super excited to begin their summers or might be restless from testing.

• How Do Teachers and Schools Develop Young Innovators? – Teacher Reboot Camp

  On Tuesday I was honored to deliver the afternoon keynote for the #KYGoDigital Summer Tour Conference, The Keys to Fostering a Culture of Innovation! Students Who S.A.I.L.

• 10+ QR Code Activities to Inspire Curiosity and Engage Learners – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Recently I presented a webinar for Simple K12, 10+ QR Code Activities to Inspire Curiosity and Active Learning. Below are the slides with example activities and resources.

• Go On Incredibly Fun Learning Adventures With These 10+ Amazing Green Screen Ideas! – Teacher Reboot Camp

  A green screen in the classroom helps spark student creativity and imagination for any subject! Last year I tried a very basic and cheap green screen with my 2nd to 5th graders.

• 7 Recommended Hands-On STEM Learning Products – Teacher Reboot Camp

  “Learning is not a spectator sport.” – Arthur W. Chickering and Stephen C. Ehrmann (1996) On this blog I’ve shared thousands of web tools, apps, and resources that are free or offer a freemium option for teachers.

• 10+ Plugged and Unplugged Coding Activities for Hour of Code! – Teacher Reboot Camp

  December 9 to 15th is the annual Hour of Code event. Coding is such an important skill that enables students to learn writing and math along with any other subject matter. Coding also inspires students to invent and innovate. Students also learn how…

• Tools, Apps, and Resources to Create and Send Meaningful Greetings – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Tis’ the season for students to express gratitude and care for others by creating and sending greetings. Students can craft messages for their peers, family members, teachers, and school staff. Students can also participate in digital greeting excha…

• Tips and Tools to Support Students in Publishing Their Own Digital Storybooks – Teacher Reboot Camp

  I still remember the storybooks I created when I was younger. They were made by stapling or gluing construction paper over notebook paper and illustrating the pages with crayons and marker.

• Student Goal-Setting with Digital Vision Boards – Teacher Reboot Camp

  A new year is around the corner, which is a great time to encourage students to create a vision board where they visualize their personal, academic and professional goals.

• Express Learning with Animated Character Videos! – Teacher Reboot Camp

  A fun way and safe way for students to share their knowledge is through animated character videos. The web tools below will get your students started with creating these videos. Students will be able to choose characters and in some cases create the…

• Lifelong Learning with Social Bookmarking Tools and Apps – Teacher Reboot Camp

  One way to inspire students to be lifelong learners is to teach them how to collect, categorize, curate, and tag resources with a social bookmarking tool or app. I have listed some of my favorites for students and teachers below. Social bookmarking …

• Comic Creation Tools to Engage Learners – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Students of all ages enjoy learning with comics and creating comics. When students create comics they use props, scenery, dialogue, text, and characters to visualize and contextualize vocabulary and knowledge.

• Formative Assessment Tools and Apps – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Ongoing assessment is necessary for student success. These assessments provide data on our learners’ progress and knowledge of the content.

• Recommended Hashtags to Discover Top Edtech Tools and Apps – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Many people ask me how I keep up with the latest technology trends and find so many free resources to share on Twitter (@ShellTerrell) and on this blog.

• The Thinking and Creativity That Goes Into Game Design – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Students can design a game in any subject to assess their peers. When students design games they use a lot of creativity and critical thinking skills. Students must imagine and design worlds, characters, levels, sound effects, game elements, and mor…

• Motivate Students with Digital Badges – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Motivate students with digital badges. The Mac Arthur Foundation defines a digital badge as “an assessment and credentialing mechanism that is housed and managed online. Badges are designed to make visible and validate learning in both formal and in…

• Document Learning in a Digital Portfolio – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Digital portfolios are powerful learning tools for students of all ages. A digital portfolio allows students to upload and keep a record of work over time and share this work with family members and school staff regularly.

• Missions and Goals to Inspire Teachers and Students! #EveryChildEveryDay Chat Resources – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Today I was the guest author for the Foundations, Inc. (@Foundations_Inc) #EveryChildEveryDay Twitter chat. We shared ways to inspire teachers and students to set and achieve goals and missions. I believe growth in steps is the key to personal, spir…

• Video Project Ideas, Resources, and Tools – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Students of all ages enjoy producing their own videos. Each year I meet younger and younger learners who have their own YouTube Channels. Not surprisingly, Forbes reported that the highest paid YouTube star of 2018 was 7 year-old Ryan of the Ryan To…

• Help Students Soar! Social and Emotional Learning Resources – Teacher Reboot Camp

  We want to inspire our students to transform the world with their ideas, creativity, and knowledge. Innovation is a difficult journey. The greatest inventions that transformed the world took thousands of attempts and years of frustration and problem…

• Find the Right Tools for Student Projects – Teacher Reboot Camp

  The majority of our students use technology daily to learn and share their voice, creativity, ideas, and passion with the world! When we integrate technology effectively into the curriculum students discover how to use technology to problem solve, c…

• Digital Learning Theories and Frameworks For Future Ready Classrooms – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Technology impacts every aspect of our students’ lives and will continue to play an important role in their lives. Teachers who integrate technology effectively help their students realize the potential we have to transform the world with our use of…

• Ways to Learn with Technology – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Technology surrounds our students and gives them a platform to share with a global audience. Technology is how our students learn, communicate, entertain themselves, collaborate, and seek advice.

• Inspiring Ideas and Resources from the #STEM4INNOVATION Conference – Teacher Reboot Camp

  “People can’t only design with their heads. They have to do it with their hands, too.” – Dr. Karan Watson, STEM 4 Innovation Keynote Speaker Recently, I attended the incredible STEM 4 Innovation Conference at Texas A&M University.

• How to Inspire the Next World Changers – Teacher Reboot Camp

  “Every child deserves a champion – an adult who will never give up on them, who understands the power of connection and insists that they become the best that they can possibly be.

• Paper vs. Screens by Christine McDonnell, CEO at Codelicious – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Traditional coding activities dictate that students sit in front of laptops or tablets, working to develop a program or a game. This approach, however, does not resonate with all types of students and learners. Luckily, there are many different ways…

• How Do We Encourage More Young Women to Innovate and Transform the World – Teacher Reboot Camp

  I am the mother of a 3 year-old girl. Each day I think of ways to help her develop into an intelligent, independent, unapologetic, brave, creative, compassionate, and resilient human being.

• How to Quickly Translate Your Live Session in Multiple Languages and Other Google Meet Must-Haves! – Teacher Reboot Camp

  If you are using Google Meet for connecting with students then the links below will help you make this a more accessible and engaging experience. Please note that some of these tips and tricks work for GSuite Edu accounts.

• Design Amazing Online Learning Experiences Quickly with These Choice Menu Templates – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Design is especially important in online learning and one key to student motivation and engagement. Designing an engaging online experience doesn’t have to take a lot of time.

• Make a Deeper Connection with Virtual Student Check-ins! – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Connection is a key factor to student success in an online environment. Do your students feel connected to you, the instructor, the learning material, and their peers? Connection in a physical classroom is facilitated by real-time face-to-face inter…

• Teacher Zen During Distance Learning – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Distance learning has transformed the routines and lives of all stakeholders- students, families, and educators. How do we reduce the stress and find some peace and balance? I recently presented for the Minnesota Distance Learning Summit, Teacher Ze…

• Remove Background from Image – remove.bg

  Remove Image Background 100% Automatically and Free No image? Try one of these: or try one of these By uploading an image or URL you agree to our Terms of Service. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Servic…

• Teach with Magic – Time Warp Games

  Time Warps are point and click adventure games where students make choices leading to branching paths. They require lots of reading but students can’t get enough!

• Learning Might be Overrated – Ideas and Thoughts

  The past 6 weeks have initiated a great deal of conversation about learning, schools and education. If we were to dive in, those three things are somewhat separate and unique. Learning is generally agreed upon as the seminal idea.

• Ways To Use Pokemon Go In The Classroom | Teaching Ideas

• How Washington school districts are succeeding and struggling since coronavirus shut them down | The Seattle Times

• Final Course Evaluation with Google Forms – Mari Venturino

  One thing I really love about my classroom is that feedback is a two-way street. I try to collect formal and informal feedback from my students as often as I give them feedback. Informal feedback may be an exit ticket question or walking around and …

• The 12 Indicators: #1 – Empower Students to Pursue Their Passions

• Schools Are Opening Worldwide, Providing a Model for the U.S. | Edutopia

• Fit You Seek. Run You Must. 5K/10K Virtual Challenge.

  Celebrate with fans around the galaxy, by accepting the Fit You Seek. Run You Must.

• Bigfoot…The Social Distancing Champion’s Running Challenge

  We all know that Bigfoot is the social distancing champion. Accept his virtual challenge and get awesome commemorative gear mailed to your door. Your participation will help support our US food bank partners and your sanity. Here is how it works… …

• Deepfakes Are Going To Wreak Havoc On Society. We Are Not Prepared.

  Last month during ESPN’s hit documentary series The Last Dance, State Farm debuted a TV commercial that has become one of the most widely discussed ads in recent memory. It appeared to show footage from 1998 of an ESPN analyst making shockingly accu…

• breakout-edu-lost-in-time

  Download the Minecraft world attached to this lesson. After logging in to the game, do the following 4. The world will show up in your list in Minecraft Education Edition – Click on it to launch the world.

• blood-cycle-escape-room-2

  Print Lesson Rework Lesson Guiding Ideas • Students will be working in groups of five. • The task is to get out of the escape room. Student Activities • The only way to open the door is to place blocks in the right order – as the blood cycle.

• escape-the-pyramid

  The students can play in groups of three-four members in the same world or individually. Inside the world there is no written instructions. As a teacher you can place a NPC or a board to introduce the adventure to the students.

• New Video: “What Other Countries Can Teach U.S. Schools About Reopening” | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  NickyPe / Pixabay Here’s a new Newsy video I’m adding to THE BEST POSTS PREDICTING WHAT SCHOOLS WILL LOOK LIKE IN THE FALL:

• End of the Year Exit Ticket: Evaluating Online Learning |

  As the year comes to a close, I encourage teachers to take a moment and collect feedback from students about their experiences learning online in the last few months. We do not know what fall 2020 will look like–in person, online, or a combination o…

• 10 easy ways to clean up your Google Classroom – Ditch That Textbook

  Consider creating some folders outside of the classroom folder to move some files over that you want to keep and find easily. However, don’t get “delete happy” and be sure to follow #4 before you begin moving and reorganizing your Google Drive.

• My Five Tech Tools with the Capacity to Make a Huge Difference

• Privacy Considerations Checklist – EdTech Guidance

• Escape Room Puzzle Ideas for the Science Classroom | Kesler Science

• Free Technology for Teachers: Five Resources for Teaching and Learning About Copyright

  In this week’s Practical Ed Tech Tip of the Week newsletter I shared a short guide to finding and using media for use in classroom projects like videos, slideshows, and podcasts.

• Great Books of 2020…So Far – Pernille Ripp

  It continues to amaze me how many fantastic books are accessible to us as readers. 2020 started off strong and continued to amaze as more books made their way into my hands.

• Amid #Covid: Gift to her peers from a formerly depressed teen author – NetFamilyNews.org

  I can’t let Mental Health Month go by without a blog post on the subject, especially this year. So this one’s not about tech, media or the Internet. It’s about – and by – 19-year-old Ruby Walker, author of Advice I Ignored: Stories and Wisdom from a…

• What is Unschooling?

• A Quick Introduction to Homeschooling

• Geek Links: Young Inventor Challenge – GeekDad

  Geek Links are cool stories that we’ve found elsewhere on the internet that we think our readers will love too.

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Timestamp Your YouTube Videos

  When you’re publishing videos that are longer than five or six minutes on your YouTube channel it can be helpful to viewers to add some timestamps to the video’s description. Including timestamps in the description lets your viewers click to jump to…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Updated – How to Use EDpuzzle to Create Video Lessons

  In my previous post I wrote about and included a video about adding timestamps to longer videos that you post on your YouTube channel. Rather than just talk about it, I took my own advice and added timestamps to one of my longest and most popular vi…

• Reopening School: What It Might Look Like | Cult of Pedagogy

  I don’t need to give you much background here: As you all know, schools have been closed worldwide in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, and in the same way that cities are at various stages of reopening businesses, schools are doing the same thing,…

• Cliff Mass Weather Blog: What is the streamflow outlook for this summer?

  Announcement: I will be doing a short weather forecast followed by live answers to your questions on Tuesday and Friday at noon using Facebook Live.

• The Next Ten Days Are Big Ones For The Possibility Of Re-Opening Schools In The Fall | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  This week is a big one when it comes to the possible re-opening of schools in the fall. On Wednesday, the Los Angeles County Office of Education will unveil its “framework” for school re-opening.

• Your food choices affect Earth’s climate | Science News for Students

• What are the benefits of distance learning?

  The rise of technology in today’s schools has brought new opportunities for both teaching and learning. Most modern classrooms have long had access to computer labs that have allowed students to learn essential digital literacy skills in preparation…

• A Principal’s Reflections: Work Smarter, Not Harder

  I have a secret to share. In my humble opinion, I am not very smart. While others might disagree, such as my mom, I pride myself on being extremely resourceful. However, this was not always my strength.

• SlidesMania | Free Google Slides themes and PowerPoint templates.

  Free PowerPoint Templates and Google Slides Themes This website uses cookies to improve your experience. If you continue surfing, we will assume you are ok with it. You can read more here.

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

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

Here are more great blog posts from last week:

• Count Up Checkboxes in Google Sheets – Teacher Tech

  My favorite part of Google Sheets is inserting checkboxes! WICKED USEFUL FOR TEACHERS! My daughter is helping me with my YouTube thumbnails (check out her handiwork and subscribe to my channel

• Control Alt Achieve: How Your Students can use Google Drawings to Create Greeting Cards

  Google Apps has loads of awesome tools, but one thing that often gets mentioned as missing is a desktop publishing app. If you want to create brochures, newsletters, flyers, greeting cards, and such, there really isn’t a dedicated desktop publishing…

• Roll Up Whiteboard with Marker | Whitey Board Company – Writeyboard

  repositionable whiteboard + marker

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Search for Matching & Similar Documents Submitted in Google Classroom

  Earlier this week a reader asked me if there was a way to quickly scan across all of the documents his students submit in Google Classroom to check for elements of copying between students.

• How To Make Your Online Lessons Irresistible To Students – Smart Classroom Management

  Although the school year is quickly coming to a close, chances are that Zoom and other live video platforms will continue to play a role next school year. This isn’t good news.

• THE CIRCLE

  ORDER OF RANKS

• Cliff Mass Weather Blog: What is the difference between partly sunny and partly cloudy?

  Twice today I was asked about the difference between partly cloudy and partly sunny. And that inquiry is one of the most frequent I get, for reasons I do not understand. OK…let’s settle this for once and for all.

• Google Arts and Culture needs to be in your teacher tool belt | History Tech

  I’ve seen it so many times. And you probably do it every day, without even realizing it.

• Lisa Nielsen: The Innovative Educator: Foster Connection and Interaction in Webinars

  Some new to conducting online webinars may feel a void in this environment. Unlike teaching face-to-face you can’t read the room the same way. It may be difficult to pick up on non-verbal cues. You can’t walk over to someone and look over their shou…

• The #1 Most Requested Desmos Feature Right Now, and What We Could Do Instead – dy/dan

  When schools started closing months ago, we heard two loud requests from teachers in our community. They wanted: Those sounded like unambiguously good ideas, whether schools were closed or not. Good pedagogy. Good technology. Good math. We made both.

• Live from NCCE Archive: “Google Tour Creator: Embed VR Into YOUR Lessons!” – NCCE’s Tech Savvy Teacher Blog

  Thanks to all that attended Live from NCCE on Thursday, May 14, 2020, on “Google Tour Creator: Embed VR Into YOUR Lessons!” with special guest Paul Zimmerman! Below is an archive of that live event.

• Earth’s Ever-Changing Surface | Lesson Plan | PBS LearningMedia

• Activities to keep preschoolers learning during a pandemic – CNN

  Three weeks into our extended coronavirus spring break at home, my husband wanted to discuss what we should be teaching our 4-year-old son. Masada Siegel is journalist and a crisis communications consultant.

• Home | The Ron Clark Academy

• MTG Cardsmith: A Magic: The Gathering Custom Card Maker

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Quickly Create a Slideshow With Google Photos and Slides

  Earlier this week someone sent me a question on Twitter seeking information about an add-on that lets you import batches of photos into Google Slides and have those photos automatically placed onto individual slides. The add-on that I’ve used for th…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Tactiq – Record the Captions in Google Meet

  Tactiq is a new Google Chrome extension that lets you record the captions generated by the automatic captioning tool in Google Meet. You can use it to record and save all captions or select just some captions to save.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Pixabay Offers Free Music to Use and Reuse

  Pixabay is one of the resources that I frequently include in my recommendations for sources of images and video clips to use in slideshow and video projects. This morning I got a notice from Pixabay informing me of Pixabay’s audio collection.

• literacyworldwide.org

• Creating a BITMOJI Class Photo by Greers Fantastic Fourth | TpT

  I created this fun class picture when I heard we wouldn’t be coming together as a class anymore. I asked all parents to create and send me their students BITMOJI and then created this class picture.

• Kids Are So Over Zoom. Here’s What To Do About It. | HuffPost Life

  In the past month, my 5-year-old has gone from being excited about video calls for school and virtual “play dates” to basically hating it all. Sometimes he’s into it — like yesterday, when he was totally engrossed in a 30-minute math class with his …

• Free Technology for Teachers: Move Items from One Google Account to Another

  It’s that time of year again when some teachers will be leaving one school district for another. With that move comes the need to move your digital resources as well as your physical resources.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Certify’em Adds Two Helpful Features for Sending Certificates When Students Complete Google Forms Quizzes

  Certify’em is a Google Forms add-on that I’ve been using and recommending for a few years. Certify’em makes it easy to automatically send certificates to students when they get a minimum score on a quiz conducted with Google Forms.

• Lisa Nielsen: The Innovative Educator: Virtual Bitmoji Classroom Help

  Have you created your Bitmoji classroom yet? If you have not and you want to, then you’re in the right place. Here you’ll find an article and two videos that outline the process. I’ll also share how you can check out Bitmoji classrooms on social med…

• Awesome teacher summer: PD bingo choice board – Ditch That Textbook

  Summer is a great time to learn what YOU want to learn. This PD bingo choice board gives you LOTS of options! ​Summer is a time for rejuvenation and relaxation. It’s a time to focus on our lives outside of education and recharge.

• Kathy Schrock’s Kaffeeklatsch: Differentiation strategies to support learners

  This article originally appeared in the Discovery Education blog “Kathy Schrock’s Katch of the Month” in May 2018 and is re-posted here with permission. _______________________ Differentiation of instruction for all students in your classroom is som…

• Kathy Schrock’s Kaffeeklatsch: Creating with Discovery Education

  For the past few years, I have focused my energies on supporting teachers who are creating assessments, both formative and summative, which target student’s higher order thinking skills.

• Kathy Schrock’s Kaffeeklatsch: Thinking processes and STEM

  The hundreds of quality STEM-related videos and materials in the Discovery Education online collection make it easy to find content to use for your lessons and units. However, take time for students to develop a solid thinking process before startin…

• Technology Tidbits: Thoughts of a Cyber Hero: Litehouse

  Litehouse is an innovative new site for creating stunningly beautiful digital stories. Litehouse incorporates a easy-to-use story editor that lets users add: text, audio, images, maps, are more to create a dynamic story.

• At age 6, he and his classmates fled Mount St. Helens. 40 years later this reporter recalls that day | NW News Network

• Naraview

  Naraview

• Free Technology for Teachers: Naraview – A Good Way to Challenge Students to Make Connections Between Topics

  In last week’s episode of Two Ed Tech Guys Take Questions and Share Cool Stuff Rushton shared a neat site called Naraview. Those who stayed on for the “overtime” of the webinar got a detailed overview of the service from one of its designers.

• Blogging About The Web 2.0 Connected Classroom: 5 End of the Year #RemoteLearning Celebration Ideas

  This school year has been anything but normal. Many educators have settled into a grove of creating the best learning experiences they can for their students while still providing some meaning during distance learning.

• Technology Tidbits: Thoughts of a Cyber Hero: Circly

  *Circly’s collaboration features make it an ideal tool for “remote learning” while schools are closed down due to the virus. Students can even use it to do group projects from home.

• End of the Year Project: What Are YOU Curious About? |

  The last couple of months have been exhausting on a lot of levels as teachers and students shift to online learning. I would venture to guess that everyone is ready for a much-deserved summer break.

• Seven Teacher-Tested Ways to Find Renewal During Distance Learning – John Spencer

  Last week, I created the following goofy video as a reminder about the differences between teaching in-person and teaching from home: While this video is a little goofy, it points to a reality that teaching from home is vastly different from teachin…

• 40 years later, Mt. St. Helens looms as a marvel and threat – Los Angeles Times

  By Seattle Bureau Chief TOUTLE, Wash. — On the morning of May 18, 1980, an earthquake shook Mt. St. Helens and the mountain’s north face collapsed in one of the largest debris avalanches ever recorded.

• Ask an Astronomer — on Video

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Convert a PDF Into a Google Document

  On Friday during Two Ed Tech Guys Take Questions and Share Cool Stuff someone asked if there is a tool that I would recommend for converting a PDF into a Google Doc. Fortunately, you can do that without having to use any third-party tools.

• Lisa Nielsen: The Innovative Educator: Which Video Conferencing Platform is Right for Your School?

  · 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…

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Use Kahoot in Google Classroom

  This is the time of year when many of us are looking for fun ways to conduct end-of-year review sessions with our students. Playing Kahoot quiz games is one of the most popular means of doing that.

• A Principal’s Reflections: 8 Key Focus Areas for Developing a Re-Entry Plan

  The COVID19 pandemic has radically disrupted both society and education as we know it. The chances of many things going back to the way they were are slim. I can say with confidence that a mentality of TTWWADI (that’s the way we’ve always done it) w…

• What if students had a choice in their daily class schedule? – Practice What You Teach

  Typically, in May, as the current school year winds down, I start to make plans for the following year.

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:

• Use the SAME Google Form to Poll – Teacher Tech

  During a live session with students there are several options for how you poll students. A quick and dirty is to reuse the same Google Form repeatedly. After submitting the Form there is a link that says “Submit another response.

• Edutopia

  This flexibility to make their own hours is also giving students a chance to exercise, take breaks, or even be bored, all of which research shows is beneficial.

• Lisa Nielsen: The Innovative Educator: An Innovative Vision for the Future of Schools

  The Center for Disease Control (CDC) guidance on reopening of schools will require innovative thinking to re-imagine how schools may open in the upcoming school year and beyond. The key will be agility and flexibility. That’s because we’ve learned t…

• How To Increase Student Online Participation By 50 Percent – Smart Classroom Management

  It’s been a tough go, this online learning. Many students are checked out.

• 118 Best Digital Tools for Educators images in 2020 | Educational technology, Education, Media literacy

• Game-Based Learning Design Competition – Legends of Learning

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Share Audio and Video in Google Classroom Without YouTube or SoundCloud

  Earlier this week I had a reader ask me for advice on sharing videos in Google Classroom with her students without having to use YouTube. My suggestion was to simply upload the videos to Google Classroom as either announcements or as assignments.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Ten Ways to Use Wakelet

  One of the reasons that Wakelet has become popular in schools in the last couple of years is that it can be used for a wide range of activities. It’s also popular because it can be used in a wide range of grade levels and subject areas.

• Snowman Army as Live Streamed on MakeCode Mixer channel | We Code MakeCode

  This video was live streamed on Wednesday, April 29, 2020 on MakeCode’s Mixer channel https://ift.tt/3cCJbFl. We will live stream a MakeCode show every Wednesday at noon Pacific for the next several Wednesdays. Our shows include MakeCode for Minecra…

• https://equitymaps.com

• Webjets.io – The new way to collect, organize and share anything

• PALMS Backchannel Chat | The new alternative to Todaysmeet

• 2 new papers spell a turning point for digital safety & citizenship: Part 2 – NetFamilyNews.org

  The timing struck me. Though it seems all of life is at an inflection point now, in the middle of a pandemic, two new papers that represent a pivotal moment for digital safety and citizenship education are published almost at the same time.

• How to Make a Movie – Learn about film

• How To Make A Slideshow Video With Photos And Music – The Edublogger

  Slideshow style videos can be a powerful way to bring together the best of your school experiences and share with others. Millions of school and college students will be graduating in the coming months. Given the current pandemic, many graduation ce…

• How You Can Use E-Sports and Gaming to Engage Students in Campus Life | Presence

• How Esports Can Support Equity • Teched Up Teacher

• Five Quick Distance Learning Activities For Teachers In A Pinch • Teched Up Teacher

• How Do I Learn Best – Setting Students Up For Learning Success Beyond Our Classroom – Pernille Ripp

  I never planned on teaching through a global pandemic. I doubt anyone did.

• How Esports Can Support Equity • Teched Up Teacher

  This was an article I originally wrote for Tech & Learning magazine. They’re a great resource for teachers looking to keep up on the latest edtech and ideas. Check them out!

• Free Technology for Teachers: An Important Setting for Using Audio and Video in Google Slides

  Last fall Google finally added an option to insert audio files into Google Slides without the need for any third-party add-ons. While it wasn’t as good as some people hoped it would be, it was still great news for Google Slides users. There are some…

• Video: “What the 1918 flu pandemic can teach us” | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  rottonara / Pixabay I’m adding this video to A BEGINNING LIST OF THE BEST RESOURCES FOR LEARNING ABOUT THE CORONAVIRUS:

• The Risks – Know Them – Avoid Them

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Add Background Music to Screencastify Videos

  Last week I published an article about how to extract the audio from your videos. A related question that I got from a reader was about how to add background music to Screencastify videos.

• Free Technology for Teachers: The Geometry of Castles – A Math Lesson in Google Earth

  In the web browser version of Google Earth there is a section called Voyager. Within the Voyager section you’ll find lots of pre-made tours, quizzes, and activities. One of those activities is called The Geometry of Castles.

• 30+ FREE PowerPoint education templates + how to make them

  Templates are productivity boosters. They can help us get more done in less time. They’re also great lesson design frameworks. They help us craft a path for students to take their thinking — or for them to guide their creating.

• The Building Blocks of an Online Lesson |

  Even though teaching online may feel like a different animal than teaching face-to-face, there are many similarities in terms of the building blocks of a lesson. The tools teachers use to engage students online are indeed different.

• Super Basic: Create a Minecraft Lesson – Teacher Tech

  Engagement matters for making a lesson memorable. While nothing is engaging for 100% of students, we do know that Minecraft is very engaging for many students. Heck, I personally spend hours playing Minecraft and lose all track of time.

• Learning at Home with Minecraft

• why-grading-policies-for-equity-matter-more-than-ever

  Every other day, a McKinney-Vento program coordinator with San Leandro Unified School District travels to the marina on the district’s eastern boundary. There, she drops off meals, hygiene kits and school supplies to families who are sheltering in t…

• “Science Instruction in the Age of the Coronavirus” | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  Science Instruction in the Age of the Coronavirus is the headline of my latest Education Week Teacher column. Four science educators share their experiences adapting to online instruction, including through collaborative learning and the use of onli…

• Vocabulary Connections with Padlet – Technology Pursuit

  When learning new vocabulary, it’s important for students to link that vocabulary to something that they already know. That’s why the ubiquitous Frayer Model includes a square for students to provide or draw examples.

• Classroom Games and Tech – Ed-Tech to Engage and Inspire: Game Designer Interview and Original Digital Games Activity

  This is part of a series of posts about the Game Design Club I am running for middle schoolers while school is closed.

• Flash Feedback: How to Provide More Meaningful Feedback in Less Time | Cult of Pedagogy

  This post contains Amazon Affiliate links. When you make a purchase through these links, Cult of Pedagogy gets a small percentage of the sale at no extra cost to you. My study of feedback began in earnest on a sunny afternoon during my third year of…

• Accountability to What’s Important in Education – George Couros

  In this post, I was able to share some thoughts on a tweet by Weston Kieschnickin the post below.  You can also check the expanded ideas on my podcast, as well as YouTube. Later this week, I will post a conversation I had with Weston on this topic a…

• Just how contagious is COVID-19? This chart puts it in perspective. | Popular Science

  Demystifying the epidemiology terms that help us understand new diseases like COVID-19.

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

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

Check out these amazing posts from last week:

• 7 Key Characteristics Of Better Learning Feedback

  On May 26, 2015, Grant Wiggins passed away. Grant was tremendously influential on TeachThought’s approach to education, and we were lucky enough for him to contribute his content to our site. Occasionally, we are going to go back and re-share his mo…

• Grace is Greater Than Grades | Shake Up Learning

  In the midst of the coronavirus chaos, the anxiety, the fears, and the extra time at home, I would like to come back to an idea that Jennifer Pearson shared on a special BONUS episode of the Shake Up Learning Show–grace.

• 4 Must-Have Google Classroom Skills for Teachers | Shake Up Learning

  Google Classroom is quite a robust platform for teachers and students to communicate, collaborate, and manage assignments digitally. Google is continually updating and giving us new features that make it an even more powerful tool.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Ten Ideas for Building Virtual Tours With Google’s Tour Creator

  Google’s VR Tour Creator makes it possible for anyone who has a Google account and a computer to create their own virtual reality tours to view and share in Google Expeditions.

• How To Avoid Parent Complaints About Online Learning – Smart Classroom Management

  Online learning increases the possibility of receiving complaints from parents—because they’re now able to see everything their child sees. They can judge and dissect every lesson and assignment as it’s given.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Three Ways to Convert Video into Audio

  Earlier this week I had a colleague ask me how she could extract the audio from a video that she had made. Some video editing tools, including iMovie and WeVideo, have an option to export just the audio from your video projects.

• Control Alt Achieve: You can take it with you! Transfer your Gmail and Drive with Google Takeout for Schools

  Change is a part of life: Maybe you are a high school senior or a college student and you are graduating. Or perhaps you are a student who is moving to a new school. You might be a teacher who is taking a job at a new school district.

• Climate Science Assessment Tasks | Science for All

  The Phenomenal Assessment site features three assessment tasks created for the Climate Science Proviso which has provided climate science education funding in Washington state. You will find an elementary task, a middle school task and a high school…

• Young artists show creativity in a plea to reduce harmful trash in the ocean | Puget Sound Institute

  Student artists from across the country are calling attention to the hazards of human trash that washes into the ocean, killing sea creatures large and small.

• Control Alt Achieve: Remote Learning & Pear Deck Webinar

  For those not familiar, Pear Deck is an awesome add-on for Google Slides that allows you to add interactive elements to your slideshows.When you run the slideshow through the Pear Deck add-on the students can join the presentation with a code and fo…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Use Whiteboards in Google Meet Without Screensharing

  On Monday I published a blog post about a new online whiteboard tool called Whiteboard Fi.

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Blur Faces and Objects in Your Videos

  One of the topics that I frequently receive questions about is privacy when posting videos online. One option is to post your videos as unlisted or private videos on YouTube or Vimeo. Another option is to blur faces and objects in your videos.

• How to Teach Social-Emotional Learning When Students Aren’t in School – Education Week

  Tens of millions of students are dealing with massive upheaval to their educations and daily lives with their schools shuttered indefinitely to thwart the spread of the coronavirus.

• 7 Important Questions Before Implementing Digital Portfolios – George Couros

  Digital portfolios have been something that I have been work on for over ten years, and I am very passionate about not only the product it can create but, more importantly, the process. Having a space to share my learning and reflections has been po…

• 4 Ways to Craft Choice Menus in Distance Learning Classes – John Spencer

  I have three kids ranging from older elementary to high school. Each one of them is handling distance learning differently. My daughter, who is also the youngest, initially felt overwhelmed at the list of assignments that popped up each Monday and t…

• Learning math through story: Examples from one teacher’s classroom – Ditch That Textbook

  ​This post is written by Mandi Tolen a math teacher from Missouri. You can connect with her on Twitter @MandiTolenEDU and check out her blog infinitelyteaching.

• Storytelling: Bringing the power of stories to your teaching – Ditch That Textbook

  Great stories have a natural structure and flow. There are several great frameworks we can use when we teach — and when students create with their learning. The three-act structure is a common story arc used in books, theater, TV and even jokes.

• Climate Clock | Human Impact Lab

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Quickly Map and Connect Spreadsheet Data

  Earlier today a reader emailed me with a great question about Google Maps. She wanted to map a set of addresses and then quickly determine the shortest route between all of those places.

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Create Complete Sentence Requirements in Google Forms

  This afternoon I held an informal webinar for a small group of people who were interested in learning some G Suite tips and tricks. Response validation in Google Forms was one of the things that I showed toward the end of that webinar.

• Climate Clock | Science for All

  I’m assuming you are coming to grips with a global pandemic and the introduction of murder hornets. So there is no better time to add on by sharing the Climate Clock. This site features a real-time clock that displays the total global warming to dat…

• Online PD: How to Support Home-Based Science Learning | Science for All

  The STEM Teaching Tools team/site recently hosted a Zoom professional development session titled- ClimeTime Professional Learning Session: How to Support Home-Based Science Learning During School Closures…it’s a catchy title to be sure.

• It’s Time For Mastery Learning • Teched Up Teacher

  Once upon a time, I was terrified that I wouldn’t pass my drivers test. I wasn’t good at parallel parking to begin with, but as I waited for my instructor to pick me up I realized that I had been practicing on the wrong side of the road.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Loom – Create Screencasts on Your iPad

  Loom is a good screencasting that I’ve written about a handful of times over the last couple of years. Amongst it’s many features, Loom offers a Chrome extension that makes it easy to respond to an email with a video.

• Control Alt Achieve: Adding Audio to Pear Deck Google Slides Activities

  Also, if you would like to learn more, I am excited to be offering a free 1-hour webinar on “Remote Learning and Pear Deck” where I will go over the fundamentals of Pear Deck for asynchronous learning, share best practices, highlight favorite featur…

• Technology Tidbits: Thoughts of a Cyber Hero: DOGOnews

  DOGOnews is an excellent site for creating Reading assignments for grades K-8 that can then be integrated into Google Classroom. This is done through 1000s of curated educated articles in a wide variety of subjects (i.e. Science, History, Current Ev…

• 7 Strategies Designed to Increase Student Engagement in Synchronous Online Discussions Using Video Conferencing |

  One of the primary roles that a teacher plays in an online class is the facilitation of learning. Facilitation is the teacher’s ability to clearly communicate learning objectives and support learners as they make progress toward those objectives.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Free Webinar – A Framework for Using Educational Technology

  Whenever I’m a guest on a podcast I always asked some variation on the question, “how do you decide what to write about?” The answer is simple, I try to look at new technology through the framework of discovery, discussion, and demonstration.

• seven-distance-learning-priorities-to-consider-before-reopening-schools

  When U.S. schools initially closed in March, distance learning emerged as a way to keep kids learning. Classroom teachers scrambled to learn how to put lessons online and tens of thousands of Chromebooks and other devices were distributed in a matte…

• Free Wordle (Word Cloud) Generators – Featuring A New Tool

• Students as Content Creators in Minecraft | AltspaceVR

  PRESENTATION: Minecraft has become an amazing tool for use in education. It allows us to leverage student expertise while meeting our learning outcomes.

• The Power of Class Rituals | Mike Kaechele

  The Covid 19 pandemic has turned the world upside down, changing life as we know in ways never dreamed possible. The only comparison that I have is dystopian or disaster movies. In all of the craziness that is now life, we need to find patterns to s…

• A Principal’s Reflections: Protecting Kids During and After Remote Learning

  With more and more schools either extending school closures or completely shutting down for the remainder of the academic year, a focus on remote learning will continue into the foreseeable future.

• Lisa Nielsen: The Innovative Educator: Reasonable strategies for the future of schooling in unreasonable times

  The Center for Disease Control (CDC) put out hard to swallow guidance about the reopening of schools. Unless there are some big changes in our educational system, we will not be able to incorporate this guidance into our schools.

• Traits of a Successful Online Teacher |

  Last week, I had the good fortune of stumbling onto John Savery’s article titled “BE VOCAL: Characteristics of Successful Online Instructors” in which he talks about the unique challenges facing teachers who are working with students in the online e…

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

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

You have got to see the great blog posts shared here:

• Free Technology for Teachers: Three Tools for Collecting Stories from Students and Parents

  Earlier this week I hosted a webinar about using online tools to build communities. One of the topics within that webinar was collecting and publishing stories from students and their parents. To that end, there were three tools that I recommended. …

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Restore Files in Google Drive

  Twice this afternoon I had people ask me about restoring files that were deleted from either Google Classroom or from Google Drive. If you’ve accidentally deleted a file or folder in your Google Drive, there is a good chance that you can get it back.

• Alliance for Climate Education on Instagram: “Meet Anisa, an ACE Fellow and climate organizer with @earth_uprising in Tampa, Florida. Anisa believes talking about #climatechange with…”

• Minecraft COVID-19 Design Challenges – NASEF | High School Esports Clubs

• Free Technology for Teachers: 5 Easy Ways to Improve Your Videos

  Many of us are making more videos than ever before as a way to deliver instruction and or to simply keep our students updated about school. With time and practice you might become adept at using the editing functions in your favorite video software.

• Fortnite Lessons: V-Bucks and Weaponized Social Fun – Classroom Powerups

  My wife and I finally broke down allowed my sons to download and play Fortnite. The major reason for this was that online gaming seemed to be a great way for our two older boys (10 and 7) to play with their friends. Boy has this been true.

• Differentiation for Parents | Stories From School

  I remember the days when class was still held in a building, and my biggest concern was figuring out how to differentiate my math lesson to meet the needs of my students.  However, in our new reality of distance learning, I am learning to differenti…

• Software Library: MS-DOS Games : Free Software : Free Download, Borrow and Streaming : Internet Archive

• Kerbal Space Program – Create and Manage Your Own Space Program

• World Climate Simulation – Climate Interactive

• Educators | Quandary

• Free Resources for COVID-19 Remote Learning Support – TeacherVision

  We’re writing to you knowing that all of our communities and schools are being impacted, one way or the other, by COVID-19. This is an unprecedented challenge with more questions than answers.

• PBL for Remote Learning Overview | PBLWorks

  How can we provide students with the safety net that school offers, while also using this opportunity to change the way we think about school?  We’re exploring the possibilities.

• Google Classroom Rubric Click the Title – Teacher Tech

  I want LESS mouse clicks and LESS mouse dragging. I was feeling really annoyed that to read the rubric description I made for a category I had to click all the way over to the right. But there is a shortcut! Under the rubric the category titles are …

• Screen time use sparks discussion over how much is too much

  Students love their screen time, especially those who have a passion for video games. Days can quickly blur into nights and vice-versa when children or teens get wrapped up in a Minecraft build, try to destroy a League of Legends nexus, or just repl…

• Google Classroom: Make Your OWN Grades – Teacher Tech

  Which Gradebook Defines Your Classroom? I have been loathing this update since the first day that Google Classroom came out. The gradebook. Now it is here and it is available to everyone and it is terrible.

• Control Alt Achieve: Annotate PDF’s Together in Google Meet with Kami

  When in a Google Meet video conference with a student, a colleague, or any other participant, sometimes you may need to work on a PDF together.

• Video: How to Run Properly — The Adventure Blog

  If you’re looking to improve your fitness and add exercise to your routine, taking up running is one of the best options. It is easy to get started, it burns a lot of a calories, and it is great for the heart and lungs.

• The Balance: Distance Learning–Mini-episode #2 |

  The Balance is now available on Spotify! It has been six weeks since California ordered residents to shelter in place. I have not left my home for anything other than the occasional trip to the grocery store.

• How To Reopen Closed Schools Amid Coronavirus : NPR

  Three-quarters of U.S. states have now officially closed their schools for the rest of the academic year. While remote learning continues, summer is a question mark, and attention is already starting to turn to next fall.

• The Importance and Impact of Greetings in Virtual Hallways – George Couros

  The statement above from the Edutopia video on “Making Connections with Greetings at the Door” is one that truly resonated. How powerful is that statement?

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Create a Green Screen Video Without a Green Screen

  If you have ever wanted to make a green video but didn’t have access to iMovie and couldn’t make the investment in other video editing software, this new video is for you. In the following video I demonstrate how you can use Zoom and Adobe Spark tog…

• Free Technology for Teachers: National Parks Games and Challenges – Try Virtual National Parks Bingo

  I love the National Parks service that we have here in the U.S. One of the things I’m looking forward to doing with my kids when they’re a little older is to help them explore some of the places in National Parks and National Forests that I’ve enjoy…

• Free Technology for Teachers: USGS Find a Feature Challenges – Outdoor Learning Opportunities

  Last week I wrote about the Learning from Home resources available from the USGS. While it’s not specifically a part of the Learning from Home resources, USGS offers another selection of activities that can be used for “at home” learning. Those acti…

• Four New Online Learning Games | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  The Webby Awards just announced their nominees for this year. Passport To Mars is from Scholastic, and puts you in the position of being an astronaut traveling to….Mars.

• Classroom Games and Tech – Ed-Tech to Engage and Inspire: How to be a game designer – Tip #1

  I recently wrote about the virtual game design club I’m running for students in grades 5 – 8. I’ll regularly post my resources so you can do the same or a similar program with your students. This week I posted the following video to teach them a goo…

• Empowering Students in Distance Learning Environments – John Spencer

  Student engagement can be a real challenge in this sudden shift toward distance learning. But one way to improve engagement is by empowering students. In this article, we explore how to improve equity and access and how to shift toward student owner…

• Add Audio Recordings to your Slides

• Political Studies through Minecraft – Christy’s Houseful of Chaos

  I have reopened my Minecraft server in light of the Covid-19 restrictions and the need to have extra online social activities for children. I host events a couple of times a week on Minecraft and Zoom, and the children play on the server whenever th…

• COVID19 Learn at Home: Content Creation Tools – YouTube

• A list of online activities and resources for teachers planning remote learning for their students

• Cliff Mass Weather Blog: Is Atmospheric CO2 Declining from the Covid Economic Collapse?

  I have had a number of people ask me: with CO2 emissions collapsing from the economic downturn, are CO2 levels no longer going up or declining? In fact, a brief search on the web reveals some headlines that seem to be suggesting this: The bottom lin…

• How to make the classic Canada’s Wonderland funnel cake at home – Canada’s Wonderland

  I bet everyone’s having some really serious cravings right about now. The aisles at the grocery store for chips, candy, ice cream and cookies never saw it so good. I’ll tell you though, it’s the things I can’t get that I’m craving the most. Like a C…

• Microns and Masks – Yummy Math

  How big is one coronavirus? How big is a micron? How well do these masks protect against the virus? What can you observe about the size of particles mentioned? Why are we wearing masks? For members we have an editable Word docx of the activity and s…

• 100 Driving Questions and 25 Final Products Related to Covid-19 Pandemic | Mike Kaechele

  Disclaimer: This post assumes that you are already doing responsible online teaching: checking the social and emotional state of your students, giving meaningful feedback but NOT grading their work, and not overwhelming them with too much work.

• Lisa Nielsen: The Innovative Educator:

  Innovative educators know how important it is to provide inclusive, accessible learning environments for their students. While, many have figured this out in the classroom, when teaching and learning remotely, it’s a little different.

• A Principal’s Reflections: Remote Learning Teaching Tips

  There is so much pressure on teachers as more and more schools close for the academic year as a result of COVID19. With little to no training or preparation, they have stepped up to keep learning going. It hasn’t been easy for them to say the least.

• Everything You Need to Know About Building a Great Screencast Video | Cult of Pedagogy

  This post contains Amazon Affiliate links. When you make a purchase through these links, Cult of Pedagogy gets a small percentage of the sale at no extra cost to you. Early in March, the COVID-19 pandemic led to a domino effect of school closures.

• Schedule – NarraScope

  NarraScope 2020 will take place online from May 28 to June 4, 2020. All times shown are US Eastern time.

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

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

Check out these blog posts from this past week:

• Messenger Kids: Pros and Cons of the Facebook Communication App for Parents and Teachers

  If you’re in North America, this wouldn’t be news to you but in Australia and many other countries worldwide, Facebook’s Messenger Kids has just been launched. I’ve been exploring Messenger Kids over the last few days and have found some pros and co…

• What is the importance of learning through play in education?

  Psychologist Abraham Maslow knew the importance of play all too well in his research, and as an educator, you’ve likely heard it before, too. But what’s the hard evidence, and how can you incorporate meaningful play into your curricula?

• 12 Practical Tips for Remote Learning During School Closures – SULS057 | Shake Up Learning

  I’ve put together 12 practical tips for remote learning during school closures.  … I wish I could do this for you. I wish I could take this burden off of the many teachers who are in a panic right now. Take comfort in the fact that we are all in t…

• Flipgrid | Minecraft COVID-19 Challenges

• Using Flipgrid in the Classroom | The Infused Classroom

  First, think about how you want to collaborate with Flipgrid. Then, go to Grid Pals at the top right of your dashboard and look for another teacher that wants to collaborate. You can look at grade and interest level too. Then reach out and let the c…

• Add Audio & Video Instructions to Help Students Navigate Work While Learning Remotely |

  When teachers introduce tasks or assignments in the classroom, they often provide both text and verbal directions. They have the luxury of holding up papers or projecting online assignments to show students exactly what to do.

• Educational Technology Guy: Vernier Software & Technology Offers Free Remote Learning Resources for STEM

  To keep students engaged in STEM learning during school closures, Vernier Software & Technology is offering a robust collection of free remote learning solutions for teachers and students.

• 3 Apps That Energize Learning | Ask a Tech Teacher

  Let’s face it. Teachers juggle an exhausting schedule of parent conferences, administrative tasks, and specialized student needs.

• Lisa Nielsen: The Innovative Educator: Prom, Dances, School Celebrations: Ideas When #RemoteLearning

  How do you have a prom or other school celebrations in a time of social distancing? Students, staff, and families across the nation are getting innovative. Ideas from across the nation You can check out what some students are doing in the stories be…

• Classroom Games and Tech – Ed-Tech to Engage and Inspire: Inspiring students when school is closed: Game Design Club for middle school

  In Michigan our students will be out of school from March 13 through the end of summer. In an effort to inspire students to create and learn during this time, I revisited my idea of running a virtual game design club. Here’s how I’ve started and a l…

• How To Work From Home Without Getting Stressed-Out – Smart Classroom Management

  As most of you know, I only teach in the afternoons. I work from home in the mornings and then head to school after lunch. It’s been my schedule for the past six years—ever since SCM became too large to maintain while teaching full time. It wasn’t a…

• A Day in the Life of Distance Teaching | Stories From School

  Disclaimer: What follows is not a complaint. It is documentation. I know many have it worse: I recognize that I am beyond lucky to still be employed and receiving a paycheck. But this site is about “where practice meets policy.” What follows is wher…

• Warm-water ‘blobs’ significantly diminish salmon, other fish populations, study says | Puget Sound Institute

  It’s no secret that salmon and other Northwest fish populations are expected to shrink as a result of a warming Pacific Ocean. But a new study suggests that the resulting decline in commercial fishing by 2050 could be twice as great as previously es…

• Three Useful Videos For Students About The Coronavirus | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  Abhi_Jacob / Pixabay I’m adding these three videos to A BEGINNING LIST OF THE BEST RESOURCES FOR LEARNING ABOUT THE CORONAVIRUS:

• New TED-Ed Video & Lesson: “What happens if you cut down all of a city’s trees?” | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  Free-Photos / Pixabay I’m adding this new TED-Ed lesson and video toThe Best Sites To Learn About Trees:

• Encouraging Student Engagement in Remote Learning – Classroom Q&A With Larry Ferlazzo – Education Week Teacher

  Teacher David Sherrin discusses ideas on how to motivate students in distance teaching and learning and shares some online resources he has created for his classes.

• allthingsassessment.info

  Many readers of this blog will be familiar with the age-old philosophical question that raises a variety of responses regarding what we see and what we perceive:  “If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?” D…

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Reverse the Mirroring Effect in Zoom

  In my recent article titled What’s On My Desktop I mentioned using a small physical whiteboard during live lessons delivered via Zoom or Google Meet. Since then a few people have emailed to ask how I am able to make the writing on the whiteboard not…

• BiomeViewer

  This interactive module explores biomes, climate, biodiversity, and human impacts around the globe and at different times.

• 6 Steps for Genius Hour – Integrating Technology & Genius Hour: My Journey as a Teacher & Learner

  Implementing Genius Hour in your classroom? Here are the 6 steps that Denise Krebs and I have laid out in the NEW 2nd edition of The Genius Hour Guidebook! We hope this helps as you implement this amazing passion/inquiry based learning in your class…

• Self Assessment of Genius Hour Traits – Integrating Technology & Genius Hour: My Journey as a Teacher & Learner

  Hi everyone! I just wanted to quickly share a new resource that Denise Krebs and I put together. This is the new rubric that we are using for Genius Hour. We hope you like it and find it useful to use with your students!

• Here’s How Some Districts Are Requiring (Or NOT Requiring) Teachers To Take Attendance | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  It prompted me to ask teachers on social media what they are required to do. I thought readers might be interested in some of their responses: I believe it’s more of a count of who is active in the class.

• Lisa Nielsen: The Innovative Educator: Graduation 2020 – Ideas When #RemoteLearning

  Graduation in 2020 will be unlike any graduation before it. While the thought of losing the traditional pomp and circumstance is difficult, there are some innovative options available. Minecraft! Elementary school students in Japan created a Minecra…

• Free Technology for Teachers: By Request – How to Create a Timed Quiz in Google Classroom

  I’m taking a digital portfolio approach to assessment in our remote learning environment and using EDpuzzle for little comprehension checks. But my approach to assessment isn’t the only one you might take.

• Free Nonfiction Articles for Kids and Reading at Home Tips – Class Tech Tips

  Are you looking for resources to recommend to families, or use with your own young children? Earlier this year, I featured PebbleGo on my site and lots of ways to use their reading platform in the classroom.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Google Meet Gets a Grid View and Higher Quality Video Sharing

  One of the things that many people like about Zoom is the ability to see all participants in a call in a grid on your screen. (It makes me feel like I’m in the opening scene of The Brady Bunch). Now Google is going to offer that ability as a native …

• Top EdTech Update Differentiated Instruction Online Learning Content for Wed.Apr 22, 2020

  Online Teaching Reflection: Day 15 Cycles of Learning Now that the COVID-19 Hackathon I have been facilitating in my engineering courses is coming to a close (see initial ideas here and final proposals here to be posted on Monday, 4/27), I have been…

• Backgrounds For Zoom and Google Meet – Teacher Created Tips

  Our Travel The Map background.As we all adjust to remote education, you’re probably looking for different ways to spice up your visual teaching space. Or maybe you’re just looking to hide the ever-growing pile of laundry and occasional toddler runni…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Google Sites Templates & Banners

  Years ago Google Sites had a gallery of templates that you could pick from when you were starting to build a website. When the new (current) version of Google Sites was launched in 2016 the template gallery was removed. Today, Google brought back th…

• Teacher – Tyto Online

  tags:games gbl educational

• Teach from Home

• Search-Icon

  In the world’s first history book, Herodotus recounts how the ancient Lydians faced a prolonged period of food scarcity. Months passed without relief and despair set in, spurring the desperate Lydians to implement an unusual solution.

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Enable Google Sites Collaboration Through Google Classroom

  After watching my video about Google Sites in my recent Practical Ed Tech newsletter a reader emailed to ask me for ideas for the best way to share Google Sites with her students so that they can all work on the same site.

• Free Technology for Teachers: A Few Overlooked Ways to Customize Google Sites

  In a recent article about using digital portfolios for assessment I mentioned using Google Sites and Blogger. Neither of those tools are known for being aesthetically outstanding. In fact, I’d say they’re very plain at best.

• Six Strategic Pen-and-Paper Games (from a Strange and Bottomless Mind) – Math with Bad Drawings

  This year, I’m writing a book about mathematical games.

• Free Technology for Teachers: Gallery AR – Augmented Reality Art on Your Walls

  Gallery AR is a free iPad app and free iPhone app that anyone can use to view classic works of art in augmented reality. The app features art work that was digitized by The Art Institute of Chicago. Gallery AR digitally displays works of art on your…

• Use Explore Explain Apply to plan remote learning lessons

  The Explore Explain Apply framework allows for multiple opportunities for students to receive feedback and to create checkpoints throughout the lesson. With a student task in each section teachers can provide valuable feedback for students before th…

• 6 Super Parent and Teacher Resources to Promote Social Emotional Learning at Home

  Children need social and emotional learning skills to cope. But how do we integrate SEL into remote lesson plans? In this post, I’ll share how we can help students volunteer from home. Volunteering opportunities are one of the easiest ways to make S…

• Technology Tidbits: Thoughts of a Cyber Hero: Top 10 Sites for creating a Digital Portfolio

  With the end of the school year coming and schools being closed due to the pandemic a digital portfolio is a great way for students and educators to showcase their work.

• Key Skill: Self-Directed Learning | Silvia Tolisano- Langwitches Blog

  As I am part of many virtual conversations with educators from around the world, reading through my Twitter feed and reading blog post after blog post, I am hyper aware of this global documentation of a unique “new-ways-of-learning” remote teaching …

• Showcase Student Work on Your Digital Fridge – Mari Venturino

  I miss my kids. A lot. One thing I miss a ton is their creativity. Whenever we have a less-structured minute in class, such as when some students finish an assignment early, many students choose to draw. They love the Sketchbook iPad app.

• Free Technology for Teachers: How to Add Answer Feedback to Quizzes in Google Forms & How Students See It

  Over the weekend I received an email from a reader who wanted to know what his students saw when feedback was added to quizzes created with Google Forms. That is exactly what I demonstrate in the following new video.

• Welcome to Recycle City | Recycle City | U.S. EPA

• Blogging About The Web 2.0 Connected Classroom: 10 #RemoteLearning Ideas…No #Edtech Required

  Remote Learning… What the we as the the collective group of educators need to realize is that no matter how well we plan lessons and learning in virtual environments it just won’t be enough for our most vulnerable learners.

• 3 Strategies for Personalizing Feedback Online |

  Feedback is one of the most powerful tools teachers have in their “teaching toolbelts” for guiding learners toward mastery. Without feedback, students do not have a clear sense of what they are doing well, what they need to focus on, and what they c…

• COVID-19 #Coronavirus Infographic Data Pack — Cool Infographics

  COVID-19 (aka Coronavirus) has obviously been a hot topic recently, especially within the media. But how dangerous is this new virus?

• Classcraft’s Guide to Remote Education – Classcraft Blog

  Remote education is a growing trend in today’s educational landscape, whether it’s because of coronavirus-related shutdowns or not.

• Teach from Home

  To give any of the suggestions a try, sign in with your G Suite for Education account. If you don’t have one already, your school can sign up here for our free suite of tools. We’re in this together. Join the #teachfromhome discussion on Twitter.

• harlowe:display [Twine Wiki]

• Alaskan Robot Nerd

• Jigsaw Easter Eggs version 1.0 – Classroom Powerups

  A conversation during a recent #XPLAP chat (Tuesdays at 10pm EST) focused on hiding digital Easter Eggs. One of the side conversations made me think about the a card trick that was shared a few months ago.

• The Easiest Classroom Daily Agenda EVER – Technology Pursuit

• Quiz: Can You Spot the Fake News Story? | Channel One News

• A Trauma-Informed Approach to Teaching Through Coronavirus | Teaching Tolerance

  “Relationships and well-being can take priority over assignment and behavioral compliance.”

  • Establishing a routine and maintaining clear communication are crucial.
  • Relationships and well-being can take priority over assignment and behavioral compliance.
  • Reach out, provide space and encourage students to connect with them or another trusted adult or counselor to talk about their safety concerns.
  • Help students plan some virtual playdates to distract them from their worries.
  • Make time to ask students about something fun they are doing right now.
  • Promote self-awareness by having students review a feelings chart and share how they are feeling.

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

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

More amazing blog posts from this past week:

• Tools to Inspire Collaborative Discussions – Teacher Reboot Camp

  More important than the learning that transpires in our classrooms is the learning we inspire beyond our classroom walls. One way to motivate students to continue using the knowledge acquired in our classes is to set up a virtual learning community.

• How To Handle Brazen Behavior – Smart Classroom Management

  So what is brazen behavior? Running or chasing in the classroom.

• Technology Tidbits: Thoughts of a Cyber Hero: Make Beliefs Comix Give Me Words

  Make Beliefs Comix is a excellent site that educators around the world are using for digital storytelling, project based learning, reinforcing vocabulary, and more. Recently, they launched their “Give Me Words” feature which lets students supply wor…

• Inspire Learning Beyond Your Classroom Walls by Setting Up a Virtual Learning Community – Teacher Reboot Camp

  More important than the learning that transpires in our classrooms is the learning we inspire beyond our classroom walls. One way to motivate students to continue using the knowledge acquired in our classes is to set up a virtual learning community.

• Google’s New “Interpreter Mode” Makes It Easier For Teachers & Parents To Talk If They Don’t Speak Each Other’s Languages | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  Google has just added what they call “Interpreter Mode” to the mobile Google Assistant app.

• Steven Singer: Charter Schools Exploit Children of Color | Diane Ravitch’s blog

  The New York Times recently wrote an article claiming that many black and Hispanic families were disappointed that Democratic presidential candidates were abandoning the charter school crusade beloved by the leaders of No Child Left Behind and Race …

• Social media and television use — but not video games — predict depression and anxiety in teens

• We all love SHEG. Now their Civic Online Reasoning tools make it easier to love them even more | History Tech

  I’m starting to get the feeling that we’ve reached critical mass. When I work with social studies teachers around the country, I always make sure they’re familiar with the work by Sam Wineburg and the Stanford History Education Group.

• Five Tech-Savvy Strategies for Excellent, Engaging Virtual Field Trips – NCCE’s Tech Savvy Teacher Blog

  In 2011 I took a family vacation to New Orleans, Louisiana.  We took in all of the sites that the wonderful city has to offer, including the National World War II Museum.  The museum was spectacular, and as I walked through the exhibits I thought ab…

• a-video-game-about-conflict-resolution-helps-develop-empathy-for-refugees

  Lual Mayen, a video game developer based in Washington, D.C., remembers the first time he saw a computer. He was just a kid at the time. It was 2007, and his family was registering for benefits at a refugee camp in Uganda, where they’d settled after…

• Infographic Tools and Templates to Visualize Data – Teacher Reboot Camp

  When students design an infographic they visualize data and present their research in a dynamic way. They can use icons, charts, shapes, stylized fonts, borders, photos, and more to make data more engaging and understandable. Students can also tell …

• Free Technology for Teachers: ScriptSlide – A Google Slides Add-on for Pacing Presentations

  ScriptSlide is an interesting Google Slides add-on that takes the speaker notes in your Google Slides and displays them in a teleprompter-like screen that you can control with your phone. That might sound complicated, but it’s not. Here’s how Script…

• Image Hotspot Generator

  Step 1: Uploadan image. Step 2: Click anywhere to start tagging it.

• New ‘Privacy Toolkit’ for youth, co-created with youth – NetFamilyNews.org

  “What do children know, and want to know, about where their data goes?” is the all-important question that leads the Children’s Data & Privacy Online project’s blog post about its just-released report.

• Actively Learn – Kleinspiration

  As a mother  and a teacher, finding time to do it all is a constant struggle. Technology is continuously evolving and making every aspect of our lives more convenient.

• Intentional and Explicit Use of the  Cross Cutting Concepts – OUR TRANSITION TO MS NGSS

• How to integrate the argumentation from evidence practice into engineering design projects : StemTeachingTools

• Lisa Nielsen: The Innovative Educator: 6 Insights from Ed Tech Leaders Across the U.S.

  Leaders in education and technology came from around the country to the Tech & Learning Leadership Summit. There they spoke openly and passionately about current trends, critical problems, and possible solutions.

• Timeline Tools to Document and Analyze the Past – Teacher Reboot Camp

  Students can create digital timelines to analyze the past and help teach others. Timelines help students display their research in a dynamic way with photos, clickable links, video, and audio. Creating a digital timeline is engaging and also inspire…

• Did they just add tour creation to web-based Google Earth? Yes. Yes, they did. | History Tech

  Google tools. Good. Maps. Good.

• Global Learning and Leading with Minecraft Education Edition – NCCE’s Tech Savvy Teacher Blog

  As an educator and professional development trainer, I have spent the last year focusing on how Minecraft Education Edition can be delivered to educators.

• Screencast Tools to Demonstrate Student Learning – Teacher Reboot Camp

  One way for students to demonstrate what they are learning is through screencasts. In a screencast, students video record their digital screen (tablet or computer) and that shows them completing a task.

• Network for Public Education Releases Explosive New Report on Federal Charter Schools Program | Diane Ravitch’s blog

  Last spring, the Network for Public Education published a report on waste, fraud, and abuse in the federal Charter Schools Program.

• Tools for Designing Awesome Graphics – Teacher Reboot Camp

  I started this blog 10 years ago, which was shortly after using Twitter and other social media tools to connect with educators.

• Is Your ‘Standard’ Really a Standard? | All Things Assessment

  Educators, more often than not, define the term “standard” as “something someone needs to know or be able to do.” We use this definition to develop curriculum, create assessments, plan instruction, and provide feedback to students and parents.

• Engage Them in the First 5 Minutes! Bell-Ringers, Warm Ups, and Prompts! – Teacher Reboot Camp

  As soon as students enter the classroom they can be engaged in learning. At my school we call these “to dos.” I have often heard these called bell ringers, warm ups, starters, and entrance tickets.

• Best Books of 2019 – Pernille Ripp

  In June, I published my Best Books of 2019 So Far list, the very next day after publishing it, I read an incredible book, and then another, and then another. And so as it happens, the list continues, here are all of the incredible books that I loved…

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

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

Great blog posts and articles from the past week:

• Northern California e-sports league possibly coming to Magnolia Intermediate School | TheUnion.com

• Albuquerque Public Schools holds first ‘esports’ tournament for students | KRQE News 13

• Water Games – Games4Sustainability

• Bringing esports on campus

• How To Give Effective Praise: 6 Guidelines – Smart Classroom Management

  I’ve been writing about praise since 2009, but there is still a lot of confusion over its use. Typically, praise is given far too frequently.

• Free Technology for Teachers: My Updated Five Favorite Google Slides Add-ons

  Earlier this year I published a rundown of my five favorite Google Slides add-ons. Since then a couple of those add-ons have gone the way of the 5.25″ floppy disk. Fortunately, I’ve recently discovered a couple of new Google Slides add-ons that I re…

• Free Technology for Teachers: The Great Thanksgiving Listen is Back!

  For the fifth year in a row StoryCorps is hosting The Great Thanksgiving Listen. This annual event is an effort to get families to talk and record their stories around the Thanksgiving table.

• New USA Today Video: “Wildfires: The science inside the flames” | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  skeeze / Pixabay I’m adding this new video from USA Today to The Best Sites For Learning About Forest Fires:

• Technology Tidbits: Thoughts of a Cyber Hero: Studydraft

  Studydraft is an excellent site for online tutoring. The way this works is an educator can place a bid on a student’s order and then the student can select the tutor of their choosing. A student can check the tutor’s background, reviews, and more to…

• its-a-smartphone-life-more-than-half-of-u-s-children-now-have-one

  Just over half of children in the United States — 53 percent — now own a smartphone by the age of 11. And 84 percent of teenagers now have their own phones, immersing themselves in a rich and complex world of experiences that adults sometimes need a…

• Weird happenings at the end of daylight saving time – Yummy Math

  Daylight saving time is controversial, disruptive, useful, saves energy, increases energy consumption, and is inconvenient …  Imagine locations where neighbors are differentiated by one or two hours and experiment with what it might be like to liv…

• Cliff Mass Weather and Climate Blog: Extended Forecasts are Not Reliable

  We are constantly exposed to extended forecasts in the media and online, with predictions extending through the next month and more.

• Civic Alerts, Toxins in Lake – Jefferson County, WA

  tags:water quality waterquality

• how-the-gender-gap-in-stem-might-get-its-start-in-elementary-school

• create-a-tiktok-style-experience-with-google-slides

• Weingarten on NAEP Results | Diane Ravitch’s blog

  WASHINGTON—American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten issued the following statement in response to the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) Report Card: “What we see in this data snapshot, while disappointing, is not s…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Slides Randomizer – A Neat Google Slides Add-on

  Slides Randomizer is a Google Slides add-on that will randomly shuffle a set of Google Slides. It’s easy to use the Slides Randomizer add-on.

• 7 Recommended Hands-On STEM Learning Products – Teacher Reboot Camp

  “Learning is not a spectator sport.” – Arthur W. Chickering and Stephen C. Ehrmann (1996) On this blog I’ve shared thousands of web tools, apps, and resources that are free or offer a freemium option for teachers.

• This Wisconsin newsroom wants to cover esports like high school football – Poynter

• ‘But Mom, Video Games Are My Job’ – The New York Times

• Research shows disconnect between results and students’ perceptions of active learning | Education Dive

• A Tech-Friendly Peer Feedback Strategy – Class Tech Tips

  This past summer, I had the opportunity to work with high school students attending a design camp. In today’s blog post, I want to share with you a combination of two favorite EdTech tools.

• 4-ways-to-power-up-your-classroom-this-fall

• Tips for Creating Infographics with Students – Easy EdTech Podcast 037 – Class Tech Tips

  In this episode we’ll discuss five tips for creating infographics with students, along with a few places to find examples. You’ll also hear about a tool you can use in your classroom to help students make infographics this school year! 4. Establish …

• Lisa Nielsen: The Innovative Educator: Face Off – Microsoft or Adobe for #Accessibility

  · 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…

• Mo Physics Mo Problems: Leveled Templates

  After listening to the latest episode of Google Teacher Tribe on templates in G Suite, I was inspired to share out how my co-teacher Andelee Espinosa and I handle leveled templates on our co-taught physics classroom.

• Technology Tidbits: Thoughts of a Cyber Hero: Gimkit

  Gimkit is an excellent game based learning solution that makes it easy for educators to assess learning and differentiate instruction. This is done through fun educational games that even students can help create and use for self paced learning.

• STEAM Up Learning with 50 Fabulous Resources! – Teacher Reboot Camp

  “… all children could and should be inventors of their own theories, critics of other people’s ideas, analyzers of evidence, and makers of their own personal marks on this most complex world.

• Lisa Nielsen: The Innovative Educator: Digital FIRST: Your New Acronym for Accessible Content

  There may be times when you think it is okay to provide a print/paper only version of content for a student. The reality as is you should do this never, ever, never, never, ever. That’s because, if you’re thinking paper first, you’re not thinking ac…

• How One Makerspace is Meeting Students’ Social-Emotional Needs | Cult of Pedagogy

  This post contains Amazon Affiliate links. When you make a purchase through these links, Cult of Pedagogy gets a small percentage of the sale at no extra cost to you.

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

Sharing Diigo Links and Resources (weekly)

Here are last week’s selection of amazing blog posts:

• Climate Sense: Talking about climate change | Watching Our Water Ways

  The urgency of addressing climate change in meaningful ways — such as reducing greenhouse gas emissions — seems to be lost on many Americans. Many others, however, feel the urgency to do something, but they don’t know what to do.

• Incompetech: Royalty-Free Music

  This is the normal default search, and can access every piece in the catalog. You can narrow your search on genre, feel, tempo, or length… or use the custom Google Search for anything else! For example, you can type in “Banjo” to find anything wit…

• Free Technology for Teachers: Free Lessons on Developing Speaking and Listening Skills

  The BBC’s Skillswise website offers many good activities for learning and practicing skills in language arts and mathematics. A section of the site that could be useful in a lot of classrooms is the speaking and listening section.

• 10-educational-podcasts-youll-love-to-listen-to

• Guest Post: Tell Them You Love Screentime! – NCCE’s Tech Savvy Teacher Blog

  By Delaney Ruston, M.D. (NCCE welcomes Dr. Ruston to the NCCE Tech-Savvy Teacher blog for a series of posts related to the impact of technology on the lives of adolescents.  The NCCE 2019 conference will feature a screening of Dr.

• Google Classroom: Pop Out Student Documents – Teacher Tech

  One of the best new features of Google Classroom is the new feedback tool. When you click on students work from Google Classroom it opens in the new feedback shell. A side panel lets you leave Private Comments in Google Classroom, assign a score, an…

• 6 Things You Can Do with a PDF this School Year – Class Tech Tips

• Ask Yourself, Why Am I Grading This? |

  “If I don’t grade it, students won’t do it.” This reasoning leaves teachers with piles of work to grade, but I wonder how much of that time spent assigning points to student work results in improved student performance. I fell into this trap at the …

• Bring back home economics class because our kids lack basic life skills | Commentary | Dallas News

• Control Alt Achieve: 20 YouTube Channels for Social Studies

  YouTube is a fantastic resource for schools to teach content and for students to learn content. For pretty much any topic you can think of, someone has made a video explaining it (which I greatly appreciate when I have had to replace parts in my clo…

• University Inc.: Capitalism, Philanthropy and Higher Education – Have You Heard

  In the latest episode of Have You Heard, Jack and Jennifer are joined by Joshua Hunt, author of University of Nike: How Corporate Cash Bought American Higher Education – which is even better than it sounds! Hunt describes what happened when tax-cutt…

• 8 Tips for Communicating with Parents using Email – Teacher Tech

  When I was a student, emailing parents did not exist. Best tips for emailing parents was not part of my teacher credential program. As a parent, I am super appreciative that my kids’ teachers can communicate better with me than putting a paper in a …

• one-story-many-endings-a-fun-creative-google-slides-activity

• Wisconsin Science and STEM Education: Phenomena-Based Instruction Isn’t Only for Science

  I have heard of an “integrated” elementary unit on apples.

• Free Technology for Teachers: ReadWorks Now Offers Illustrated eBooks

  ReadWorks, a fantastic free service for ELA teachers, recently added new illustrated ebooks to their library. These illustrated ebooks can be used in the same way that all other ReadWorks ebooks can be used by you and your students.

• Run An Empire – A real world strategy running game

• The less flexible the teaching, the more poorly boys read – UKEdChat

• Time parents spend with children key to academic success – UKEdChat

• ‘Doing science,’ rather than ‘being scientists,’ more encouraging to girls – UKEdChat

• Defending the Early Years on Academic Rigor in Kindergarten: NO! | Diane Ravitch’s blog

  Response to Le, Schaack et al. study, “Advanced Content Coverage at Kindergarten: Are There Trade-Offs Between Academic Achievement and Social-Emotional Skills?” Advanced academics in kindergarten?

• Free Technology for Teachers: Try These 6 Things When a Website Doesn’t Work as Expected

  In the last week I’ve fielded a half-dozen emails from readers who were experiencing problems with web tools not working as they expected. This seems like a good time to revisit six things that you should check when a website doesn’t work as you exp…

• What serious lessons come from playing games in the classroom – Classcraft Blog

• 10 Stages Of Mastery Infographic – e-Learning Infographics

  How do you become a master in your field when you’re starting from scratch and you’re not even talented or lucky? Here’s your complete blueprint to achieve mastery and stand out from the rest.

• your-vibe-attracts-your-tribe-3-steps-for-building-a-personal-learning-network

• Live Long and Prosper…: Winning the War for Science Education

  With about a dozen Democrats running for president (and a few more still “undecided”), there’s no doubt that the race for the 2020 presidency has begun.

• 3 Years Of Data: An Infographic On Corporate Gamification – e-Learning Infographics

  Gamification is a buzzword that gets thrown around a lot these days. At Trajectory IQ, we’ve worked with companies of all shapes and sizes over the past few years to create many different learning experiences for their employees.

• Gaming for Info Lit Flow | Information Literacy @ CUNY

  A few years ago Michael Waldman at Baruch Library was kind enough to recommend what he described as the least intimidating marathon training book, The Non-Runner’s Marathon Trainer, which introduced me to Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s theory of flow, as…

• Almost final versions of progressions up through Ratios and Proportional Relationships | Mathematical Musings

  Cathy Kessel has been working hard to incorporate the feedback from this blog and from other places into final versions of the progressions. Here is the close to final version of the progressions up through Ratios and Proportional Relationships.

• “Rise-Up!” Is A Curriculum Based On The Hamilton Musical | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

  Apparently, a group of Bay Area educators and artists teamed-up to create a free curriculum inspired by the musical called Rise-Up! An American Curriculum. It looks impressive.

• Games for Learning

• Game-Based Learning in Action

• Home – James Paul Gee

• Game-Based Social and Emotional Learning for High School English Class | iThrive Games Foundation

• Has the Game Really Changed? Notes From the 2017 Games for Change Festival | EdSurge News

• Piloting Game Based Learning in Jordan’s Public Schools | Institute of Play | New York City

• What Research Says About Game-Based Learning | EdSurge News

• Research | Quest to Learn (Q2L) – Middle School and High School

• Spires-2015-Journal_of_Adolescent_&_Adult_Literacy (1).pdf – Google Drive

• ERIC – Exploring Media Literacy and Computational Thinking: A Game Maker Curriculum Study, Electronic Journal of e-Learning, 2016

• The University of Arizona – Institute for Mathematics & Education

  tags:progression document documents math maths mathematics common core ccss

• Coherence Map

  tags:math maths mathematics coherence maps map

• The Importance of Not Stepping In – The Principal of Change

  I had a fantastic opportunity to do a student podcast recently, and although the students were there to ask me questions, I took a lot of time to ask them about their own experiences in school.

• A Principal’s Reflections: Are Students Off-Task in Class on Phones? There’s an App for That!

  As teachers and administrators, grappling with off-task behaviors and distractions when it comes to student phones in the classroom has occurred at some point.

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