“The iPad is just a neat tablet computer, it does not have magic learning dust coming out of the back vent” was a tweet I sent yesterday and which I wanted to follow up with a more substantive post. Being an avid twitter kind-of person, I read quite a few tweets about the iPad in education and teachers eager to introduce these to their classrooms, and it was one of these which pushed me into the mini-rant you see encapsulated above. This is in no way an anti-iPad posting (although I imagine some  show all text

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I’ve been wanting to write a follow up to my popular 1st little book for some time now, but I really wanted to make sure that all of the ideas that I put in to it were really tried and tested. That they really have got the pedagogical impact that teachers want from tools that students use in their lessons. It is really important to me that teachers don’t just take these ideas as an alternative to engaging students with engaging learning opportunities, but that they use them as tools to enhance ...  show all text

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Hosting a Google+ Hangout can be good way to have a video conference with a small group, but only if everyone you want to join you has a Google account. Meetings.io doesn't require users to register at all which could make it a great alternative to Google+ Hangouts. Meetings.io allows you to have up to five people in a room. You can start using Meetings.io by simply clicking on the blue "Get a Meeting Room" button. When you click that button Meetings.io will create your room and assign it a URL  show all text

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“Be regular and orderly in your life, so that you may be violent and original in your work.” ~ Gustave Flaubert Learning online can be an incredible journey but at some point you may feel overwhelmed with the surplus of information and resources. You may feel very excited about a resource you come across, but want to access that resource at some other date. Perhaps, you are teaching your students how to research online and they want to bookmark and create notes on websites. Many free webtools e...  show all text

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I seriously considered leaving education today. And if I had a viable exit strategy I might have taken it further. Did I have a bad lesson? Was a pupil abusive, violent or threatening towards me? Not at all. I had the pleasure of my delightful Y7s, made a breakthrough with my Y8s, managed some productive revision and even had a pleasant time on a cover lesson. What made me think about leaving was the agenda for Monday’s full staff meeting. Item 1? OFSTED. And pinned up next to it, the minutes of  show all text

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For the past years, Apple has been showcasing the educational advantages of devices like Macs, iPhones and iPods on its Apple in Education website. Since the introduction of the iPad in 2010, however, the company has been making an effort to position the device as the best tool now available to teachers and students to improve the quality of education and level of engagement. The dedicated iPad in Education webpage showcases recent moves by Apple such as iBooks Textbooks and the iTunes U iOS ap...  show all text

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The Research tool makes it easy to add information from the web to your documents. To access the tool:Select the Research option from the Tools menu.Use the keyboard shortcut (Cmd + Opt + R on Ma

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Inkling is an e-book publishing platform that's currently running an app on the App Store, and while Apple has been making an official push for more textbooks in iBooks, Inkling is strengthening its own holdings. The company has made a deal with Follett to bring hundreds of Inkling titles into college bookstores, where students can buy the ebook content right there in person. The company is selling whole textbooks, or it's also offering a program called "Pick 3," which allows students to grab t...  show all text

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"A flashcard or flash card is a set of cards bearing information, as words or numbers, on either or both sides, used in classroom drills or in private study. One writes a question on a card and an answer overleaf. Flashcards can bearvocabulary, historical dates, formulas or any subject matter that can be learned via a question and answer format. Flashcards are widely used as a learning drill to aidmemorization by way of spaced repetition. (wikipedia)"  Flashcards are used by students and educat...  show all text

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A newly launched app called Nearpod will allow teachers to create and share interactive lessons for mobile devices, and help them receive feedback on the ways students are using their devices.

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By the Boston Globe (Editorial) What value the certificate ends up having — if any — will be up to the market. But the fact that online classes are new and unfamiliar doesn’t mean they won’t eventually be recognized as meaningful.   Now, having MIT and Harvard involved in online education makes it a lot more likely the classes offered by edX will be rigorous, and that the credentials it awards will be taken seriously.  The long-standing higher-education formula — four years at a high-cost resid...  show all text

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Ever since I discovered it last July, I've been promoting using A Cleaner Internet as a way to remove from YouTube unwanted "related" videos and advertisements. The only problem was that it required users to install the extension on Chrome, Firefox, or Safari. That left out anyone working in a school that doesn't allow them to install extensions and anyone forced to use Internet Explorer. That problem has been resolved. If you point your browser to http://youtube.clea.nr you can search YouTube...  show all text

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Are American students spending too much of their lives at their desks? And is putting in that grueling second shift of homework paying off in the long-term? Two recent studies have fueled a growing debate over how much homework is too much, and whether it has any benefit at all.

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GmapGIS is an easy to use Google Map creation tool which allows you to quickly draw polygons, lines, labels and markers on a map and then save for later use or editing. There are obviously many possible uses for GmapGIS. One use which instantly springs to my mind is that it is the perfect map tool for teachers to use with an interactive whiteboard. Using the Google Maps satellite view with the drawing tools GMapsGIS would be a great aide to geography teachers teaching geological features. Tea...  show all text

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What it is:  Next year we are adding a kindergarten to Anastasis (currently we are a 1st-8th grade school). In honor of this addition, I’ve been digging up some fun primary sites and resources.  Quincy and the Magic Instruments is a great primary site to teach students about music and instruments.  The site is enchanting with it’s interactive story/video platform. It invites students to take part in the story and introduces them to various “magic” instruments. As students learn, they get mouse ...  show all text

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Even as we are seeing more schools and educators transform the way they teach and learn with technology, many more are not. Some of the reasons for not embracing technology have to do with several misconceptions.

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Web startups are made out of two things: people and code. The people make the code, and the code makes the people rich. Code is like a poem; it has to follow certain structural requirements, and yet out of that structure can come art. But code is art that does something. It is the assembly of something brand new from nothing but an idea. More »

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Education Week Teacher's take on the latest news, ideas, and resources for teacher leaders. Coverage runs the gamut from the inspirational to the infuriating, from practical classroom tips to raging policy debates, and from "news you can use" to "news of the weird".

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The picture of college that we get from Hollywood is usually one where everyone is happy, carefree, and laid back, giving no thought to tomorrow. If only college were actually like that. While university days should be some of the most exciting and enjoyable times in a person’s life, there’s no getting around the fact that there is immense pressure to achieve academically.

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Zoho Sites is a new site by the creators of the Zoho Suite (online learning tools) that allows users to create free web pages.  This is ideal for educators and is a nice alternative to Google Sites/Weebly/etc.  Also, ZS is very easy to use, has stunning looking themes/templates (Blue Fume rocks!!), and even allows for blogging.  (FYI, a paid PRO account offers for more features). I recommend checking out Zoho Sites by clicking here!! Thanks to David Andrade's wonderful blog for the tip!! ...  show all text

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We're always trying to figure out the best tools for teachers, trends in the education technology industry, and generally doing our darnedest to bring you new and exciting ways to enhance the classroom. But I wanted to take a moment to bring a wonderful list of resources to your attention.

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Blogger Andrew Miller recalls five critical lessons about staying fresh and focused from early in his own teaching career.

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This afternoon I discovered a new feature in Google Documents (now a part of Google Drive) that could prove to be handy for students to use while writing research papers. Google Docs now has a search function built-in. This feature allows users to search the web without having to leave the document they're viewing. To access the new feature open the "tools" menu then select "research" while you have a document open. The search box will appear on the righthand side of your screen. See my screens...  show all text

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Teacher Shelley Wright is on leave from her classroom, working with teachers in a half-dozen high schools to promote inquiry and connected learning. I think the revised Bloom’s Taxonomy is wrong. Hear me out. I know this statement sounds heretical in the realms of education, but I think this is something we should rethink, especially since it is so widely taught to pre-service teachers.  I agree that the taxonomy accurately classifies various types of cognitive thinking skills. It certainly ide...  show all text

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This article was originally posted on the Getting Smart blog. From the first week of school, the six year olds in my classroom begin to create an online presence in the form of a digital portfolio.  We use a blogging platform to do this, and include artifacts that show their progress in writing, reading, math, social studies and science. I am frequently asked why I do this.  Even more frequently, I can see in a colleague’s eyes that they are thinking “why”, even if they don’t verbalize their q...  show all text

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