A Principal's Reflections

AUGUST 1, 2012

'I am extremely excited that August is Connected Educator month. In my opinion, being a connected learner, leader, and/or educator is no longer an option. My personal and professional journey in this area is well documented and something that I regularly present on. When I think back to my life as an educator prior to becoming connected, I can honestly say that I was isolated, naive, and definitely not as well rounded as I am today.

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Personal Learning Network Personalized Learning Social Media Education 311

The Web20Classroom

AUGUST 6, 2012

'For many teachers the traditional textbook just doesn''t cut it any more. Between the rapid pace at which information changes and rising cost, many are looking for alternatives. Believe it or not, there are lots of options out there, if you know where to look and you are willing to get your hands dirty. The best part? Kids can create these using any of the tools below.

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Common Core Classroom eBook Video 269

Educational Technology Guy

AUGUST 12, 2012

'This past Friday I attended EdcampCT and had a great time learning, sharing, and meeting new people. I facilitated a discussion about Evernote and one of the questions I got was "why not just use Google Docs for notetaking?" I went on to explain all the features of Evernote but wanted to expand on it a bit. Evernote is my way of organizing lesson plans, lesson resources, notes, web clippings, and more.

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Google Education Resources Twitter 236

Baker's B.Y.O.D.

AUGUST 3, 2012

'To be a progressive teacher, you find and do what works. Period. The students should be stakeholders in their education and have accountability, responsibility, and be actively engaged in and out of the classroom. Period. I apply the theories and philosophies of Bloom , Bandura , Vygotsky , Maslow , Gardner , and many many many others. I''m a proponent of critical thinking, cooperative learning, metacognition, blended learning, flipped learning. see a pattern?

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Assessment Edmodo BYOD Common Core 139

This white paper examines and proposes revisions to the "Seven Principles for Good Practice in Undergraduate Education" introduced by Arthur Chickering and Zelda Gamson in 1987 for today's technology-driven world.

Technology

The 21st Century Principal

AUGUST 11, 2012

'To paraphrase Marc Prensky from his collection of essays From Digital Natives to Digital Wisdom: Hopeful Essays for 21st Century Learning : “The easiest, executable solution to our education problems today “is to change what goes on in our classrooms.” We need to move from teacher-centered and teacher dominated learning models to more personal, student-centered learning models.

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Classroom BYOD Learning Education 110

wwwatanabe

AUGUST 10, 2012

'We are starting our second year of having iPads in our elementary classrooms, our Title I CCJH classrooms, and some of our AJHS classrooms. We''ve created a list of tips for managing the equipment in our classrooms. Tip 1: Team decisions regarding equity Will you break the cart up across your grade level? If so, who will host the cart in their room?

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iPad Classroom Educreations Elementary 99

The Web20Classroom

AUGUST 15, 2012

'Once again, its #LeadershipDay. For 6 years educators have been gathering together on this day to write specifically to address technology and leadership. And since I''ve had my blog I have participated. (Here are my entries: 2009 , 2010 , 2011 ). The idea is to share some sort of wisdom, question, knowledge, thoughts or ideas related to technology leadership.

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Edcamps Assessment Classroom Technology 197

Educational Technology Guy

AUGUST 20, 2012

'Prezi , the zooming presentation tool that makes presentations engaging and fun, has added some cool features. Prezi has added 3-D backgrounds for the presentations, which can add some great images to your presentations. Also added are Fade-In Animations like PowerPoint has to slowly reveal your content or only have it come up once you click. Great for posing questions and hiding the answer.

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Tools Education Twitter Google 203

Baker's B.Y.O.D.

AUGUST 19, 2012

'With two weeks until school is back in session and in preparing for my presentation on Edmodo for the upcoming TeachMeetNJ unconference , I''ve been reflecting on past practices and thinking about how I structure the educational process in my class. Prior to the digital revolution, I used worksheets as the hub for lessons and content. I can hear the gasps of horror right now, but let me explain.

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Edmodo BYOD Assessment Classroom 95

The 21st Century Principal

AUGUST 11, 2012

'“The educational improvement efforts now in place are aimed at bringing back the education that American offered students in the 20th century (with some technological enhancements,” From Digital Natives to Digital Wisdom: Hopeful Essays for 21st Century Learning by Marc Prensky Do Americans really have the stomach to “reform their schools?” Looking at the list of reforms in vogue today, one can only wonder whether reform is really the goal, or as Prensky points out, “Reform efforts are more abo

Education 93

Education BYOD Classroom System 93

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The Mobile Native

AUGUST 3, 2012

'As a student at Michigan State University, Brett Kopf struggled with dyslexia and ADD. Likely during a class in which he should have been paying attention, his mind wandered to a potential solution for his resulting disorganization - if there was a service that could send him a text message every time he had an assignment due, test, or schedule related announcement, his status as a student could dramatically improve.

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System Mobile Learning Mobility Education 86

A Principal's Reflections

AUGUST 15, 2012

'I have been engaged with social media for over three and a half years now. As I often reflect on my journey, I can’t help but think about the early days and months after I first began to use Twitter and some other tools. There were many times during this early period that I questioned the value of the time I was putting in, or the actual impact any of this was having on teaching, learning, school culture, and leadership.

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Social Media Education Twitter Student Engagement 262

The Web20Classroom

AUGUST 1, 2012

'Kicking off today (Aug. 1) is Connected Educators Month. Through a partnership with the US Department of Education, the idea is to get the word out about what it means to be a connected educator and the importance of being connected. There are lots of webinars, panels, discussions and resources to share. You can learn more about it by visiting the Connected Educators Calendar.

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Education Classroom Resources Twitter 191

Educational Technology Guy

AUGUST 12, 2012

'At EdcampCT this past week, I was chatting with Greg McVerry ( @jgmac1106 ) about devices, 1-1 and BYOD and he made an interesting comment. Instead of a school purchasing an iPad and keyboard for all the students, what about a Chromebook and Nexus 7 for each student? I like this idea for a lot of reasons. An iPad starts at $500 and then add the case for $50 and keyboard for around $50 and you are at $600 for one device.

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Chromebook iPad Edcamps Android 198

Speaker: Chris Paxton McMillin, President of D3 Training Solutions

There are plenty of great authoring tools for developing eLearning, but the one you select could directly impact your course's outcomes. Depending upon your learners’ needs and your organization’s performance goals, you could be overlooking considerations that impact the both effectiveness of your courses and how long it takes to finish them. From general capabilities to specific workflow structures, some aspects are critical when it comes to learning objectives and deadlines.

Comparison

SpeechTechie

AUGUST 24, 2012

'In a recent post, I discussed the essentials of using iBooks as a tool for displaying (and saving) PDFs files you possess, download or create. Thanks to Alex Dunn ( @smartinclusion ) for pointing out in a followup discussion on Twitter that interactive whiteboard lessons such as those displayed on a Smartboard can also easily be saved as PDFs and reviewed in that manner.

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iPad Student Engagement Tools Twitter 76

The 21st Century Principal

AUGUST 26, 2012

'“Our students must learn not only how to use current technologies, but also how to evaluate which ones work best for particular tasks or projects,” write Howard Pitler, Elizabeth R. Hubbell, and Matt Kuhn in their latest edition of Using Technology with Classroom Instruction That Works , 2nd Edition. In the digital age, that is the crux of our instructional problem: how do we give students the experiences with digital technologies that make them effective consumer-users?

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Technology Strategy Classroom Tools 87

The Mobile Native

AUGUST 17, 2012

'Guest Post for SmartBlogs on Education Over the past four years, I have had the privilege of teaching in a forward-thinking school district that has embraced the use of mobile learning devices in the classroom. Mobile learning has become the new buzzword in many educational communities. Mobile learning is essentially anytime, anywhere learning. This type of learning could be with a netbook, iPad, iPod touch or even a smartphone.

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Mobile Learning Mobility Learning BYOD 78

A Principal's Reflections

AUGUST 29, 2012

'The other day I had a discussion with Colleen Tambuscio, one of my teachers, where she was actively sharing some of the innovative ideas she planned to implement during the upcoming school year. Colleen is the architect of our globally recognized Holocaust Education Program. During our conversation, she shared with me her experience with Today’s Meet at a recent professional development program hosted by the Shoah Foundation in California.

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Social Media Education Meeting Tools 221

Speaker: Amanda Davis, Chief Experience Officer and Liam O'Malley, VP of Association Solutions

The "new normal" is now a little less new, a little more normal. Does that mean your current LMS strategy is in need of a refresh? Is your organization or association leaning into the always-evolving eLearning environment to ensure you have the tools and content to remain relevant through all this change? There are many complex decision-making processes within your learning & development strategy and LMS lifecycle management, including: Selection.

LMS

The Web20Classroom

AUGUST 21, 2012

'Last week on #edchat the discussion turned to blogging and the importance (or maybe not) in and out of the classroom. As always the conversation was a lively one with lots of different ideas on student blogging, administrator blogging, platforms and more. (Check out the archive to read and follow all the discussions.) I wrote about how to be come a blogger a while back.

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Classroom Education Meeting Technology 189

Educational Technology Guy

AUGUST 31, 2012

'Evernote , one of my favorite web apps (along with Google''s many apps), has a great product, Evernote Clearly which is a browser extension for Google Chrome (other browsers will be added soon) that allows you to read online with less distractions. You simply click the extension and it hides all the distractions from blogs and articles, allowing you to read with less distractions and more easily.

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Google Twitter Resources Education 191

SpeechTechie

AUGUST 3, 2012

'In my last post, I talked about the potential benefits of using iBooks for displaying and interacting with ePub books in therapy. iBooks is also useful as a collection spot for useful PDFs that you might want to display as visuals in a therapy session. What is a PDF? A PDF is a Portable Document Format, and we have seen them more and more over the past few years.

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iPad Adobe Accessibility Strategy 73

The 21st Century Principal

AUGUST 19, 2012

'What if you only had time and money to use and purchase six tools to teach your entire curriculum? What would those six tools be? Authors Harvey Silver, R. Thomas Dewing, and Matthew Perini seem to do just that in their book The Core Six: Essential Strategies for Achieving Excellence with Common Core. Many of us are right in the midst to implementing the Common Core Standards, whether we philosophically agree or disagree with the need for their existence.

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Common Core Strategy Classroom Tools 78

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The Learning Revolution Has Begun

AUGUST 6, 2012

'Join me Wednesday, August 8th, at an early time , for a live and interactive FutureofEducation.com panel with Stephen Downes, Howard Gardner, Alfie Kohn, and Gary Stager to talk about the need to reform the education reform movement. With four thoughtful and articulate education thinkers, my job will be to help them describe their alternative views to the current narratives that drive much of the impassioned debate around teaching and learning worldwide.

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Blackboard Education Laptops Online Learning 76

A Principal's Reflections

AUGUST 22, 2012

'I am extremely excited that my second book is now available through Solution Tree entitled What Principals Need to Know About Teaching and Learning Science. It was a great deal of fun co-authoring this book with Keith Devereaux , one of my Science teachers at New Milford High School. It is our hope that this book becomes the go to resource for principals looking to establish and maintain effective science programs that focus on doing science as opposed to just knowing.

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Resources Program Evaluation Assessment Strategy 206

The Web20Classroom

AUGUST 18, 2012

'This Tuesday (Aug 21) at 2pm EDT, the folks over at Nearpod are starting their Educator Spotlight webinars and I am honored to be the first guest! Are you using technology as effectively as you could in your classroom? Or perhaps you know you need to try to use it but don''t want to include tech just for the sake of it? This session will introduce you to TPACK (Technological Pedagogical and Content Knowledge) and how it can be used to effectively integrate new technology in a classroom setting.

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iPad Classroom Android Tablets 167

Educational Technology Guy

AUGUST 16, 2012

'Google Cloud Print is a very cool, useful service Google has. Google Cloud Print connects your printers to the web, allowing you to print from any device (smartphone, tablet, Chrome device , PC, or other web-connected devices) without any cables. Heck, you don''t even have to be in the same building, or state, for that matter. It is easy to use and has some great features.

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Google Tools Chromebook Tablets 187

Speaker: Aaron Webb, Jamf

Apple empowers educators and students by design. Whether using Macs, iPads, or Apple TV, Apple devices encourage creativity and can simplify teaching with apps to make the classroom more flexible, collaborative and personalized for each student. To unleash the full potential of the technology and create the best learning environment, you need to understand the tools and resources available, and develop an education-focused, comprehensive plan, from equipment purchase to deployment, management an

Classroom

SpeechTechie

AUGUST 23, 2012

'Many of you have already begun your school year, I can see from my social media channels. This is a time of excitement, but also of some anxiety! I myself have some transition nervousness as I have cut out the public school piece of my job(s) and will be working in private practice (also consulting to schools on students with social learning and language challenges), continuing my app work with Smarty Ears , and running workshops on tech integration!

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iPad iPhone Social Media Learning 71

Baker's B.Y.O.D.

AUGUST 8, 2012

'Very excited for viewing the Edmodocon presentations today. Additional information on Edmodocon here too. I am geeking out over the new upgrades to the Edmodo platform: enhanced organization with folders & groups, reaction button (similar to FB''s "like"), gradebook upgrade. the keynote speech by Nic Borg has me fired up! The Beta version will be available for all Edmodocon attendees "soon" (we can switch back and forth between the old and new platform versions).

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Edmodo BYOD EdTech Groups 60

The Learning Revolution Has Begun

AUGUST 10, 2012

'The Learning 2.0 virtual conference is just around the corner (August 20 - 24 [link] ). We have an incredible lineup of keynote speakers and some GREAT practitioner sessions--AND there is still time for you to sign up to present (we hope you will do so)! Learning 2.0 is a free conference and is held online, in multiple time zones, over the course of five days.

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Conference Learning Blackboard Flipped Classroom 75

A Principal's Reflections

AUGUST 13, 2012

'Every year educators create outstanding lesson plans to help students learn, understand and uncover their passions. We want to ensure that the hard work does not go unnoticed. Starting this week, educators can win great prizes by simply submitting their best projects, lesson plans, curricula and tutorials to the 2012 Educators’ Choice Awards. The 2012 Educators’ Choice Awards will honor and reward Adobe Education Exchange members who submit the most innovative teaching and learning materials.

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Adobe Education iPad Secondary 169

This whitepaper explores integrating the PowerTeaching pedagogical approach within a HyFlex (Hybrid Flexible) educational model, focusing on employing cooperative learning strategies and efficient classroom management techniques.

Education