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CATEGORY: Technology Integration |
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The new feature of Blackboard's communication platform lets teachers communicate easily with students' families - in their preferred language - helping to improve parent involvement and student engagement in the classroom, according to the announcement.
News/Breaking News - Posted 03 Mar 2010
An online learning community is a place designed to help users achieve learning goals of some sort through collaborative partnerships, including varying degrees of social networking and internet-based and computer-mediated communication. Charlie Doe takes a look this month at some of the more formal versions of online learning communities—often called learning management systems (LMSs)—which are usually developed by professors or teachers to achieve academic goals via web-based services.
Most of today's teachers are comfortable with the notion of technology inclusion. On nearly every campus today, you will see students using online or software programs to supplement and extend learning. Infusion is another paradigm altogether, one that emphasizes technology as an essential partner—and many times, as the creative element—in traditional learning. Technology applications become one of many parts that contribute to the everyday education of students. Learning remains curriculum-based, but those tech apps—research, digital storytelling, websites—are now embedded into the disciplines.
After reading an interesting Library Journal piece by Tom Peters entitled "The Future of Reading: As the Book Changes Form, the Library Must Champion Its Own Power Base—Readers," Stephen Abram is moved to ask, Is reading in jeopardy? Personally and professionally, he says, he really doubts it, but …
The advent of the internet and Web 2.0 has significantly changed our relationship to information and personal learning opportunities outside of formal education, notes author Steve Hargadon. The technology that took this amazing change and multiplied it tenfold is an underlying theme of Hargadon's article, which ranges across social networking, Web 2.0, the emergence of educational networking, and what he sees as the first real area of significant adoption for educational networking: professional development for educators.
With these agreements, a total of more than 62,000 K-12 and public library titles are now available for purchase online through parent company Follett's ecommerce sites, Titlewave and TitleTales.
News/Breaking News - Posted 04 Feb 2010
The unit's built-in SD card slot and USB port allow the Spirit SD to work with the latest digital file formats, providing educators with the technology to play pre-recorded instructional resources, stories, and music for the whole class.
News/Breaking News - Posted 22 Jan 2010
Under the agreement, FLVS will move all of its more than 100 courses to a fully hosted Blackboard Learn platform by the beginning of 2011.
News/Breaking News - Posted 21 Jan 2010
Sponsored by the organization's Education Division, the Vision K-20 Survey gives educational institutions an opportunity to take a short, online survey to evaluate their current technology use.
News/Breaking News - Posted 15 Jan 2010
The new version of GradeCam is the first online assessment solution to use a document camera to grade paper-based quizzes and tests, according to the announcement.
News/Breaking News - Posted 13 Jan 2010
The new features are intended to help schools eliminate paper waste and conserve energy while saving money by offering parents more choices.
News/Breaking News - Posted 13 Jan 2010
People say it all the time: If you want to keep up in today's fast-moving world of technology, keep a kid around. In other words, just ask a Digital Native—someone who has grown up with computers and the internet. Well, Mary Ann believes that we can absolutely learn from our students, children, and even grandchildren. At the same time, though, she believes that adults need to be careful not to attribute more expertise and understanding to youngsters than is justified.
Educators have begun to shun the monolithic basal approach to teaching reading, opting for a more robust mix of specialized print and technology-based resources that provide intensive, dynamic, motivating methods that children embrace and enjoy. These print and technology tools must use student data as a cornerstone of an approach that intensifies and individualizes instruction. Find out more from Lexia Learning's Bob McCabe.
Susan Hixson takes a look at it's learning, an online learning platform for collaboration, planning, authoring, and the delivery of course materials and courses.
There is an economical way to introduce videoconferencing that involves inexpensive laptop computers and programs such as iChat, Skype, and ooVoo. A technology integration plan shared by a few pioneering districts in the author's area proves this point. Through it, schools have been able to make a serious commitment to the "new wave" of interactive technology at a minimal cost.
The E-rate Form 471 application filing window for Funding Year 2010 is open for applicants across the country. It extends from Dec. 3, 2009 to Feb. 11, 2010. E-rate consulting firm Funds For Learning has put together a list of seven key tips to help applicants navigate the waters of the E-rate funding application process.
News/Free Resources - Posted 07 Dec 2009
Through NGAGE, available through December 31, 2009, Netop provides financial support for schools to purchase an individual or site license for the Netop Vision6 Class Kit classroom management software.
News/Breaking News - Posted 01 Dec 2009
The consortium is designed to offer a research-based approach for transforming chronically struggling schools into successful learning environments without requiring mass dismissals of staff, school closures or turnover to charters or outside management organizations.
News/Breaking News - Posted 13 Nov 2009
The guides offer best practices on building standards, assessments, curriculum and instruction, professional development, and learning environments.
News/Breaking News - Posted 13 Nov 2009
Insight enables instructors to teach, monitor, and communicate with an entire class from one central computer. This latest version extends Insight's platform compatibilities, allowing teachers to run the console within the Mac OS X operating system.
News/Breaking News - Posted 12 Nov 2009
The Milestones for Improving Learning and Education Guide is a tool designed to help practitioners evaluate their 21st Century skills initiatives.
News/Breaking News - Posted 06 Nov 2009
MyVision Basic provides four essential tools for teaching with computers, so any teacher can supervise student computer work, share engaging on-screen demonstrations, instantly capture the attention of the class and control student internet access.
News/Breaking News - Posted 03 Nov 2009
The new partnership combines netTrekker's digital resources with CyberSmart! Online Workshops to support 21st century teaching and learning.
News/Breaking News - Posted 02 Nov 2009
Samsula School has been a successful institution since its inception in 1912, in no small part due to the commitment and involvement of the Samsula, Fla., community. But the school community had to think on its feet in February 2008 when the public school district announced its intention to close the doors of the small, rural campus, along with those of several other rural and minority schools across the county. Johanna Riddle recounts how that thinking led to action … and the hammering out of an alliance with a successful charter school that kept Samsula's doors open.
Twitter, Blogger, Facebook, MySpace, Ning: How do we help our students learn the social skills needed to understand what it really means to live and participate in a global community? How do we incorporate this into our schools and classrooms? How do we keep ourselves and our students safe? Social networking sites are mainstream media for many tweens, teens, and adults. There are even social networking sites that attract kids as young as 5 years old. This is the reality of the world we live in, and schools should reflect this reality.
A recent story in the St. Petersburg Times focuses on how a local elementary school has embraced the "kids' technology" and is pressing iPods into service for teaching and learning in multiple ways.
News/Cool Links - Posted 15 Oct 2009
The virtual workspace is designed to give districts greater control of social media and allow educators to create and manage collaborative groups across classrooms, schools, districts, and around the globe
News/Breaking News - Posted 15 Oct 2009
More than 200 schools, districts, states, organizations and businesses have signed the National Action Agenda on 21st Century Skills.
News/Breaking News - Posted 12 Oct 2009
A 9-year-old girl is poised on the surface of the moon, a spaceship and stars in the background. Her fellow voyager, in the form of an orange, cylindrically shaped robot, responds to her conversation with an unintelligible mechanized beep. These two space pioneers are engaged in a lively discourse about the nature and origin of constellations. Is it a Nickelodeon special? The latest remix of Lost in Space? A juvenile version of 2001: A Space Odyssey? Nope. Just business as usual as an elementary school class Johanna Riddle reports on produces another Pawprint Production educational video.
A year ago, Barbara Fiehn wrote in Multimedia & Internet@Schools about the emergence of social networking features being added to school library automation systems. At the time, Follett’s Destiny was the leader among school automation vendors in implementing the social networking or Web 2.0 features, and some schools and media specialists were getting on board. A good deal has transpired in the ensuing year. So here’s an update based on a user survey Barbara did as well as information from interviews she conducted with vendors at the recent American Library Association (ALA) conference in July 2009.
Collaboration is one of the defining characteristics of the 21st century, but many educators are still searching for ways to embrace this idea in their schools. Some technologies facilitate the creation of a collaborative learning environment better than others, but there are a number of technology tools that can lead to collaborative student and teacher engagement while also addressing budgetary and infrastructure issues. This article offers suggestions for overcoming barriers using simple tools that foster complex thinking.
Developed in partnership with the Monsanto Fund and the International Society for Technology in Education, the series is being offered for free to students in grades three through five and is meant to help students build their knowledge base.
News/Breaking News - Posted 15 Jul 2009
The Best Websites for Teaching and Learning, a list honoring the top 25 internet sites for enhancing learning and curriculum development, is considered the "best of the best" by AASL.
News/Breaking News - Posted 15 Jul 2009
This latest release of the TetraData warehousing and analytics tools provides school districts with a convenient point-of-entry solution (Bronze level) and then builds upon that foundation with Silver and Gold levels, according to the announcement.
News/Breaking News - Posted 13 Jul 2009
This latest release of the TetraData warehousing and analytics tools provides school districts with a convenient point-of-entry solution (Bronze level) and then builds upon that foundation with Silver and Gold levels, according to the announcement.
News/Breaking News - Posted 13 Jul 2009
Offered through a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) model, the new enhancements are part of the annual subscription fee.
News/Breaking News - Posted 08 Jul 2009
As in nearly every other subject area, digital resources for language arts are changing and exploding into a dizzying array of materials. Currently, the number of technology-based language arts resources is so extensive that this article can only scratch at the surface in an examination of these compelling programs and platforms. In this roundup, Charls Doe takes a look at some reading and writing applications, as well some online tool programs and a couple examples of podcasting hardware.
Collaboration is certainly the way that today’s learners prefer to work. Technology-savvy students are creating a demand for learning and communicating collaboratively at school, just as they do at home. This trend is not only creating a new kind of learner but a new kind of educator as well—one who specializes in developing and sustaining a nexus for cooperative learning and who has the skills, knowledge, and contacts to connect students with resources. Enter Roxana Hadad—“The Collaborator.”
The 21st Century Skills Science and Geography Maps demonstrate how the integration of 21st century skills into science and geography classes support teaching and prepare students to become effective and productive citizens.
News/Breaking News - Posted 30 Jun 2009
Pinnacle Accelerated Learning offers districts a secure virtual learning environment.
News/Breaking News - Posted 26 Jun 2009
Iowa, Kansas, Maine, New Jersey, North Carolina, West Virginia, and Wisconsin have been recognized for incorporating knowledge and 21st Century Skills into their classrooms.
News/Breaking News - Posted 11 Jun 2009
Enhanced usability and accessibility, extended international support, and additional learning management system integrations are among the Elluminate Learning Suite enhancements.
News/Breaking News - Posted 28 May 2009
The summit, which will take place solely online, affords education, policy, civic, community, and business leaders the opportunity to interact with one another and discuss important education reform initiatives. The Cyber Summit leads up to the National Education Summit on 21st Century Skills, which will take place on June 12 in Washington, D.C.
News/Breaking News - Posted 27 May 2009
The new study underscores the importance of aligning the realities of the classroom with school leaders' positive outlook on Web 2.0 for learning.
News/Breaking News - Posted 05 May 2009
Today, everything from the school lunch program to attendance rosters, telephone operations, and more can be handled by computer systems. And, of course, more and more student assessment can be managed (or at least scored) with computers, generating data results that can be used for additional software manipulation. Data management systems are developing enormous amounts of information that can be stored and then combined and additionally analyzed (or “mined” or “drilled”) for data-driven instructional leadership. This roundup takes a look at several products with different approaches to data-driven decision making.
The updated ISTE book for administrators shows how to leverage technology to improve student learning.
News/Breaking News - Posted 15 Apr 2009
A mobile device—also known as a hand-held device, handheld computer, ultrasmall laptop, tablet, palmtop, or simply a handheld—is a small, very mobile computing device. Many mobile devices have features that make them especially useful tools for educators, teachers, administrators, students, and others. This article will take a brief look at some examples of ultramobile PCs, handhelds, probeware, portable gaming devices, and digital media players that could be useful in an education setting.
For one afternoon every week, Bob Hassett’s middle school library becomes a gamer’s paradise. Free snacks, loud music, Guitar Hero, and Dragonball Z: Budokai Tenkaichi. But even though it’s very much about gaming and hanging out, there’s so much more to it than that. Check out Bob’s feature to see what all the fun … and learning … is about.
It’s a celebration of creative learning through technology. It’s a day filled with minds-on, hands-on, collaborative learning experiences. It’s a mini-Oscar event, complete with red carpet, lights, and paparazzi. It’s the 34th annual International Student Media Festival. Read all about it in Johanna Riddle's report.
We live in a Web 2.0 world where everyone is capable of creating content and sharing it, not just accessing what someone else has created and shared. Tools to create content are now readily and freely (or somewhat inexpensively) available to the general population. Content creation tools can aid in instruction and teaching, providing another avenue for students to access and learn material. Want some ideas and products to play/teach with? Read on as Karen Klapperstuck and Robert Lackie provide you with a great rundown and roundup.
A review panel of educators and psychometricians have ensured the assessment provides valid and accurate data for elementary and middle school students, the announcement states.
News/Breaking News - Posted 27 Feb 2009
Direct Instruction eSuite is a set of online tools designed to integrate technology into instruction to save daily planning time for teachers and increase student engagement.
News/Breaking News - Posted 19 Feb 2009
The Partnership brings together the business community, education leaders, and policymakers to define a vision for 21st century education to ensure every child's success as citizens and workers.
News/Breaking News - Posted 12 Feb 2009
PBS Teachers and Classroom 2.0 host free monthly webinars that feature education experts, authors, and PBS producers discussing curriculum topics and technology integration.
News/Breaking News - Posted 20 Jan 2009
For January 15, 2009: Gadgets and widgets are small applications that can be pasted on individual Web pages or a computer desktop. Visit Widgetbox to find hundreds of widgets already created and ready to go.
Cyberbee Web Pick/Cyberbee's Web Picks - Posted 15 Jan 2009
By
Linda C. Joseph
With the theme "The World is Your Stage," students can submit entries using Adobe applications in three categories: Web Design and Development, Film and Video, and Graphic and Print Design.
News/Breaking News - Posted 12 Jan 2009
With these agreements, a total of more than 51,000 K-12 and public library titles are now available for purchase online through parent company Follett’s ecommerce sites, Titlewave and Titletales.
News/Breaking News - Posted 05 Jan 2009
Five winning schools will be given the opportunity to expand educational technology and learning resources for students and teachers.
News/Breaking News - Posted 05 Jan 2009
The Seal assures educators that a product or resource is in alignment with ISTE’s National Educational Technology Standards (NETS), refreshed in 2007 to emphasize 21st century skills. Nearly all states use NETS for Students (NETS-S) in their curriculum planning and assessment.
News/Breaking News - Posted 02 Jan 2009
Mary Ann is on a mission to spread the word that Draconian filtering at schools is a practice that produces negative outcomes. So in this issue’s Belltones, she lays out more reasons for saying this is so ... and she challenges readers to make a New Year’s resolution to work for gaining more internet access for students and faculty members in K–12 schools.
Media specialists everywhere have stories to tell about teachers who believe they no longer have time to teach their favorite units, collaborate, or use technology in educationally sound or creative ways. The combination of NCLB and other demands have created a situation where teachers have little time or interest in using technology beyond basic instructional management and easy-to-implement instructional tasks they are comfortable with. But you can help by bringing your creative ideas to your teachers! Read about two such great ideas in this month’s Media Center.
How well are you faring with getting your technology agenda endorsed and funded by your management team or district? Is everything going swimmingly? No one is trying to block useful applications such as YouTube or blogging? Your filters aren’t obstructing useful teaching technologies? … From his conversations with many K–12 folks, Stephen Abram believes that this is the management challenge of our times. And so he devotes this month’s column to tactics and strategies for talking about tech with management—those key stakeholders, such as principals, board members, trustees, administrators, and even parents.
The potential of ebooks in schools can be forecast by the sheer popularity of ebooks in society in general. Over the last 5 years, ebooks are the only book publishing segment consistently showing double-digit sales increases. Why should librarians and other educators jump on this bandwagon? Twenty-first-century school libraries really must provide the tools and resources students need to develop technology and information literacy. Read Deborah McKenzie’s feature to learn more.
Charles Doe takes a look at Teachscape XL, a Web-based digital database with a search engine and tools to create learning materials.
Today’s students are truly digital learners. Outside of school they are texting, using cell phones, creating social networks on the internet, and playing interactive games online; they often do all of these things at the same time—multitasking. They expect to use some of these tools when they are in school. Teachers can create new learning opportunities for students and turn classrooms into the 21st-century global classroom when they integrate technology into the learning environment. Read on to learn from Sheila Gersh just how teachers can begin to create such environments.
The report, Leadership in the 21st Century: The New Visionary Administrator, contains profiles of nine education leaders representing four school districts and three schools to highlight their success in leveraging technology in the classroom.
News/Breaking News - Posted 12 Nov 2008
More than 3,000 students nationwide are being assessed with Learning.com’s newest assessment, designed to go beyond assessing whether students are proficient using technology tools.
News/Breaking News - Posted 12 Nov 2008
In her previous column Mary Ann Bell protested loudly, "I'm Mad and I Am Not Gonna Take It Any More!" regarding overly restrictive internet filters. In this column, she shares some tactics for gaining access, starting here with the bandwagon ploy: "Everybody else is doing it!" After all, decision makers need to know that many educators are moving ahead with Web 2.0 sites.
Like that of many others, the condition of the technology in Mary Alice Anderson’s district has declined to the point of continuing frustration. The need for change was obvious. Even this longtime Mac user and champion knew they had to do something … And so they did. In this column, Mary Alice shares her district’s success story in the hopes that she can help media and technology specialists in similar situations remain … well … a little less discouraged.
School districts noted that their biggest challenge is funding for technology (50 percent), closely followed by integrating technology into the classroom (40 percent). Twenty-nine percent of responding districts have explored or adopted open source technologies.
News/Breaking News - Posted 30 Oct 2008
Via the internet, PlumChoice’s technicians take temporary control of the troubled computer while the user watches – even at 3 am or on holidays – eliminating the delays associated with repair shop visits, technician house calls, or do-it-yourself fixes with instructions from a call center, according to the announcement.
News/Breaking News - Posted 17 Oct 2008
The new program is intended to increase the capacity of practitioners to embed 21st century skills into classroom practices.
News/Breaking News - Posted 16 Oct 2008
The agreements bring to 46,900 the total number of K-12 and public library titles available for purchase online through parent company Follett’s ecommerce sites, Titlewave and Titletales.
News/Breaking News - Posted 13 Oct 2008
Discovery Education recently launched New Teacher Survival Central, a new Web site and partnership with Walden University, mimio, Adobe Systems, Inc., Elmer’s Products, Inc., and CDW-G.
News/Free Resources - Posted 13 Oct 2008
The Consortium for School Networking (CoSN) launches its fourth annual professional development Webcast series on Oct. 15.
News/Breaking News - Posted 11 Oct 2008
The International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) presents an “Introduction to Geocaching” Webinar on Sept. 24.
News/Breaking News - Posted 12 Sep 2008
The current issue of Forbes magazine (9/15) includes an article titled “Teaching to the New Test” written by Harvard Business School professors Clayton Christensen and Michael Horn.
News/Cool Links - Posted 12 Sep 2008
The current issue of Forbes magazine (9/15) includes an article titled “Teaching to the New Test” written by Harvard Business School professors Clayton Christensen and Michael Horn.
News/Cool Links - Posted 12 Sep 2008
Teachers' Domain is a digital library of free media online resources for teachers, and online professional development courses created by public television station WGBH.
News/Free Resources - Posted 05 Sep 2008
Discovery’s 12-hour “streamathon” on September 23 offers sessions on integrating digital media into classroom instruction.
News/Free Resources - Posted 04 Sep 2008
Four leading education and education technology associations launched a print and radio public service announcement (PSA) campaign that asks the presidential candidates to make K-12 student access to education technology and modern learning environments a national priority.
News/Breaking News - Posted 02 Sep 2008
Students in Mary Alice Anderson's district are benefiting from new or renovated media centers in four of their nine schools, a significant part of the district’s renewed emphasis on facilities improvements. The district opened two entirely new secondary media center constructions in 2000 and 2006; this summer a new elementary media center opened in completely renovated spaces and another relocated to improved spaces in former classrooms. In this column, Mary Alice looks at features that enhance the functionality and educational environment of these long overdue new facilities.
From using Twitter to encourage short story writing to utilizing Delicious to organize professional development tips and favorite articles, the number of social networking tools and websites is increasing exponentially. We know educators use these 21st-century tools with students in all grade levels. The question remains, however, whether and how these tools might be used to positively affect student understanding and achievement. "Yes," says ePals' Tim DiScipio, "these tools, when chosen thoughtfully, implemented appropriately, and combined with innovative pedagogy through internet-connected communities, can teach students the skills necessary to thrive in the 21st century and expand their ability to communicate and collaborate in a global marketplace." Read on, learn more!
The ISTE Classroom Observation Tool (ICOT) is a free online resource created to help guide teachers, administrators, and other educators as they observe and assess technology integration in classrooms.
Innovation First, Inc. and Autodesk, Inc. offer a new curriculum now included in the VEX Robotics Design System Classroom Lab Kits.
News/Breaking News - Posted 28 Aug 2008
To mark the third anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, youth leaders for Global Kids, Inc. have created an online community and game in conjunction with Game Pill, Inc., AMD, and Microsoft Corp.’s Partners in Learning where young people can engage in and experience the ongoing relief efforts in New Orleans.
News/Free Resources - Posted 27 Aug 2008
What do you get when you tinker with thinking … and playing … and technology? Well, one result would be the ThinkeringSpace project, which Information Today Inc.’s Kathy Dempsey reported on recently. It’s compelling. (From Information Today, Inc.'s NewsBreaks)
News/ITI Cross Links - Posted 06 Aug 2008
The MyLibraryPlus component enables schools and districts to manage, upload, organize and deliver a growing library of digital assets.
News/Breaking News - Posted 25 Jul 2008
LEGO Education WeDo encourages teachers to issue curriculum-based challenges for students to solve. Working in teams, children invent their own solution by building a LEGO model and programming it to perform a certain task.
News/Breaking News - Posted 24 Jul 2008
The new version of LanSchool classroom management software improves teacher control through USB limiting and keystroke monitoring.
News/Breaking News - Posted 23 Jul 2008
The five grand-prize-winning schools just announced will each win a $45,000 21st-Century Classroom.
News/Breaking News - Posted 23 Jul 2008
The International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) releases the second edition of National Educational Technology Standards for Teachers (NETS*T) this month.
News/Breaking News - Posted 19 Jul 2008
The 21st Century Skills and Social Studies Map is the first in a series of core content maps designed for educators, administrators and policymakers. Other maps will be available for mathematics, English, geography, and science throughout 2008 and 2009.
News/Breaking News - Posted 17 Jul 2008
According to the Partnership for 21st Century Skills, the skills we need to be teaching include the following: information, media literacy, and communication skills; thinking and problem-solving; interpersonal, collaborative, and self-direction skills; global awareness; economic and business literacy, including entrepreneurial skills; and civic literacy. While the context in which our schools operate today has changed, the goals have not. We can look at these 21st-century skills as an extension of efforts that date as far back as John Dewey at the turn of the previous century. The key difference is that today we have a new set of tools to apply to the tasks. Moreover, the changing economy makes it more of a necessity that our students can use technology to solve problems, collaborate, and create. Learn more on this subject in this article by Adobe Systems' Bob Regan.
In this article, cybersafety education promoter Art Wolinsky offers some historical perspective and context on internet safety and technology integration, with, ultimately, an optimistic view and a plan for success in both areas.
If there’s a refrain Stephen Abram hears too often, it’s that many of us feel it’s impossible to keep up and learn all this new stuff in technology and learning. So he has devoted this month’s column to a few sites that he finds useful to quickly orient himself to some of the Web 2.0 technologies. Even when he has already played with or experienced some of these tools, he says, he always learns something new from these sites.
Noting that American students use 21st Century technologies in their personal lives everyday to learn, create content, and communicate with peers, SIIA education companies worked together to develop the Vision as a guide for educational institutions to implement technology district and campus-wide.
News/Breaking News - Posted 13 Mar 2008
ISTE releases new books on RSS and PowerPoint with an educator perspective.
News/Breaking News - Posted 12 Mar 2008
In this article, Aline Soules discusses some current options for media specialists who want to adopt elearning tools and makes some suggestions about how to keep up … because, as she notes, "the pointers that will help you today will be old hat tomorrow and obsolete the day after."
The company's new EasyTech lessons and activities support middle school students to learn critical skills in blogs, podcasts, online communicating and more.
News/Breaking News - Posted 07 Feb 2008
The solution is highlighted by new partnerships with key educational technology companies, including Futurekids, Inc., 8e6 Technologies, Promethean, and RM Educational Software, that broaden CDW-G’s offerings.
News/Breaking News - Posted 28 Jan 2008
Reinventing Project Based Learning: Your Field Guide to Real-World Projects in the Digital Age offers educators a practical guide for maximizing the benefits of project-based learning in today’s technology-rich learning environment.
News/Breaking News - Posted 17 Jan 2008
The featured technologies in the book, Technology in the Secondary Science Classroom, range from the easy to master, such as digital cameras, to the more complex, like probeware and geographic information systems.
News/Breaking News - Posted 11 Jan 2008
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) will launch the ICT Competency Standards for Teachers at the World Ministerial Seminar in London on Jan. 8.
News/Breaking News - Posted 07 Jan 2008
Do you still remember the thrill of receiving a summer postcard from your teacher? How exciting it was to open the mailbox and find that personal piece of mail waiting—and to realize that your teacher was thinking of you. Perhaps the photograph on the face of the card led you to the encyclopedia to learn more about a particular place, while a handwritten line or two described a cultural experience, unusual food, or new language. Travel postcards, sent by thoughtful teachers over the years, have broadened the world of many a child. Yesterday’s postcards have gone high-tech. Weblogs, or blogs, enable today’s teachers to send a new kind of post, sharing their travel experiences as they unfold. Blogs provide an up-to-the-minute opportunity for teachers to continue to educate their students through semester breaks, to interact with their school communities, and to share experiences and locales that encourage understanding of the broader world. And those 21st century postcards come complete with the ability to upload and publish journal entries, photos, slideshows, audio, video, and educational links.
The Consortium for School Networking (CoSN) will hold its 13th annual conference March 9-11 in Washington, D.C.
News/Breaking News - Posted 22 Dec 2007
The Accidental Technology Trainer: A Guide for Libraries addresses a range of issues for library staff who find themselves newly responsible for technology training, be it in computer labs, classrooms, or one-on-one with library users.
News/Breaking News - Posted 21 Dec 2007
Teacher education programs for initial licensure are oriented toward preparing teacher candidates to use educational technology, according to a report from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES).
News/Breaking News - Posted 06 Dec 2007
The Consortium for School Networking (CoSN) offers a free Small School District Technology Leadership wiki created with support from the U.S. Department of Education.
News/Free Resources - Posted 21 Nov 2007
The EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative's (ELI's) 7 Things You Should Know About… series provides concise information on emerging learning technologies and related practices.
News/Free Resources - Posted 22 Oct 2007
The International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) released “Differentiating Instruction with Technology in K-5 Classrooms,” a book written by Grace E. Smith and Stephanie Throne.
News/Breaking News - Posted 22 Oct 2007
Three winners will receive an Interwrite Makeover by creating a music video of the song of their choice, plus prizes valued at more than $15,000
News/Breaking News - Posted 11 Sep 2007
The International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) recently released the second edition of its National Educational Technology Standards for Students (NET*S).
News/Breaking News - Posted 11 Sep 2007
While our students might be able to click through Web sites with ease and change the layouts of their MySpace profiles in the blink of an eye, there are still many things we can teach them about the read/write Web. There are also many ways we can teach our students using the read/write Web. Underlying these opportunities is the possibility to use the read/write Web to discuss the issues of authorship, authenticity, and the production of information—all topics for rich discussions of information literacy. This article provides a review of some of the best online tools you can use to excite teachers and to prepare students to be active agents in today’s participatory culture.
The International Society for Technology in Education (NECC) is seeking proposals for the juried portion of the National Educational Computing Conference (NECC), to be held June 29 - July 2, 2008 in San Antonio, Texas.
News/Breaking News - Posted 29 Aug 2007
Nearly all students with online access—96 percent—use social networking technologies such as chatting, text messaging, blogging, and online communities such as Facebook, MySpace, and Webkinz, according to a new study released by the National School Boards Association and Grunwald Associates LLC.
News/Breaking News - Posted 17 Aug 2007
Don Johnston, Inc. and the Center for Implementing Technology in Education (CITEd) are co-sponsors of the “Moving Forward with Technology” free Webinar series covering a variety of technology-related topics.
News/Free Resources - Posted 06 Aug 2007
The Consortium for School Networking (CoSN) is accepting presentation proposals for its 13th annual K-12 School Networking Conference until August 24, 2007.
News/Breaking News - Posted 18 Jul 2007
Cables, adapters, and memory cards disappear; batteries run low at inopportune times; and busy teachers quickly borrow a camera from another classroom “just for a second” to take advantage of a photo opp. Digital photographers excited about creating photo-filled classroom Web pages come to work sessions with a camera incompatible with the computer’s software or without the necessary connecting cable. It seems that no technology has caused more management hassles than digital cameras. Well, if you've got such problems—and who doesn't?—Mary Alice Anderson's got answers!
Blogs, wikis, social software, Web 2.0—it’s not really about the technologies but about the method of collaboration between users that presents some of the more interesting advantages. The goal of authors Robert Lackie and Robert Terrio in this article is to continue the discussions of practical Web 2.0 tools and social networking sites that have been brought up in this magazine and at recent school librarian conferences and to highlight other collaborative tools and exciting developments in free Web 2.0 social software, items they categorize as “Useful Collaborative Tools” and “Practical Mashups”—both very exciting and practical for today’s teacher-librarian!
Educational videoconferencing has come a long way over the years. It started out very slowly, and, in recent years, there has been a burst of interest on the part of museums and zoos in providing their educational programs via this medium. As schools find it more difficult and more expensive to take their students on physical field trips, students are missing out on the phenomenal resources that these cultural institutions have to offer. When gas prices began to rise, local museums found that even schools in the neighborhood were unwilling to spend their precious fuel budgets bussing students off-site. Those in the museum community chose to take this as a sign that they should begin to promote their distance learning efforts.
The Consortium for School Networking (CoSN) released two new case studies, illustrating how school districts in Iowa and Wisconsin measured and assessed the costs and benefits of planned technology projects.
News/Breaking News - Posted 29 Jun 2007
The International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) unveiled an update to its National Educational Technology Standards for Students (NETS*S) at the National Educational Computing Conference (NECC) in Atlanta.
News/Breaking News - Posted 28 Jun 2007
The new netTrekker channel provides educators and students with three pathways to find resources that support the core elements of 21st century skills.
News/Breaking News - Posted 27 Jun 2007
TeachingBooks.net filmed award-winning authors Sharon Creech, Walter Dean Myers, Sarah Weeks, and Avi performing scripts from one another’s books, including Love That Dog, Don’t You Know There’s A War On?, Bad Boy, and others.
News/Breaking News - Posted 14 May 2007
Charles Doe's Look At ... this month surveys software that includes student management systems featuring record keeping, scheduling, and other similar tasks; teacher evaluations; online learning environments; communications (usually email); grades and grade books; reporting; and more.
Technology is playing a key role in various types of communication within the classroom today, changing the way communication takes place in a way that is having a real impact on learning. A different breed of technology, leveraging the power of simplistic Web 2.0 design principles, is proving to finally break through with a real impact on students and teachers. Technology such as online learning communities is proving to offer a more dynamic learning experience, with direct benefit to students and teachers. It’s a refreshing change for educators who have struggled with the complexity, cost, and practicality of the last generation of technology tools.
The new licensing, certification, and curriculum programs for primary and secondary schools will make it easier for schools to deploy Adobe’s new offering of integrated design and development tools into the curriculum.
News/Breaking News - Posted 24 Apr 2007
The Florida Educational Technology Conference (FETC) is seeking Applications to Present for consideration for the 55-minute sessions to be held on Thursday, January 24, and Friday, January 25, 2008 in Orlando, Florida.
News/Breaking News - Posted 15 Apr 2007
As online learning has become commonplace at universities throughout the country, the option is now being explored to a greater degree by teachers and administrators at the secondary and elementary levels. Nancy Rohland-Heinrich and Brian Jensen take you through the state of the art of online learning in this feature, with special emphasis on the role of media specialists in supporting and furthering it.
GenevaLogic now offers three new education kits designed to provide individual classrooms and entire schools with classroom management tools for effective computer teaching.
News/Breaking News - Posted 07 Feb 2007
Mary Ann continues this month to ponder the question of when, whether, and how to use technology in teaching and learning. After all, she notes, her friend Bernie Poole stands up for technophobes in certain cases, writing to her: "If they're truly technophobes, leave them alone, Mary. They deserve their space. They can teach absolutely as effectively the way they know and love as if they were constrained to use high tech."
Multimedia online technologies now offer an unprecedented ability to enable every student, teacher, and even every family to "meet" the authors of books they are reading. If you have ever seen an author speak or have hosted authors in your school, you have experienced the impact meeting an author has on a personal relationship to a book. It humanizes the book, it reveals the person and personality that created it, and more. This article highlights specific ways you can replicate these personal connections to authors and illustrators by optimizing a variety of multimedia and online technologies.
All PBS TeacherLine courses embed technology resources in the course content. Educational technology provides the means to engage students in core subjects while helping them gain skills to communicate, collaborate, and create, the announcement states.
News/Breaking News - Posted 08 Nov 2006
Mary Ann Bell counts herself as a hortiphobe-turned-hortiphile. Well, almost. The point is, she says, she was able to change. And she thinks you can help your school's remaining technophobes change as well.
A mystifying or vague buzzword to many, Web 2.0 was made fashionable in late 2004 by O'Reilly Media, the foremost publisher of computer technology books and a leader in cutting edge online technology conferences. This article will provide an introduction to Web 2.0 for libraries and will also attempt to bring to light a few notable, free Web-based interactive communication tools that can help librarians and other educators seamlessly access, create, organize, and disseminate information for their library, themselves, colleagues, and friends. The resources mentioned and the references and recommended readings provided should bring librarians up-to-speed on little-known and newer techniques, tools, and thinking on this crucial topic.
SIFA has also released its first version of the SIF Web Service Reporting Specification, version 1.0.
News/Breaking News - Posted 31 Oct 2006
MaxData is designed to teach students all aspects of data handling, from the first steps of simple representation of data, to learning database concepts such as fields, field types, records, tables, and filters.
News/Breaking News - Posted 06 Oct 2006
ISTE’s new book is a comprehensive guide for planning, implementing, and managing successful laptop programs in the classroom.
News/Breaking News - Posted 25 Aug 2006
Here’s a hot Cool Link, thanks to the Internet Scout Project’s Scout Report. It all points to the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching’s Knowledge Media Laboratory and its work on how technology can best be used in the classroom.
News/Cool Links - Posted 21 Aug 2006
UltraKey 5.0 now includes new features that enable Spanish-speaking students to hear instructional support in their first language while learning to keyboard in English.
News/Breaking News - Posted 11 Aug 2006
“Using Data for School Reform” is one component of SETDA’s 2006 Leadership Summit Toolkit.
News/Free Resources - Posted 04 Aug 2006
For August 1, 2006: At DigiTales, multiple media and storytelling really come alive! The Web site presents seven steps to creating a 3-5 minute digital movie, with specific directions for each step.
Cyberbee Web Pick/Cyberbee's Web Picks - Posted 01 Aug 2006
By
Linda C. Joseph
Through the partnership, Inspiration will be preloaded on Fourier’s Nova5000 student computing device.
News/Breaking News - Posted 11 Jul 2006
Designed to be a comprehensive online source for educators, Promethean Planet provides searchable information to help educators maximize the use of interactive technology in the classroom.
News/Free Resources - Posted 05 Jul 2006
The software now includes built-in lesson plans with activity files to further help teachers integrate technology into their language arts, math, science, and social studies curricula.
News/Breaking News - Posted 05 Jul 2006
In this issue, Linda Joseph's Cyberbee guides you and students to sites with ideas and tools, plus loads of examples, for leaving "a legacy of cultural history for future generations through digital storytelling."
GO Solve Word Problems, Science Court, Reading for Meaning, and Decisions, Decisions 5.0 are among many of the company’s titles now supported by online guides to help educators use them with interactive whiteboards and projectors.
News/Breaking News - Posted 28 Jun 2006
The fourth annual survey of teacher technology use indicates technology access and professional development are driving improved teacher and student performance, according to the announcement.
News/Breaking News - Posted 27 Jun 2006
SirsiDynix and INFOhio, the Information Network for Ohio Schools, announced that 140 librarians and educators in Ohio are creating content for SirsiDynix SchoolRooms.
News/Breaking News - Posted 26 Jun 2006
Dr. David Thornburg’s new book, When the Best is Free: An Educator’s Perspective on Open Source Software, examines free software programs that run equally well on nearly any current operating system found in schools today.
News/Breaking News - Posted 22 May 2006
In Mary Alice Anderson's district, the high school media center is getting a makeover. As always, Mary Alice was in the thick of the process, serving on the district committee as they began planning. In this month's Media Center column, she shares wisdom gained, particularly from the committee's tour of a dozen new or recently remodeled facilities in the region.
Stephen Abram has been following the Duke University experiment of providing iPods to all students ... and a lot more that's been going on with iPods in education. iPods represent, he asserts, a bellwether technology. In this column he discusses why and lays out a host of educational activities the technology lends itself to.
The new online service is available to help districts measure K-8 students’ proficiency with information and communication technology.
News/Breaking News - Posted 22 Mar 2006
New MMIS columnist Mary Ann Bell introduces herself in her inaugural Belltones column and discusses some of her interests and plans for upcoming columns, including information ethics, technology use in schools, the principles of AASL's Infomation Power, information access, and more.
Stephen Abram writes in this month's Pipeline, "While we may be seeing some learner resistance to traditional writing and creation activities, maybe we can increase their engagement in learning good writing, editing, and information literacy competencies by aligning some of the projects with a Web-based option." Among the options he discusses are social networking, blogs, wikis, and photo sharing.
In this article, Johanna Riddle offers four elementary-level projects that use technology as the mortar of interdisciplinary and inter-literacy learning. Some of the technology applications are as simple as scanning an image or clicking a digital camera. All four of these projects spring from works of literature that are common to most school media centers. They follow a framework that includes introducing a work of literature, learning a technology process, providing reading and working time, self-evaluation, and group discussion of outcomes The communication skills garnered by the students build on each other from project to project and year to year.
The new book is a comprehensive guide for measuring students’ ability to use technology effectively for learning.
News/Breaking News - Posted 16 Feb 2006
Thinkronize’s netTrekker d.i. search engine will now feature links to Promethean lesson plans and resources for educators to use with their ACTIVclassroom solutions including the ACTIVboard, Promethean’s interactive whiteboard.
News/Breaking News - Posted 10 Feb 2006
In the last installment of the two-year run of Learning Unleashed!, Trevor Shaw looks back and takes stock of what they have accomplished over the past 2-and-a-half years of their technology infusion and integration program at his school.
In her newly published book Super Searchers Go to School, Joyce Kasman Valenza interviews a dozen prominent K–12 educators and educator-librarians who share their strategies for helping students become effective, lifelong information users. In this excerpt, Joyce elicits wisdom that points the way toward a successful future for K–12 libraries from Ken Haycock, whose impressive professional experience includes being a school librarian; principal; school board president; president of the American Association of School Librarians; and, currently, director of the school of library and information science at San Jose State University.
Expanded book and author online resources will help connect students to reading through technology, according to the TeachingBooks.net announcement.
News/Breaking News - Posted 17 Nov 2005
The tablet computer rollout--culmination of the Learning Unleashed! program--went off smoothly this fall for Trevor Shaw's school. In this column, he discusses how and why it worked out so well.
Always peering ahead, Stephen Abram discusses e-paper and e-ink technology this month, including a "here and now" form of e-paper from Sony, in his Pipeline column.
Districts nationwide are assessing progress toward achieving technology goals through a beta program that uses Learning.com's TechLiteracy Assessment.
News/Breaking News - Posted 28 Oct 2005
Trevor Shaw documents their plans in anticipation of "deployment," as the the first day of the 2005–06 school year and the initial rollout of their student tablet PC program approach.
Much has been written about the challenges “digital immigrant” teachers—those who have come later to technology—face as they work with digitally native students. But what’s it like to work with digitally native teachers? Mary Alice Anderson has noticed some consistencies among this first generation of educators to grow up with technology. This article reflects insights from other media specialists and educators as well as her own experiences working with new teachers and innumerable university students each year.
This article examines a sampling of cutting-edge early literacy products for a variety of uses: full curriculum, limited computer access, adaptive computer-based instruction, large and Web-based programs, Reading + Writing and ESL, and home or school. Keep in mind that this is not an attempt to cover the entire category; these programs were selected as good examples of their types.
In the latest in the Super Searchers book series, leading librarians and educators share their strategies for helping K-12 students become effective, life-long information users.
News/Breaking News - Posted 24 Aug 2005
MDR’s report features the latest data on purchasing practices and preferences and on teachers’ use of e-mail.
News/Breaking News - Posted 06 Jul 2005
This month, Trevor Shaw focuses again on the importance of the public relations aspect of his school’s tablet PC initiative—good PR gained largely through a substantive, all-faculty professional development day primarily planned and executed by the faculty themselves, that is.
This article—Part 2 of Barbara Fiehn's two-part series on a group of library systems vendors that are active in the K–12 realm—reflects interviews with vendors who work with a wide range of library environments: Mandarin Library Automation, The Library Corporation (TLC), Innovative Interfaces, and Sirsi Corporation were asked to talk about current and future developments in library automation.
Learning.com’s new offering will allow districts to assess progress toward achieving national and state technology goals and mandates, according to the announcement.
News/Breaking News - Posted 29 Jun 2005
ISTE’s new book is a collection of essays on exemplary projects from the Preparing Tomorrow’s Teachers to Use Technology program.
News/Breaking News - Posted 15 Jun 2005
Pinnacle Studio and Advanced Academic Toolkits are designed to be simple, affordable software that makes learning fun.
News/Breaking News - Posted 25 May 2005
For this article, author Dr. Barbara Fiehn spoke with four vendors—Follett, Sagebrush, Companion Corp., and Dynix—to determine what, in their estimation, would be "coming soon," what would be coming "within five years," what the salient trends to watch might be, and what else mattered in the world of library automation for K-12. (Note that she’ll be speaking with another group of automation vendors for their perspectives in Part 2 of this story, for the July/August 2005 issue.)
Change can be hard to swallow, and the introduction of one-to-one computing has presented massive changes for virtually everyone involved in Trevor Shaw's school's technology initiative, Learning Unleashed. In this column, Shaw discusses their experiences with getting parents and teachers on board with the initiative, in the face of resistance to change. And he comments on new tactics they evolved that helped.
EasyTech, available in English and Spanish, provides a series of instructional lessons that integrate technology into the core curriculum. Working at their own pace, students complete activities while learning how to use a variety of technology tools for their curriculum-related products.
Canvastic is a publishing tool that combines paint, draw, and text tools and can be used to created single page-sized documents or slideshows. The program offers easy-to-understand text, draw and paint tools, and a clear interface. Canvastic is customizable for use with younger students and has none of the "toy" features that are common with paint programs for this age group. The download package includes backgrounds, clipart, templates, and some sample lessons in several content areas.
News/Breaking News - Posted 23 Feb 2005
Staff technology training sessions can get bogged down if too much time is spent in direct instruction and not enough time is spent actually working on projects and discussing ideas of how to use the technology in classes. There are ways to avoid such pitfalls, however, and this month’s Learning Unleashed! column discusses some techniques … learned from experience.
The NCLB Act mandates technology literacy by the time students reach the eighth grade. To prepare for meeting this mandate, our district worked to equip the school community with all the tools it would need to help the students achieve computer proficiency by the end of their eighth grade year. But initially, we found that not enough of the district's eighth graders had met the standards we set. We soon realized that despite adequate facilities, equipment, and funding, we would not succeed in achieving computer proficiency without a technology literacy teaching tool. The missing piece was curriculum—a program to teach kids technology skills in a real-world context.
We now have some pretty good track records on some new technologies that make access to information—both physical and intellectual access—simpler and, therefore, we hope, better. Hurdles to that access exist in both the physical and virtual worlds. Requiring a PC or specific browser to access information sets a hurdle in place in the virtual environment. Requiring information to be used within a library during specific hours is a hurdle of sorts too. Here are five key technologies that improve access in one way or another, or both.
As the Web continues to develop and faster Internet access becomes available to more individuals, the likelihood of Web-based programs replacing CD-ROMs is becoming more and more real. The advantages provided by subscription Web-based services will lead them to be used for direct instructional purposes in the classroom.
Shaw discusses his 3-day workshop for teachers, which is designed for technology training and model effective teaching. The lack of time available for teachers to experiment with technology and to develop ideas is one of the biggest problem they seem to have about technology training, so he designed his workshop with a mix of direct instruction activities and unstructured time in order to give them their flexible, free time.
Technological advances have provided new opportunities and greater power to support the teachers' endeavors and have simplified the process of collecting and using data to help them make informed decisions about their increasingly thinning resources, to better collaborate on what works, and, ultimately, to help all children learn.
A comprehensive, integrated suite of CD- and DVD-burning tools.
Earth Science, Life Science, Physical Science
PLATO Intermediate Writing Process and Practice is designed to supplement and support the teaching of writing in the middle school years. The program contains levels of lessons with a focus on many of the specific writing skills set by NCTE and the Mid-Continent Research for Education and Learning Lab.
The Blobs, an interactive animated program with narration by Jane Horrocks, helps students learn basic number, letter, color, and beginning word skills.
In "Learning Unleashed!" Trevor Shaw is chronicling the progress of a multi-faceted technology initiative at the Dwight-Englewood School, a private K-12 day school in Bergen County, New Jersey. This issue's column focuses on introducing the school's board and staff to the concepts involved, and 30 of the staff to new tablet computers.
Go! Temp is a science tool that provides students with the opportunity to collect, examine, and calculate data using a sensor probe. The program allows data to be saved, displayed, graphed, analyzed, and recalled.
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