Summer improvements

Source: Plik:Wikinews collaboration logo.svg

Finally, summer vacation is in full swing around the country. Well, as far as I know no one is still waiting to begin break. That word "break" is a bit of a misnomer for many of us in education since summer is really a time for us to reflect on learning outcomes and use the data to alter instruction for the coming year.

A great way to work collaboratively on data interpretation is by using Google Spreadsheets. Collaboration is an important part of data interpretation since it requires us to infer what has worked and what needs to change. Software, algorithms and spreadsheet formulas are great for doing math, but they'll never give us the explanations or guidance we need improve outcomes. No, that takes human intervention. With Google Spreadsheets, you can upload any Excel document that contains assessment data. Once it's uploaded, change the privacy settings to Anyone who has the link can edit. Email that link to your colleagues and you can all start sorting through the information together. There is no need to have a Google account, they just need the link you've provided. 

If your colleagues do have a Google account, then you have an even better opportunity to work with the data- Google plus. While continuing to collaborate on the Spreadsheet, up to 10 people can video chat about the information through Hangouts. Essentially, you'll be having a virtual PLC which saves everyone time and gas money.

This summer, don't just work solo. Get together with others in your department over a Google Spreadsheet and come up with some great ideas. You'll be sure to see great results in the coming year. And, hey... you'll also have something to brag about to administrators.

DIY LMS or get one pre-made?

I've been wondering about Learning Management Systems (LMS's). How exactly is learning management different from teaching? Yes, I know all of the discussion about online content storage, assessment creation and data tracking. All of that really just begs the question, though. After all, in a typical teaching situation, there is a person who serves as a repository of information (supplemented by a textbook) who gives out assignments and keeps track of how students are performing. An LMS is really just a way to do all of this digitally. 

Since an LMS is a digital "teacher", can't we as teachers just make our own LMS? And are formal LMS's performing any better than ad-hoc systems? I've read quite a bit on both sides of the argument. So far, I'm not wowed by the pre-fab products. A well designed system can provide students with the essential items. First, they'll need review materials (videos, presentations, text) to understand an idea. Next, is a way to work with the material socially or alone so that learners understand ideas rather than memorize facts or phrases. This is typically done by assigning some sort of assignment. Finally, the system also has to have some way to assess students and share that assessment data with the students in a secure and sensible way. Usually, this is in the form of a gradebook. 

I've put these ad-hoc LMS's together using Google tools and a bit of hard work and they've performed pretty well. The biggest challenge (besides creating the actual learning material) was to decide how to organize everything so students could easily find what they wanted to quickly and easily. However, since all LMS's have a very similar design, it wasn't terribly difficult to get it to work about as well as Moodle or Blackboard. The most important thing I did was to keep the system consistent with what I did in the classroom. I think if a teacher does that, any LMS is as good as the next. 

Gmail and ESL

Update: Gmail now available in Latin American Spanish

Originally posted by Chris Yang, Product Manager, Translator Toolkit

It has taken Google a surprisingly long time to provide translation services for Latin American Spanish (LAS) emailers. As teachers, we have been working with LAS communities for years and communication between English speaking teachers and non-English speaking parents can be tricky. Now that we can translate our emails into LAS, parent-teacher communication just got easier.

Google hopes that by making Gmail available in many languages, more people will be able to share their culture and knowledge with others worldwide. Spanish is spoken by more than 300 million people in the Americas and the Caribbean. The Latin American Spanish version of Gmail is designed to be a closer match to the expectations of Spanish speakers in the Americas. You can select Latin American Spanish as your default language in Settings:

Advantages of Google for teachers

For schools, Google holds a number of advantages over other online programs. I'd like to focus on one aspect in particular. Google's products all play well together. Examples are listed below.

Docs and Blogger- Blogger is a pretty good blogging platform. I can get all of the basic functionality that I expect including the ability to change fonts, add images and link to other websites. It’s a pretty limited word processor, though. Notice that I’m able to adjust the left margin of the lower portion of this paragraph. Blogger doesn’t allow me to do that, so I go over to Google Docs to write and edit my work. Then I simply cut and paste. Since these are both Google products, the formatting is perfectly preserved.

Docs and Calendar- Google Calendar is a wonderful product which allows you to easily record and share events online. One of the great features of Calendar is that you can attach any file stored in your Docs to an event. This integration makes the entire process of lesson planning effortless. Plans are easy to produce since they are laid out visually. Students can see the events you allow them to see and be able to access attached study guides. Teachers can collaborate on planning and restrict the public from accessing any sensitive events or files. Click here to read more.

Gmail, Chat, Google plus and Docs- Google’s email platform is top of the line. Space is almost unlimited (I have over 15,000 emails and only use 29% of my allotted space) and its search ability is unmatched. It also works beautifully with Google’s other social products. For schools with Google apps, this means that you’d be able to send instant messages to colleagues and administration to ask for assistance or to verify a student’s excuse for coming in late. In addition, you have the option of storing any and all email attachments in your Docs account. You can even adjust Gmail’s search preferences so that it will look through your Docs as well as your emails.

Openclass and everything else- Openclass is a learning management system (LMS) produced by Google and Pearson. The platform is very similar to products like Blackboard and Moodle. Accounts are free and since it is all online, there are not upkeep costs. One of the big advantages here, however, is the single log-in. After logging in once, students have access to Gmail, Docs, Calendar and Youtube as well as being able to access any online course material.

I know that there are dozens of great online products for schools to choose from. Some of these products are better for certain faculty than Google. However, given all of the great ways Google’s products work together, it makes sense to look closely before going with something else.

Content knowledge and digital literacy

wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons Almeida_Júnior_-_Moça_com_Livro.jp


While at supper with friends, someone asked me to look over some medical claims they found online. A quick glance at the material revealed it to be a fraud. The article mentioned softening the patient's cell walls. Humans don't have cell walls, just membranes. Had my friend known this basic biological fact, she could have rejected the information out of hand.  She’s not alone, though. People tend to trust the first few Google hits rather than reading what is there and judging accordingly.

The fact that we can learn anything, anywhere and at any time we please has convinced quite a few people that content knowledge is a silly goal to pursue. The idea is that since mobile devices and the internet gives us unfettered access to information, there should be no reason to "waste" time teaching students any basic content knowledge.  Such opinions are dangerously mistaken. After all, electronics run out of power, loose connection and (gasp) get lost. More importantly, students will be exposed to large amounts of questionable material online. Without the internal resources to double check validity, anyone can be led to believe scams which could be costly indeed.

The trick is to use triangulation. This is a process of using three sources to figure out the accuracy of information. When researching online, the three sources are as follows:

1. You- Consider how comfortable you feel about the article or claim. Does it feel right? If there are warning bells going off in your head, pay attention.
2. The Internet
3. A trusted expert- This could be a teacher, doctor or encyclopedia. It could also be your background education. The important thing is to look to an outside authority. Which agrees more with the authority... you or the internet?

Teachers of course have limited time. We struggle to strike a balance between teaching content knowledge and thinking skills. The triangulation method is a great way to find some of that balance. Not only will students have a great critical thinking tool, but they’ll also have additional motivation to learn content. When students ask “Why do we have to know this?” you can always tell them that it will help them avoid being ripped off by liars and idiots.

Space for learning

One of the great things about word processors is the ability to manipulate documents in any way you see fit. Whichever program you use, you should be aware of the importance of blank space. Emptiness is not the same thing as "nothing". If you're purposeful about the way you use emptiness, it will work to promote learning in your students. Here are several ways blank space can help your students in the learning process.

1) Chunking information-

Emptiness takes up real estate which means less information can fit on a single page. You’ll be forced to put only the most important items there.  A handout ought to contain all the relevant material for a lesson and leave out all the fluff. This way, students can focus more easily on what matters.

2) Focus-

Blank space will guide students’ eyes to the right spot. Too many items on a sheet of paper confuses the reader. Grouping pictures and text boxes to one side not only makes your handout visually appealing, but also provides space for students to write in.

3) Note space-

As I just mentioned, kids need a place to write down important information. As you know, actively engaging with a handout is going to lead to greater understanding and retention than passively reading it. Emptiness also provides the space to jot down clarifications and questions they may have.

4) Interest-

Beauty isn’t your first aim. However, if something is more appealing, it becomes more interesting which in turn makes material more memorable. That in turn improves learning. Consider using white space to add asymmetry, depth and perspective to your materials.

The old adage that “less is more” still holds true. Try to include a bit more white space in your handouts and see what the results are. Please let me know if you see any improvements!

Classroom communications and the computer

We're in the communications business. We need to get our lesson across to kids, let our administrators know how well we're doing in the classroom and help parents understand how to help their child succeed in academia. As in all other communication fields, there are 4 primary ways we get information across. Each of these is important and each can be improved by technology.

1) Electronic

This includes things like email and teacher webpages. Really, it should just be used to pass along information like homework assignments, powerpoints or weekly lesson plans.

This is NOT the place to try to inspire or motivate your students. While sites like Edmodo have some motivational items (badges, for instance), these sites are primarily for relaying content.

2) Phone

Telephones are mainly for short conversations and for the assurance that a teacher has actually made contact with an adult. While there's no way to know for sure if a note was read, the voice on the other end of the line lets you know the message was received. Most teachers keep a hand written log of their calls. There are sites, however that will provide verification that phone calls were indeed made when you said they were. My favorite is Google voice. Here, you can make calls for free strait from any computer. This is a one of a kind service in that it provides outside verification and it is searchable. You can quickly and easily bring up the number of calls you made to a student's home and the exact dates and times you did so. The fact that you can add notes allows you to keep track of what was said during each conversation.

3) Handwritten

This may be the most personal of all communications. As we move closer to electronic classrooms, this really needs to stay in place. Consider the fact that we'll put little notes in a scrapbook, but we forget about an email in two weeks time.

Right now, tablet devices like the iPad are the means by which people are adding handwriting to their electronic media. I use PDF Notes Free. It's an app that lets you bring up any PDF document on the iPad and write whatever you like. When you're done, just email the annotated PDF to whomever you like.

4) Live communication-

This is the one time people get those compliments, smiles, and handshakes they don't find elsewhere. This is also where relationship building really happens. We need to take advantage of the fact that people can see our facial expression, here our tone of voice and read our body language to get the full meaning of what we say to them. While nothing electronic can really take the place of face to face communication, there are some tools that can bring us closer when we can't meet in person.

Skype is probably the best known, but any online video chat will give you good results. These services allow you to see one another while you chat, adding a personal dimension to a tutoring session or parent conference.

Consider these methods of communication in your own professional work. I've mentioned a couple of useful tools here, but I'd love to hear what other online tools you come across to improve your own communication. If you think of something, please leave a comment.

Teachers of robots so students can learn more

As teachers we are charged with increasing the amount of knowledge in the world. We work with our students whatever their age to help them gain skills and information. Most of us, though (myself included) are in the business of spreading information rather than generating new knowledge. Now, what if you knew you could aid researchers by playing online games? What if, just by goofing around on the internet, you could add to the knowledge pool in addition to passing it on to students? Well, you can.

One such game is devoted to fixing mistakes in an index of old Finnish newspapers. These fixes increase the accuracy of text-based searches and therefore increases the amount of information available for all of us online. The site is called Digitaltalkoot. The games are set up with moles as the characters. In the game, you are to double check the computer's reading of a selection of text. You get points as you play.

Perhaps more well known are the games designed to increase scientific knowledge. These online games include Foldit and EteRNA.  Both of them deal with solving biological puzzles involving shapes. Foldit deals with proteins while EteRNA deals with RNA. You earn points by making shapes that are likely to to exist in nature. The games have worked so well, Foldit players have been able to help in AIDS research!

These are great examples of how digital systems can improve our understanding of the world. Here is proof positive that a well designed system can help the world learn new and important information from people who are just having fun!

Digital reading and 'riting in education

Reading and writing used to be much simpler. We would get some sort of sharp stick (a pen or pencil) and scratch at paper until the marks we made could be interpreted by someone else. Well, our writing has evolved somewhat and along with it, so has our reading. Nowhere is this change more evident than in the home of reading, 'riting and 'rithmetic... academia.

Lets start by looking at our writing tools. Lets start off with PDF's. For those of you unfamiliar with the term, PDF's are files that can't (of themselves) be modified. Admittedly, this is kind of a strange place to start. After all, they're designed to be immutable. The funny thing is, that unchanging nature lets us write in a special way. On my iPad, I have an app called PDF notes free. With it, I can highlight, jot down notes, or add doodles. I can't call this idea new, really. I mean, students draw in the margins of books all the time. In my case, though, I can erase everything whenever I want.

Interactive whiteboards (IWB's) like Promethean and Smartboard are also great ways to work with PDF's. Most worksheets come in PDF form these days and can easily be imported and used on an IWB. If your favorite handout doesn't have a digital copy, you can make one by scanning the sheet and saving it as a PDF. You could either use a scanner or the scan function on your copier. That PDF can then be imported and projected onto the IWB so that students can write on or highlight the important parts of the worksheet. The process of working on a handout becomes far more participatory this way.

Digital tools are great, but has anyone really tried to make a better pen? Yes, as a matter of fact. Livescribe is an extraordinary tool that looks and writes like a regular pen, but records information like no other divice out there. Whatever you write with the pen is recorded along with the audio it picks up. Later you can relive your note-taking and watch as your words and drawings apear in time with the teacher's lecture. This adds two new dimensions to traditional note taking. Audio is one of them of course, and can help you keep up with fast talkers. The other (and less obvious) dimension is time. When you see when items are added you can put them in context.

 Reading, too has changed dramatically. Consider the flood of electronic textbooks that have come out in the last year or so:
iBooks
Chegg Etextbooks
Amazon's Kindle Fire books
Kno
Pearson success net
Glenco online additions
...or just Google eTextbooks to see a huge list pop up.

Students don't have haul 40 pounds of books around. Okay, so in theory they wouldn't have to if they all had iPads, Kindle Fire, Nook tablet or the Acer Iconia. Really, any tablet would do. Lets just pretend that school districts had all the political and financial capital to make that happen. With all of this digital material, kids no longer have to worry about forgetting to bring their book to class since it's always on the device. More importantly, these textbooks interact with the students as well as the outside world. Students can watch film clips. End of chapter reviews can be interactive games. And updates can happen overnight. Textbooks are notorious for getting out of date but if they are electronic, scientists can update the material as it becomes available.

Perhaps one of the most interesting changes in reading is the newspaper. News used to be delivered to the reader in one format. If you were interested, great. If not, you were out of luck. Zite has changed all that. This is an app that works with most tablet and smartphone devices. It brings the news to you based on the categories you select. Then it does something amazing. Based on what you say is good (thumbs up) or bad (thumbs down), it will seek out and find blogs and news stories you probably want to read.

How about that? Finally, there is a piece of software that helps you discover and learn exactly what you are interested in. This is the ultimate in differentiated instruction.

Reading and writing have come a long way. It's fascinating to see how they are still evolving!

Critical thinking and internet research

Critical thinking has always been tied to the search for answers. In the past, this search involved speaking to respected leaders and reading authoritative books. Now of course, we type in a few key words into our favorite search engine and hope to find the answers. For students, this is often a haphazard affair. It is important, however that they understand how to critically search for good information. I developed a search guide for students to address this issue after I was inspired by another article written about scientific literacy (How to Read a Scientific Paper, Posted on: January 10, 2012 11:10 AM, by Chad Orzel).

Feel free to copy, use or modify this guide as you see fit:

STEP ZERO: Know what you want.
Before doing anything else, make sure you know what it is you hope to get out of this search, because that will dramatically change how you do it. Many research questions do not lend themselves to a systematic and analytical approach. You must be very careful.

Activity:

1. Write your research question. For example: To what extent did General Zia ul-Haq influence the people of Pakistan? 
2. Decide if you have an answer in mind you want to defend or if you are honestly searching. Is this a historical or philosophical work? Are you looking for hard, numerical data or personal interviews? 

STEP ONE: Know the structure.
The basic structure of all search programs is pretty standard. There is a search box which may or may not allow you to do more advanced searches. The programs search for combinations of key words. Now, if you can shorten your question to the one or two most important words in the question, you’ll probably get a good search.

Activity:

1. Pick out the key words and phrases (a phrase should not be more than 3 words long).
2. Order those key words from most relevant to least. Consider which word or phrase would give you the best results as a search term.

STEP TWO: Know the types of searches.
There are many types of search programs out there, but you can roughly divide programs into a couple of categories.
The most well know programs are Internet search engines. These include Bing, Yahoo Answers and of course Google. Google is the most popular because most of the time it gives you the sites your looking for. Thats not to say it provides accurate information. Consider the search “9/11 Truth”. This will bring up sites devoted to the idea the government was behind the events of 9/11.

Similar to this are databases. These are designed to search through reputable articles and books. Typically, this is where you will go to find primary documents. Unfortunately, they are also subscription based. 

Another very important type of search program is the calculator. These programs allow you to solve math problems of course, but also to see how to do chemistry or adjust a recipe. There are also word calculators to help you fill in the missing letters of a word if you leave a bl_nk in the middle. I would put dictionaries and thesauruses in this category as well. These would provide you with definitions and similar/ different words. For an excellent example, look at Wolfram Alpha.

Finally, there are searches within sites. These are often hit or miss. They sometimes bring you the information you want, but often do not.


Activity:

1. Use your #1 search term to find good information. We will use Google scholar and Google books. 

STEP THREE: Read the Summary.
Most of the time, the summary will tell you what sort of website you're dealing with. Combine that knowledge with your goal from Step Zero, and take the appropriate action. Keep in mind that students have limited time and energy. It's vitally important that they look over the summary before clicking on a website.



Activity:

1. Look over your first page of hits. 
2. Quickly decide on the best one. 
3. Click on it and look over the information. 
4. Write down how useful the site was. 

STEP FOUR: A picture/map is worth a thousand words.
Sometimes doing an image/map search will lead you to more relevant information.

Here are the results I got from entering my search term into Google maps. Note the two countries that the General's name is being used. Also note how easy it was to find the location of his tomb.

Activity:

1. Enter your top search term into Google maps and images. 
2. Describe the results. 

STEP FIVE: Command F.
When you have a web site up in front of you, glance at it to get a feeling for it’s trustworthiness (does it have a date, an author, a method of contacting the institution, etc...) then hit command F. 

A “find” box will come up. Enter in your key word or phrase and hit return. The program will find that term for you. This is a huge time saver. It avoids wasting precious time and energy sifting through useless information to find the nuget you need.

External memory

Today I had so much to do I barely had time to stop for lunch. The day started with a long list and then I started to get emails requesting technology help and teaching opportunities.  Without a list, I would have been sunk. I just cannot keep all the information that I need inside my skull. Physical notes are fine, but with the tools Google provides me, I don't even bother.

When I need extra memory for the day, I turn to Google. Their most important product for me is Gmail. This is a service that goes way beyond typical email programs. Oh, the email is great but it is so much more than that. First of all, the search capabilities are lightning fast. When I need to find some piece of information, I typically type a few key words and viola! I have what I need. I can also sync my Gmail to any other system from Outlook to Apple Mail.

Better yet, every email is tied to my contact list so that when I click on the name of the sender and I can see important information like their class schedule or room number. That allows me to stop by whenever it's most convenient for them.

The part of Gmail that really helps me out are the tasks. I can convert any email into a task on my to-do list. That's great for a couple of reasons. First of all, it's a quick way of creating a reminder straight from someone's request. When I'm reading an email, I just need to click on the "more" button, then click "add to tasks". Done.

GoTasks

It gets better. While I'm moving from place to place helping people, I want to travel light. Besides a few odds and ends, I really just have my iPad. On it, is Gotasks. It's on my phone as well, but I mainly use it on the iPad. This is an app that syncs to my Google tasks. It allows me to keep my to-do list in front of me at all times. I can even rearrange my tasks in any order I choose. So completed items go on the bottom and high priority ones are at the top.

With this small arsenal of tools, my memory can expand beyond the limits of my skull. Good thing, too. I'd never be able to keep track of everything without a little help.

An online place for everything

Teachers have a lot of stuff. Never mind all of the posters and popsicle sticks we reuse year after year. I'm thinking more about what we have electronically. From lesson plans to movie clips, there's an awful lot of valuable material on our computers. Should that computer get lost or damaged, all of those wonderful resources will disappear. There is a safe place to keep it all though- or rather safe places. Not every service is right for everyone. You have a lot of material in a lot of different forms so its important to chose your storage service carefully. I want to talk about a few of those services. Full disclosure here- I am a cheap skate so I only use free services.

Google:
Google docs- We cannot have a discussion about cloud storage without bringing up Google Docs. This is a powerhouse of document storage. Anything you have created in Word can be converted to Google Docs format. As long as your files are converted to Google's format, your storage is unlimited and files can be edited and shared online. You can also store a finite number of all other types of files in your account to share and download.

Two other Google services that allow you to store a limited number of files are Gmail and Google sites. With Gmail, you need to attach a file to an email and save it as a draft. Google sites lets you upload files of a limited size as well and store them in a "file cabinate". While this would be a little awkward, it does provide an alternative place to store your materials.

Microsoft Office live: Formatting is typically lost whenever a word document is changed into a Google document. If you are looking to store, share and edit a Microsoft document, presentation or spreadsheet online, this is the way to go. You will maintain all of your original formatting and you can feel safe knowing your document is stored in the cloud. You will also be able to edit a document with your coworkers online.

Zoho: This is another one of Google's competitors. You can store a gigabyte of data here and work with coworkers and collaborators on Zoho friendly documents. One thing that this site does that no other site can do (or will do) are databases. If you need a free program that will work across platforms, try Zoho's database option.

Dropbox: This is a service that is designed to save important files online. A Dropbox folder is placed on your computer. Any file saved in this folder is then copied to the internet. If you need to access the file from elsewhere, just open the Dropbox and grab your file. No worries. It works well and is reliable. You can also share files with whomever you wish.

CX: Nearly identical to Dropbox, it makes file sharing with colleagues a little easier.

Edmodo: This online social service is often overlooked. While it has been primarily designed as a way to keep in contact with students and parents, it also works as a way to store small files. You can upload any file (up to 100 megabytes in size) to your Library. Once those files are there, they can be downloaded by anyone you choose- parent, teacher or student. You can also choose to keep these files private.

Google voice: Teachers need to keep track of who they call and when. Calling logs are great, but they have an inherent weakness. They assume that the person filling them out is honest. Google voice allows you to call parents from you computer for free. It records the time you called (or when the parent called you) and stores that information online. There is also a place for notes. You can keep an accurate record of all parent phone calls for years with this service.

Youtube: If you have video clips, youtube is a good place to keep them. You'll be able to keep them 100% private or you can choose to share with fellow teachers or students. If you decide to download them afterward, simply go to "My Videos", click on one of your movies, and download it.


These are just the services I've grown to love. If you have other online storage ideas, please share!

Learn anything...really?

There is a flurry of competition in the arena of free online education. Major universities have put classes online for free. There are dozens free books, movies and courses available from Openclass. Site like HTMLGoodies is a great place to learn how to work with computers. Lets not forget about Khan Academy. The most recent news story is about Apple's push into education via iBooks2, iTunesU and iAuthor. All of this provides the world with an (up till now) unbelievable amount of free, authoritative, trustworthy and understandable education.

Can we now expect droves of people flocking to public libraries and hunching over cell phones in hopes of improving their lot in life by improving their minds? Maybe. I'm reminded of Thomas Paine when he said “What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly."  Free public education is esteemed so lightly that laws are in place to force students to attend classes. Libraries have long held texts filled with information the general public could use to educate themselves. So far, few people have taken full advantage of these resources.

Thankfully, there are some distinct differences between past attempts at providing free learning and what is going on now. Free public education has been run on a strict schedule and in a defined location where students are forced to associate with people they dislike and sometimes fear or hate. Now, the learning can happen whenever it is convenient and wherever students are most comfortable. There is no need to sit next to a bully or sit quiet and still for an hour or more. Furthermore, students can access courses that are most relavent to their lives. Perhaps the most important aspect of online learning is that it can be as minute as looking up proper spelling to being as in depth as learning basic Spanish. And all of it is nearly instantaneous.

Libraries have had their own barriers.  Like all buildings, they have a specified schedule and are located in a specific place. If you have a hard time getting to that place at the specified time, you're out of luck. Perhaps two of the least obvious roadblocks were literacy and (more often than not) sight. Youtube and recorded lecture/ podcasting has drastically reduced that barrier.  

More and more, the internet is becoming a place of astounding resources for improving people's lives. God willing, the trend will continue.

Searching for lesson materials

As teachers, we search a lot. We go online for a more useful lesson plan, a good picture to go along with our powerpoint or even a quick fact check before a lesson. Even though we're all pretty good at finding what we need, it always seems to take a bit longer than it should to find what we want. It doesn't have to be terribly difficult to get good things fast. Here are my recommendations for getting your hands on quality online material.

Useful lesson plans-  40 Places to Find Free Lesson Plans Online
This is a pretty comprehensive list describing the most popular sites online to find quality ideas for new lessons.

Handouts, handout creators-  Handout Maker  and  Teachnology worksheets
Best for middle school, this is a great place to go when your short on time, but you need a handout for kids on a specific topic. Make crossword puzzles, traditional worksheets and even mazes.

Safe, quality searching: netTrekker, Digital Vaults 

Good pictures- Pics4Learning
Need some images to add to your powerpoints? Do your students need to complete a project involving pictures? Here is a great place to get photos that are free, copywrite friendly and most importantly safe.

Quality video- Youtube/education , Brainpop,   Discovery Education* (paid subscription)  
You can now find great videos for your classroom on youtube! This has been a long time coming. Some of the best educational youtube videos have been put in one place. Plus most browsers have a way to download youtube videos to watch them later. Chrome makes this especially easy. Discovery education is probably the best source of educational video on the internet. Unfortunately, it is a paid subscription. If you have the means to pay for it, I highly recommend it.

Audio- Internet Archive , SoundFX Now,      
This is a great place to find stories, songs and sound effects. It's especially nice if you have a short story you would like to have the kids listen to in class.

Fact checking-  Wolfram Alpha
Forget Google. They're only interested in providing you with relavent websites. If you're looking for some fact checking, this is the place to go. It will perform calculations, find the relavent facts on historical figures or fill in the blanks for n_t_.  Even better, they provide references for all the information they provide you.

Calculator- Desmos or Wolfram Alpha
If you're trying to do some basic calculations, either of these would work fine. However, if you want to do a word type problem (what is 20% of 1.6?), Wolfram Alpha is the way to go. If your goal is to calculate algebraic expressions, Desmos will work a bit better. This is also an excellent replacement for a graphing calculator and can handle enormously complex equations.



Do you have other suggestions? Please let me know!

I, Robot, have a PLN

A PLN is a personal or a professional learning network. Typically, they consist of a group of people who help you learn and grow in whatever it is you do. This covers everything from rock climbing to high school administration. These networks have always consisted of other humans. The internet, though has changed all that in amazing ways. Robots now join in the mix. Please don't start to picture Rosie or C3PO. No, I'm talking about computer programs that are able to bring you important information. Programs have become sophisticated enough to listen to what a room (that is, an online group) full of people are saying and make sense of it. I'd like to introduce three of my favorite robots.

First, there is the hashtag robot. A hashtag is really just the # sign put in front of a word. The convention started with Twitter. People wanted an easy way to search for tweets based on key words. The hashtag became a way for people to mark specific terms as most important. Twitter employs a program that scours all the tweets online, looking for these small symbols and organizes tweets accordingly. So if you write #edtech for example, the hashtag robot will put your tweet in a list with all the other tweets containing  #edtech. That means that you can do a simple search for that term to get thousands useful tweets about (in this case) educational technology. The robot has become a vital part of learning networks for educators.

Zite is a mobile app that works as an electronic magazine. When you first download this free app, it asks you to describe the kinds of articles you'd like to read. You can choose from sports, politics, gossip... whatever you like. Then it does something amazing. It begins to learn from you. You tell the robot back at the Zite company when you like an article and it will bring you more of the same. Tell it when you dislike an article, and it will bring less. What's even better is that on a tablet, it brings up some key terms. You can tell Zite to look for articles in your genre with those key words. For example, I've taught Zite to fetch me articles on Technology which also deal with education, tablets and Google. I get all the educational technology news I want from Zite's robot.

Google Plus is bringing a new robot on the scene. The robot is called Search+ and it works by looking at your Google plus social network to bring you material it thinks you would be most interested in. Since it is only now being rolled out, I haven't had much time to test it out to see what it will bring to me. The implications are huge, though. If this robot is able to make sense of your network on Google plus and truly bring you relavent results, you should be able to find quality resources more easily and in less time. I think this would work best if you were careful to use Google plus just for professional networking. Having your friends in the mix could skew your search results giving you some great gift ideas, but not really showing you want you want for work.

Don't get me wrong- none of these PLN's could function without the people who make them up. I'm just saying that now we're going to have to welcome the newcomers. Now, we're working with robots.