Cool Cat Teacher Blog

Edu app news: apps, ebooks, and sites for your classroom #mlearning 03/03/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Sat, 03 Mar 2012 09:31:04 PST

App Store - Draw Something by OMGPOP

This is like pictionary with friends. Draw something and send it to a friend and have them guess what it is. This app is on sale right now. Lots of fun.

tags: education eduapp edapp drawing app
Mac App Store - Gradient

Those of you who are a bit geeky and use CS3 may like the gradient app for Mac that helps you create beautiful gradients for websites (you no longer have to have ONE color with CS3). This app is highly recommended from the sites I've reviewed this week.

tags: education eduapp edapp webmaster

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

Daily Education and Technology News for Schools 03/03/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Sat, 03 Mar 2012 02:32:22 PST

Are You Network Literate? - Eric Hellweg - Harvard Business Review

I have a month of social media marketing and awareness that I do with my ninth graders in addition to the digiteen project (which rocks digital citizenship) - it looks like Reid Hoffman would agree. Now I can put a term on it -- the ability to see and understand networks. YES! We know how to find popular hashtags and trending topics. Slicing and dicing conversation and networks is quite a challenging thing to teach as it teachers higher order thinking but it is important. Maybe one day, it will be exciting what these kids do.

Reid Hoffman, co-founder and executive chair of LinkedIn and investor in Facebook, Zynga, and Groupon, sees networks. "It's not like The Sixth Sense," he told the crowd at TED on Wednesday. "I don't see dead people. But I do see networks." This lens has given Hoffman a framework for how he views investment opportunities, various projects, and the world.

Hoffman believes the ability to see and understand networks and use them to your advantage is a critical skill for the 21st century workforce. "It's more than networking. It's more than exchanging business cards and following up after a conference — although that is still important," he says.

tags: education news
Pakistan Builds Web Wall Out in the Open - NYTimes.com

Many companies publicly share that they are going to censor the Internet. They want a Great Firewall of their own to cover Pakistan. This is sad.They are taking out advertisements. WE have collaborated with some lovely teachers and students in Pakistan and it seems it will get harder for them to get out both physically and mentally.

The government published a public tender last month for the “development, deployment and operation of a national-level URL filtering and blocking System.” Technology companies, academic institutions and other interested parties have until March 16 to submit proposals for the $10 million project — but anger about it has been growing both inside and outside Pakistan.

tags: education news

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

Daily Education and Technology News for Schools 03/02/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Fri, 02 Mar 2012 02:33:43 PST

Auto-Correct Blunder Causes High School Lockdown - ABC News

Oh dear! Autocorrect caused a major problem today. This isn't funny but it is something to be aware of. We are all extremely sensitive after the tragedy at West Hall High School this week.

"“Gunna be at West Hall Today” was what a student at Lanier Technical College meant to type and send, but auto-correct changed the first word to “gunman.” The message went out as: ”Gunman be at West Hall Today.”"

tags: education news iphone
Project Share

Texas is using project share to deliver PD to their teachers.

"Introducing a global online learning community where educators collaborate, share resources, and showcase accomplishments. The Texas Education Agency (TEA) is proud to announce a new initiative that will explore the development and delivery of high-quality professional development in an interactive and engaging learning environment. Project Share™ utilizes a collection of Web 2.0 tools and applications to provide professional development resources for teachers across the state and to build professional learning communities where educators can collaborate and participate in online learning opportunities.

tags: education professional development news
Google Privacy Changes Labeled 'Unfair And Unwise' By Consumer Groups

A coalition of American and European advocacy groups sent a joint letter to Google on Wednesday, calling on the search giant to suspend its controversial plan to revamp its privacy policy.

tags: education news privacy

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

Teach This! Teaching with lesson plans and ideas that rock #teaching 03/01/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Thu, 01 Mar 2012 11:31:24 PST

Teachers are the New Rich.

Why teachers are the new rich. I believe this and am very rich since I began teacher - not in pocketbook but in the things that matter. Here is a post I wrote for the Atlantic about this. Hope you'll help me by sharing how teaching has improved your life in the comments on that post.

tags: education teaching
Character & Mental Toughness- A Reminder to Press On | coachbillmoore

I needed some inspiration today and found it in Coach Bill Moore in this article with some great quotes and his own thoughts.

"Like the stand-up comic who fails to make an audience laugh, sometimes I find my efforts to highlight the importance of character and mental toughness fall on apathetic ears; both young and old."

tags: education teaching inspiration encouragement character
Life Success For Students With Learning Disabilities: A Parent's Guide | LD Topics | LD OnLine

Life Success for Students with Learning Disabilities: A Parent's Guide. Teachers could send this to parents.

tags: education parenting teaching

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

Edu app news: apps, ebooks, and sites for your classroom #mlearning 03/01/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Thu, 01 Mar 2012 09:30:54 PST

Topicmarks: Extract Facts from Lengthy Documents and Obtain Their Summaries

Topicmarks is a useful way to summarize and read. It takes some getting used to but is a great service for taking a long paper and extracting meaning. It is like an indexing engine. It is a bit tricky to learn how to drill down but once you do, you can use it to read everything from your google reader to your evernote and google docs. It is definitely a handy tool for researchers.

tags: education eduapp edapp reaading literacy
Hiding Exchange Mailboxes from the Global Address List « 318 Tech Journal

Here's a how to for you IT people who want to hide some users from the Global Address list. This way, some users can't be looked up by everyone in the organization (things like your generic front office email, etc.)

tags: education eduapp edapp it_support
Windows 8 Consumer Preview

Here's the Windows 8 consumer preview version if you just have to download and try it out. (Or, if, as Microsoft hopes, you want to start building apps.)

tags: eduapp edapp windows technology education innovation

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

Daily Education and Technology News for Schools 03/01/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Thu, 01 Mar 2012 02:34:36 PST

- DDKPortraits DDK Portraits

A lawyer / photographer shares about Pinterest's terms of service and the law.

tags: Education news copyright
Creativity is the Future of Education - YouTube

A new video that is making waves over on youtube about education as made by the "Ghetto film school." Worth a watch.

tags: education creativity news
(5) Free Photography Instruction Online Hangouts - Google+

If you're a newbie photographer and want to learn, there are Google Hangouts for you. One area where Google+ is rocking is in the area of the "hangout." I think it will change how we do video once people really understand what we can do with it. (Stream to youtube, live stream to others.)

tags: education news google
Ebooks Get the Respect They Deserve at 'Download the Universe' - Rebecca J. Rosen - Technology - The Atlantic

A community of writers and scientists are reviewing and discussing scientific ebooks at Download the Universe. eBooks aren't where they are going to be. I'm toying with the idea of producing my own ebook after this next project because I haven't really seen what I think is possible in an ebook but have already storyboarded my own private thoughts in this area. This is a fascinating once in history experience to be part of a major trend as books evolve from paper to ebook. I'm excited! Take a look.

"e-readers have opened up a period of great innovation in how we convey and consume "books," but, as of yet, these new products have not met with the sorts of rigorous and routine reviews that new printed books receive. But a new project, Download the Universe, aims to change that. Led by a set of some of the top science writers in the country -- including Carl Zimmer, Steve Silberman, and Atlantic contributor David Dobbs -- the site aims to provide reviews of new straight-to-ebook science books."

tags: ebook education news science science_teacher tablet_computing mobile_apps
Windows 8: Microsoft’s radical redesign of the computer desktop. - Slate Magazine

Windows 8 redesign has been released. I'm excited about installing this in my touch screen lab, personally but there are sure to be some old time Windows users that will FREAK OUT.

"While it is optimized for touchscreens, the new OS is also meant to run on the billions of laptops and desktops that have long been Microsoft’s bread and butter. The company has tried to make the system work in both places by giving Windows two completely different interfaces that you can use side by side. First, there’s the Windows you grew up with, called the Desktop in Windows 8. In the Desktop, Windows lives up to its name—all your programs run in windows that you can position anywhere on your screen. When you run any program designed for today’s Windows in the new OS, it will show up in the Desktop interface.

tags: education news technology
Kindle Format 8 Overview

You can download a KindleGen program from Amazon to generate your own Kindle books from HTML XHTML or ePub formats. You can also use Kindle previewer to see how the Kindle 8 format will work. THE KF8 replaces the mobi format and gives you the capability to add HTML5 and CSS3.

tags: education news ebook
Live discussion: How can technology enable more sustainable lifestyles in 2025? | Guardian Sustainable Business | guardian.co.uk

Sony and some "leading thinkers" are convening to look at future scapes. This is a good read, however, often these sorts of things carry the political overtones of those who comprise the thinking. Sometimes I feel like people are more interested in the truth as they know it than really getting to the truth. We need innovators to seek out "THE TRUTH" - the one truth about something if it exists instead of letting things get political. That said, I think this is a good read for those who care about looking at future trends. They call these "thought-starters" and I do like the idea of having thought starters with my students. I like the term.

In the face of such rapid evolution, envisaging what might happen in the next 13 years requires practical foresight, as well as brilliant imagination – and this is exactly the task of the FutureScapes project.

Convened by Sony and leading sustainability non-profit organisation Forum for the Future, FutureScapes is bringing together business leaders, thinkers, designers, futurologists, writers and the public to explore the potential of technology to create a better, more sustainable world, by imagining and discussing life in 2025

tags: education news innovation
25 alleged Anonymous members arrested internationally; hacker group retaliates

Hackers have knocked down Interpol's site this week in retaliation. Cybersecurity is a huge issue.

"Tuesday afternoon, the international police organization Interpol announced the arrest of 25 alleged members of Anonymous by officials in Argentina, Chile, Colombia, and Spain. Shortly after the announcement, Interpol's website was hit by a distributed denial-of-service attack. At the time this story was posted, the website remained unavailable."

Interpol announced that the arrests were made as part of "Operation Unmask", an international effort launched in mid-February to grab the perpetrators of attacks on websites in Columbia and Chile, including the Colombian Defense Ministry and presidential websites, a Chilean electricity company, and Chile's national library. Officials also seized 250 pieces of equipment, including computers and mobile phones, during a search of 40 locations in 15 cities.

tags: education learning hacking technology news

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

Elearning and global competency #flatclass #globaled 03/01/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 17:31:55 PST

All About Creative Commons And Copyright - LiveBinder

Excellent livebinder on copyright for those working with global collaboration.

tags: flatclass copyright digiteen digital_law

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

Teach This! Teaching with lesson plans and ideas that rock #teaching 02/29/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 11:30:44 PST

THe hungry caterpillar electronic book. - Resources - TES

The hungry caterpillar ebook (in a powerpoint) that uses sound effects and animations. You could use this on your board to retell the story.

tags: education lessonplans teaching elemchat literature reading literacy
Drawing a Fairy Tale - Resources - TES

How to draw a fairy tale. This is an elementary level project that lets students draw the stories of the three little pigs and Cinderella. This is a downloadable worksheet.

tags: education elemchat lessonplan teaching
What Is a Leap Year? - YouTube

A video explaining leap year if you want to share it with your students.

tags: education news teaching
The Wind Power Challenge - Resources - TES

A wind power challenge for students for upper elementary, middle, and high school.

tags: education science teaching lessonplans
Electric circuit builder - Resources - TES

This electric circuit builder program is something that you can use with all ages. It is a great resource for teaching about electricity.

tags: education teaching lessonplans physics electricity science science_teacher
NSEW collection - Resources - TES

Some great lessons to use for science and Engineering week (in the UK but why not bring it over the pond) March 9-18th. If you are promoting STEM here are some fun lessons including the squashed tomato challenge.

tags: education stem teaching lessonplans math science engineering bestpractices all_teachers
A look at the tools used to draw sesame street characters | The Sesame Workshop Blog

This blog post is an excellent tutorial about how the digital pen works.

tags: education teaching art art_teacher

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

Learning about Learning: Research and Edreform News and Views 02/29/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 08:31:49 PST

25 alleged Anonymous members arrested internationally; hacker group retaliates

Hackers have knocked down Interpol's site this week in retaliation. Cybersecurity is a huge issue.

"Tuesday afternoon, the international police organization Interpol announced the arrest of 25 alleged members of Anonymous by officials in Argentina, Chile, Colombia, and Spain. Shortly after the announcement, Interpol's website was hit by a distributed denial-of-service attack. At the time this story was posted, the website remained unavailable."

Interpol announced that the arrests were made as part of "Operation Unmask", an international effort launched in mid-February to grab the perpetrators of attacks on websites in Columbia and Chile, including the Colombian Defense Ministry and presidential websites, a Chilean electricity company, and Chile's national library. Officials also seized 250 pieces of equipment, including computers and mobile phones, during a search of 40 locations in 15 cities.

tags: education learning hacking technology news
Foldit, crowdsourcing, and labor. - Slate Magazine

I know that some are saying that we can't gamify education. But what happens when problems become a game and we compete to find answers? This article talks about foldit and how crowdsourcing has become a possibility for something that can work when it becomes a game. This is a great read for those exploring how we will use games in education. I would suggest that this is an approach that we could use.
". Foldit, a novel experiment created by a group of scientists and game designers at the University of Washington, had asked the gamers—some still in middle school and few boasting a background in the sciences, much less microbiology—to determine the how proteins would fold in the enzyme. Within hours, thousands of people were both competing against (and collaborating with) one another. After three weeks, they had succeeded where the microbiologists and the computers had failed. “This is the first example I know of game players solving a long-standing scientific problem,” David Baker, a Foldit co-creator, wrote at the time."

tags: education gamification news foldit. game_based_lng gamebasedlearning

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

Simple Pinterest for Beginners

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 04:35:00 PST

Pinterest is a new network that revolves around pinning photos. If a website or blog does not have a photo, it literally cannot be "pinned" to a pinterest board. (Listen up bloggers and website owners, powerful sharing is going on at Pinterest, if you want to be included, you should have nice graphics.)

I'd like to help you get started just like I did with QR Codes, Web 2.0, wikis, etc.

1 - Get an invitation.
Anyone can view Pinterest boards, but if you want to start pinning, you'll need to get an invitation.

Option A (Stealth method for getting an invitation)
If you're on Facebook, this is simple. Just go to the Pinterest app on Facebook and look on the right (as shown in the graphic below) to see if you have any friends on Pinterest. If they've taken the time to like the Pinterest page, it is likely that they not only use it but like it. Message a friend or two and ask for an invitation if you don't like to be open about it.

Go to https://www.facebook.com/pinterest?sk=wall and see which friends you know that "like" Pinterest. Ask them for an invitation.

Option B (Open Method)
You can do like I did and ask on Twitter. I had at least 10 people who messaged me and said they'd give me an invitation. Don't be embarrassed, I've just been using pinterest for a week. Tons of people aren't there... yet.

2 - Create some boards

If Pinterest didn't ask you to set up boards, you can go to your name and click on Boards and it will take you to your boards screen.

You'll want to have a few boards to start adding to before browsing and before connecting with friends. Usually pinterest suggests some for you.

Examples
You can see my boards at my profile http://pinterest.com/coolcatteacher/ and in the graphic below along with some typical descriptions

Note: What is particularly fascinating about Pinterest is that when you follow someone, you can follow either just the person or one or more of their boards. I usually follow the person and then can unfollow specific boards on topics that don't interest me (like Tattoos or wines), I can also just follow a random person's board about iPad apps and nothing else. It lets you get very granular with your time. Think of it as if you could segment a person's Tweets and follow just their technology tweets and leave off the junk about their dog.

Here are my boards and how many are following each board (after a week):

Happy Thoughts - 209 followers - "These are the thoughts of things that make me happy when I look at them. It is my personal mood booster."
Things that make me laugh 221 followers - This is my board of funny things so I can always find them again. Like Mary Poppins' uncle, I love to laugh!
Teaching ideas and apps 243 followers - Great ideas for teaching and helping students be more.
Inspiration - 219 followers - I love to look at things that inspire me to be more. This is a personal boost for those days I need to climb mountains.
Productivity 223 followers - I am a productivity fanatic. Here is where I'll post ideas about how to improve my life and get more out of it. With 3 kids, global collaborative projects where thousands of kids work together, books, a busy blog, and lots of social media to attend to, time is valuable. We all have the same 24 hours in a day but differ in how we use those hours. Let's use them well.
Collaborative Writing 232 followers - My second book with @eyeoneducation is about collaborative writing. I co-manage wikis where over 1,000 kids collaborate AT ONCE. Google docs, and cloud tools are just some of the cloud tools I use to teach and encourage writing. I'll pin examples, ideas, and tools here to help with collaborative writing.
Being a Social media Maven - 217 followers - I love social media and want to understand and use it well. Here is my collection of tools, ideas, and methods that help me in this area.
iPad and iPhone apps for Teachers - 230 followers
Global Collaboration in Education (a board I'm inviting some friends to help me moderate) 222 followers - Excellence in global collaboration in education by people who are flattening classrooms.
Beautiful Workspaces - 188 followers - You spend a lot of time at your desk and I do too. I want it to be beautiful and inspiring. Here's my collection of beautiful work spaces when I'm looking for how to improve where I work.
Little BIG things to improve education - 194 followers - My collection of the little things that can improve education in big ways.
Online and F2F Presentations 204 followers - A collection of my online and face to face presentations by Vicki Davis, full time teacher, @coolcatteacher, co founder of @flatclassroom.

Board Set up Basics

Board Name I recommend around 28 characters. Any more and it will run off the board and a person glancing at your profile might not be able to see what you are talking about. (Note: It might take 29 characters, I was afraid to mess up my board names and that is the most I've been able to get on there without running off. Nudge me in the comments and I'll update this number.)
Board Description Tell people why you're making the board and what they can expect on the board.
Who can pin? You can invite others but they must be on pinterest. I'm inviting our Flat Classroom teachers to our Global collaboration board to collect best practices, and it is taking a bit of time to get them invited, set up and then add as collaborators.
Category. They have preset categories. This is important because a person can go to the homepage of Pinterest and browse by category. This category determines whether your pins might show up on the main pinterest feed or not. All of your boards should have a category. I'm so excited that Pinterest started off with an education category! That has helped teachers find each other.

Once you've set up your boards, you can start pinning.

3- Pin some things on your boards.

There are several ways to pin.

Pinning Method #1: Pin from the homepage of Pinterest.

You can always click the red Pinterest logo in the middle of the page to go back to the homepage. You'll want to click "everything" because you may not be following anyone yet. If you see interesting people, you can follow them, but I wouldn't link up with your friends quite yet.

When you put your mouse arrow over a graphic, the options appear. I can repin it (onto one of my boards). I can Like it (it will now appear in my likes) and I can comment on the pin.

When you click repin, you can pick the board you wish to pin it onto. (Note: the iPhone app doesn't let you make a new board when you pin but the computer version does.) You can type a title for what the item is. Add information to it and send it to Twitter (if you've linked it and want to.)

WARNING: Your Twitter stream doesn't want to hear every pin from you. I made the mistake and tweeted out about 20 pins on my first day at pinterest. In the normal flow of life, I get about 18 unfollows a day. (inactive accounts or whatever reason) I got 66 unfollows on the day I started pinning. I've since limited my pin Tweets to just 2-3 important items a day. I do post my pins to Facebook on my timeline, just because I want to. We'll see how that works.

Method #2: Pin from your friends

I'm having you WAIT on this, because when you go and add all your friends from Facebook, you get one chance for them to decide you're interesting and that they want to follow you.

I waited to do this until I had at least 5 boards with quite a few pins on them. I wanted enough pins so people new I was legit and not just another person starting and fading into the sunset. Then, I went and found my Facebook friends on Twitter by clicking on my name and finding my friends. Find your friends and then you can start pinning from your main stream.

Anatomy of a pin

When you look at a pin like this one pinned by Jennifer you'll see the graphic at the top, you'll see a list of other things pinned to the board. You'll also be able to add a comment. (I do this when I want to ask a question.)

You can see who originally pinned the item and where it came from (this one, actually came from Google which shows you about the copyright concerns that many have with pinterest.)

Finally, you can find other people to follow at the bottom. I can see another board about common core and others from teachers.

My Golden Rule for Joining a New Network: Find the 300
I've found that when I go on a new site that if I find and follow 300 good sources of information in my field that I will begin to get meaning out of the content. Sometimes I have to go unfollow content. For example, there was a great pinner I found who also had a real tattoo fetish that filled up my whole screen. I unfollowed just that board and it cleaned up my stream right away.

I did this on Twitter and every other site. After I follow 300, I start engaging, sharing and being as helpful as I can. If you're sharing in social media because you want to be the hot chic on the block, think again. People will see through your diva charade in a moment. Be real and be really helpful. If you are helpful, kind, and useful, people will follow you. If not, you'll still learn a lot.

Have fun on Pinterest and be sure to share your tips below.

Daily Education and Technology News for Schools 02/29/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 02:33:00 PST

What Is a Leap Year? - YouTube

A video explaining leap year if you want to share it with your students.

tags: education news teaching
Recess - Read, submit, vote and comment on education articles.

A friend of mine, AJ Juliani, will be launching academic recess soon where you can read, submit, vote, and comment on education articles. He's very sharp so I expect great things out of him. For now, you can put in your email to be notified about the service.

tags: education news
Featured Wiki: Expedition Earth and Beyond

This wiki has NASA scientists and students sharing on a wiki. This wiki is where the student teams that participate in EEAB collaborate and share.

tags: education news collaborativewriting
How to Remove Your YouTube Viewing and Search History Before Google's New Privacy Policy Takes Effect | Electronic Frontier Foundation

How to remove your viewing and search history. It is time to do this now.

tags: education privacy news
BBC News - Twitter partners with Datasift to unlock tweet archive

We need to be backing up our own tweets, I guess. Tweets are going to be sold to companies now.

"Firms can search tweets back to January 2010 in order to plan marketing campaigns, target influential users or even try to predict certain events.

Until today, only the previous 30 days of tweets were available for companies to search. Regular users can access posts from the past seven days

tags: education news twitter privacy
Cool Cat Teacher Blog: Clear your Google web history NOW! Why and how educators should do this.

Wednesday, February 29 is a leap day in many ways as you'll get just one more day to clear your web history before Google puts in place new policies on March 1st. Here's how.

tags: education privacy news
California expected to reap Facebook windfall - Feb. 28, 2012

If government could understand that business is good for the state. California is set to "balance the budget" perhaps literally from the Facebook IPO. I wish they'd invest in education more as they've been struggling there for some time.

"California could reap as much as $2.45 billion in additional revenues over the next five years from Facebook's initial public offering, according to a new report issued by the state Legislative Analyst's Office."

tags: education news
Foldit, crowdsourcing, and labor. - Slate Magazine

I know that some are saying that we can't gamify education. But what happens when problems become a game and we compete to find answers? This article talks about foldit and how crowdsourcing has become a possibility for something that can work when it becomes a game. This is a great read for those exploring how we will use games in education. I would suggest that this is an approach that we could use.
". Foldit, a novel experiment created by a group of scientists and game designers at the University of Washington, had asked the gamers—some still in middle school and few boasting a background in the sciences, much less microbiology—to determine the how proteins would fold in the enzyme. Within hours, thousands of people were both competing against (and collaborating with) one another. After three weeks, they had succeeded where the microbiologists and the computers had failed. “This is the first example I know of game players solving a long-standing scientific problem,” David Baker, a Foldit co-creator, wrote at the time."

tags: education gamification news foldit. game_based_lng gamebasedlearning
Have you accepted online technology as your organizational savior? - Small Act

If you work in social media, this article talks about the balance between immediately distrusting new technology and "shiny object syndrome." There is a balance and this article does a great job of helping you see both sides.

tags: education nonprofit news technology
France Says Google Privacy Plan Likely Violates European Law - NYTimes.com

The French data protection authority said Tuesday that Google’s new privacy policy appeared to violate European Union law, raising the stakes in a showdown with the company only days before it planned to put the new system into effect.

tags: education news privacy
Women in Haiti | United States Institute of Peace

If you work with empowering the victims of crimes, I think the Women in Haiti case study shared on this website is an important one to help you understand how to empower people who are or could become victims. This program by digital democracy, uses technology, trains volunteers, and collects data so that an understanding of what is happening can help drive solutions. This is something we should look at doing in many other areas. If you work as an advocate with victims of any kind, take a read.

This, my friends, is a great use of technology. I want to be part of helping such things spread. Will you?

"Recommendations
Technology is not a panacea. In any successful project, it is only one piece of the puzzle. However, technological tools provide an opportunity to amplify peacebuilding efforts. Some key recommendations from Digital Democracy’s recent experience working with women’s groups in Haiti include:
Survivors of sexual violence are not passive victims. They are often strong, vocal advocates for change.
A shared blog can provide a powerful platform. In the aftermath of the earthquake, the blog Fanm Pale offered an opportunity for women to share their stories with the outside world.
Data matters. Accurate data can help target preventative and relief efforts. With technical skill-building, women can collect this data themselves.
Engaging male allies is crucial. Gender parity and respect for both sexes can only be achieved through engaging men and women alike to work for peace in their communities.

tags: education news haiti technology nonprofit
Cybersecurity's new reality: The attackers are winning - Feb. 28, 2012

Cybersecurity is a growing problem. Schools shouldn't think we're immune. Be smart about what you do to protect your school's system and remember that one of the biggest problems is people who keep their passwords under their keyboard.

This from a cyber security conference...
"Never have the attacks been as targeted, with the aim of breaching one organization as a stepping stone to breaching others," he said.
Coviello dealt quickly with the elephant in the room, acknowledging RSA's black eye over the breach -- one of the largest in terms of the number of clients put at risk through a vendor's vulnerability.
"My colleagues and I feel this as personally as everyone in this room," he told the crowd of thousands. "Since the breach, we've been dedicated to regaining and maintaining your confidence in us. We have a sense of urgency as never before."

tags: education news cybersafety hacking
iPads for Orangutans: Program would let apes Skype other zoos

I think that giving apes iPads to let them skype other monkeys is over the top. Why not connect retirement homes with their families like my students are doing with their Skype project? This is a bit over the top.

tags: education news skype bizarre technology
BBC News - Apple iPad 3 expected on 7 March following press event

We'll see on March 7 if the world has been fooled. Is it an iPad 3? Is it an iTable? What is it? The journalists are banking on the Ipad 3 but who knows. Here is what the BBC is reporting on February 28.

"Invitations sent to journalists read: "We have something you really have to see. And touch."

While not officially confirming the product's launch, the message was accompanied by an image showing what looked to be an iPad touchscreen.

tags: education ipad news ipad3 apple

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

Clear your Google web history NOW! Why and how educators should do this.

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Tue, 28 Feb 2012 14:30:43 PST

You can go to https://www.google.com/history/ and sign in with your Google account and clear your web history before the March 1 (Thursday) privacy change. You can click "remove all web history."

IMPORTANT NOTE: IF you have multiple Google accounts ( a personal gmail and a school account through Google apps for domains, for example) you'll need to do this for both. I'm going to have my students do this tomorrow.

Why would you want to clear your history if you're a good person?
Your gmail, youtube, and web search accounts are going to be combined for Google to use somehow as they share with advertisers or whoever. I don't know and Google may not either.

I have nothing to be ashamed of, but I do have some things I need to keep private including the IP addresses of every machine and smart device I log into here on campus. I also found a few things like my children searching for no-so-nice lyrics of some songs they may like (that Momma doesn't know about.) You're not the only one using your web browser, you know.

Additionally, you'll find if you look deeply, the topics I'm researching. Most of them are just fine but what about the links and information I'm putting in my next book? I've worked hard for what is in my head, do I want you to be able to see everything there before it is published in my next book? Would it put me in breach of my publishing contract? I'm not totally sure (but then again, I'm not totally unsure either it is enough of a question to bother me, however.)

I also vet the people I work with. If someone calls me from out of the blue and wants me to do work for or with them, I check them out. I do due diligence. So I may combine someone's name with various search terms to see if something comes out. (If you saw I had the name of a reputable person combined with odd search terms would you think I knew something bad?)

Even more important, could I possible disclose something covered by an NDA? I'm under lots of NDA's that let me see advanced products and websites. If I was searching for things related to work with them or consulting work I do for people who want to be bleeding edge in technology, then I could be in breach of those NDA's, I would think, depending upon who saw it.

After I cleared my web history, it let me pause the collection, which is probably where I"ll leave it for now until I understand what this means and how it impacts the legal requirements.

I think the big question in the minds of many is something that happened like with Google Buzz privacy fiasco where everyone's emails were shared that you had in your contact list and people started asking why people were emailing each other.

Big companies rarely test such things completely and often just asking forgiveness is the course.

I work with children and have a responsibility to protect them and the teachers as well. I will always err on the cautious side of the fence with such precious ones in my care. It is the right thing to do.

Some scenarios.

What if you're looking for a job and no one knows it. How is this going to be used?
What if you had a parent situation and you were looking up information on the parent?
What if a student typed something bad on Facebook and you had to type in what they said to find it?

I don't know where this information will go but sometimes I find myself typing things I"d rather not have to type. I recall having to look up a word not too long a go that was scratched on something and it was a very embarrassing definition.

I paused my web history search.

Then. Clear your Youtube History
Clear your youtube search history by going to www.youtube.com and sign in. Click on your name and click on "Video manager" and then click "Search History." You can clear your search history and then, click "Pause Search History" which is what I did.

YouTube after I cleared and paused search history.

and go through all the steps outlined by the Electronic Frontier Foundation. They did a great job of explaining it.

Now that you've protected yourself, it is time to educate others. I think this is very important for teachers and principals as we are under policies that require us to keep things private. Until we know and understand what they are doing, we should be safe.

Daily Education and Technology News for Schools 02/28/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Tue, 28 Feb 2012 02:32:59 PST

Preparing Teachers to Teach Online

An excellent paper from Educational Technology magazine about preparing K-12 teachers to teach online. This article by Greg Kearsley and Robert Blomeyer is an excellent overview and still current.

tags: education news k12 blending
Astronauts' Cravings: Hot Food for the Cold of Space Travel - ABC News

This is fascinating. New conditions make for circumstances we cannot predict. Horseradish is a popular condiment in space because of the congestion astronauts experience. I find this interesting.

"To make space food more interesting (and probably generate some buzz while they're at it), NASA invited Rachael Ray to create some spaceworthy recipes; the selections favored by astronauts included spicy Thai chicken and vegetable curry. Emeril Lagasse joined in too -- with green beans in hot sauce.

tags: education news change prediction
How One Ship's Anchor Disrupted Internet Access in 6 Countries - Alexis Madrigal - Technology - The Atlantic

A ship drops anchor in Mombasa, Kenya and hits a set of fiberoptic cables and six countries experience outages and slower Internet: Kenya, Rwanda, Burundi, Tanzania, Etiopia, part of south Sudan.

tags: education news internet connectivity digital divide
The New IT: Drivers, Challenges and Opportunities

Those in IT will want to read Gartner's predictions for IT as a way to understand what is and what will happen. Aseducators, we need to make sure we understand the cybercrime impact and work towards creating an educated citizenry capable of protecting themselves.

"Emerging technologies and innovation are accelerating changes in the business and IT. In "Gartner's Top Predictions for IT Organizations and Users, 2012 and Beyond: Control Slips Away," several Strategic Planning Assumptions showcase the top trends associated with cloud computing, consumerization, and the proliferation of information or data. These trends will not only change the nature of business and the ways how work is done, but also impact the role of IT in the enterprise and the capabilities it needs to deliver to the business today and beyond:
By 2015, mobile application development (AD) projects targeting smartphones and tablets will outnumber native PC projects by a ratio of 4:1.
Through 2015, more than 85% of Fortune 500 organizations will fail to effectively exploit big data for competitive advantage.
By 2015, 35% of enterprise IT expenditures for most organizations will be managed outside the IT department's budget.
By 2015, low-cost cloud services will cannibalize up to 15% of top outsourcing players' revenue.
Through 2016, the financial impact of cybercrime will grow 10% per year, due to the continuing discovery of new vulnerabilities.

tags: education it news
Apple iPad 3 Shipments May Be En Route to US Already - Technorati Gadgets

Those who love Apple will love this news. iPad 3 may already be shipping. I don't know which is more interesting - Apple rumors or the lengths that Apple fans go to verify rumors. In many ways, their secrecy has become a marketing tool for Apple.

"To back these claims up of iPad 3 shipments en route to the US, are some shipping documents found on Weibo's forums seen below. The documents point out that the cargo is from Foxconn, and are requiring higher than normal and unusual security over the goods. The information is translated as follows

tags: education news apple
Google to Sell Heads-Up Display Glasses by Year's End - NYTimes.com

It is likely we will be asking for Google Glasses for Christmas. These will be android based glasses that we will wear that include 3G and 4G data connection including sensors and GPS detectors. Prepare for a new form factor -- motion and the human eye, we may not be using tablets at all.

tags: education news augmentedreality AR augmented
Technology Tools for Reflection - Reflection for Learning

A wiki about reflective practice that includes a selection of tools for reflection. (by Helen Barrett and others) This is a very nice wiki built using Google sites with a lot of good information.

tags: education news collaborativewriting
Attorney Says Pinterest Needs To Change Its Digital Copyright Policy

Pinterest is a very cool site but it is obvious to a even a casual user that there are copyright issues. The site hinges around the use of graphics and the clean interface that lets you use the picture and add text may be what gets them in trouble. You have to click on the pic to see the copyright holder. Here is an overview at Read Write Web of the problems Pinterest is going to have legally and it could shape the future of the rapidly growing site.

This happened just after Flickr added code to prevent pinterest from pinning Flickr pics. I think Flickr may find that it hurts them.

tags: education pinterest social media news
When's the Best Time to Blog & Share?

People read more on Mondays and share more on Thursdays. This will help you decide when to share your work, although it is great to share when others don't. Sometimes my most shared posts happen when others are asleep.

tags: education social media news

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

Teach This! Teaching with lesson plans and ideas that rock #teaching 02/27/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Mon, 27 Feb 2012 11:31:39 PST

iPad As....

RT @jswiatek: This is the best iPad App post I've ever come across - "The iPad As..." - http://t.co/pM2zaCfe #edtech #mlearning #teaching

tags: edtech mlearning teaching twitter

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

Google Glasses here by Christmas

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Mon, 27 Feb 2012 08:49:35 PST

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

Schools don't teach classes to kids who wear glasses? Many of us have been telling you for some time that banning cell phones is going to go the way of the dodo.

By Christmas, Google will likely be selling some Oakley-looking glasses that will display search results and run on the Android operating system. It will be a matter of time before these are prescription style glasses and people like me can wear them every day.

It is increasingly apparent that we have go tot go exist with smart devices and focus on what we're doing instead of banning the devices altogether.

Are you going to start discussing the USE of devices now so that you don't look like a person who just didn't see it coming by the end of this year? Start thinking about educational uses, technology is here to stay and we're rapidly approaching the day of implanted devices, first to help those with disabilities but later to help all of us have abilities we haven't dreamed up yet.

Distractions abound, we have to all learn to focus and do the appropriate task for that moment. There are no easy answers for this and banning cell phones and handheld devices just isn't the way to keep kids on task in the long run.

Learning about Learning: Research and Edreform News and Views 02/27/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Mon, 27 Feb 2012 08:31:13 PST

iPad As....

RT @jswiatek: This is the best iPad App post I've ever come across - "The iPad As..." - http://t.co/pM2zaCfe #edtech #mlearning #teaching

tags: edtech mlearning teaching twitter

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

Learning about Learning: Research and Edreform News and Views 02/25/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Sat, 25 Feb 2012 08:30:40 PST

The Impact of One - Capella University - The Atlantic

How to reengage students with learning. There are 8 things that I think we can do now, as teachers, in order to bring our students back and reengage them with learning.

tags: education learning news

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

Daily Education and Technology News for Schools 02/25/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Sat, 25 Feb 2012 02:31:42 PST

Classroom-Based Assessment Should Replace 'No Child', Experts Say - High School Notes (usnews.com)

Watching the republican debate this past week, I believe that the tide has turned against NCLB from both Republicans and democrats. I hope that we don't swing the entire other direction and have no accountability. We need accountability just not all due to standardized tests. We need flexibility and local control, however, some oversight. These sorts of things require balance. Unfortunately, in the US, when the pendulum swings we tend to go to extremes when most often wisdom lies in the middle where the level heads meet.
"It behooves us to take a careful look at the policies at the heart of NCLB, because they have not worked, [and] if they are not working, we need to change them," said Monty Neill, chair of the Forum on Educational Accountability (FEA), at the FEA House Briefing on Assessment last Thursday.

tags: education news edreform
Education Department Wants Tweets from Teachers and Students - High School Notes (usnews.com)

Great article on US news about initiatives in the US that have started but of special interest is the request that students and educators tweet.

The biggest issues I've had with the town hall meetings is that most of them are in the middle of the day when everyone is teaching. On Thursday at 3 pm there is a chat about rural education. It is nice that they're having these meetings but if they REALLY want teachers to participate it will be when teachers are able to focus on the conversation. You can't have teachers teaching and Tweeting. It doesn't work. If you see me tweet during the day, most of the tweets are scheduled or I'm on break or lunch break.

"February has been a busy month for K-12 education. On February 1, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan kicked it off by announcing that all U.S. schools should transition to digital textbooks within the next five years. On the 9th, President Obama waived 10 states from No Child Left Behind. And last week, the president proposed a 2013 budget that includes a $1.7 funding increase for education."

Although these federal policy decisions may not seem directly connected to day-to-day classroom activities, the Department of Education is using Twitter to encourage teachers, administrators, parents, and students to play a more active role.

tags: education news Twitter socialmedia
The Impact of One - Capella University - The Atlantic

How to reengage students with learning. There are 8 things that I think we can do now, as teachers, in order to bring our students back and reengage them with learning.

tags: education learning news
Secondary: English: KS3 Drama: Plays by Title teaching resources - TES

Here's the page that high school literature teachers will want to go to. On the left hand side you'll see "Sub Sub topic" and you can click on the play. Click More and you can see even more plays. This way you can find information by play.

One of the things I found is a popular resource that uses Simpsons Images linking to Macbeth. (Not sure about copyright but it is there and is very popular.) Curriculum directors will want to share this with their English departments.

tags: education teaching shakespeare news curriculum literature

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

Teach This! Teaching with lesson plans and ideas that rock #teaching 02/24/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 11:31:08 PST

Macbeth Events - Simpsons Images - Resources - TES

This is a powerpoint listing the major events in Macbeth, each slide describes the event (eg Macbeth kills King Duncan) and has a corresponding image using Simpsons characters.

tags: education literature teaching macbeth shakespeare
Secondary: English: KS3 Drama: Plays by Title teaching resources - TES

Here's the page that high school literature teachers will want to go to. On the left hand side you'll see "Sub Sub topic" and you can click on the play. Click More and you can see even more plays. This way you can find information by play.

One of the things I found is a popular resource that uses Simpsons Images linking to Macbeth. (Not sure about copyright but it is there and is very popular.) Curriculum directors will want to share this with their English departments.

tags: education teaching shakespeare news curriculum literature
KS3 Shakespeare Schemes of Work - Resources - TES

This is a fascinating holistic through through Shakespeare by English teacher, John Field. Including Much Ado about Nothing and Romeo and Juliet. He calls these his "tudor hall shakespeare units." If you teach Shakespeare, you may want to look at this and the other items here. Here's a tip: If you look at the classification at the bottom KS3 means high school and then you can click on Plays by Title and click on just about any play you will teach to find a lot of lesson plans and information for that play. If you're a beginning teacher or looking for new things, you'll want to drill down. I hope you'll share too.

I'm having a love thing this February. ;-)

tags: education teaching learning shakespeare literature engchat
AQA LITA3: Love Through the Ages - Resources - TES

This teaching pack includes a pdf and word document and will let you read about love through the ages. Drama, Poetry, Prose are covered in this high school resource for English literature. Great topical reading for February. I recommend this for literature teachers.

tags: education literature teaching
European Quiz for EDL - Resources - TES

How much do your students know about Europe? Here is a set of activities including maps, flags, and a few quizzes relating to this content. For those who want to make sure that students are globally literate (including geography) this is one of those resources you may want to add to your folder.

tags: education teaching europe

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

Edu app news: apps, ebooks, and sites for your classroom #mlearning 02/24/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 09:31:24 PST

Collobos Software

This software is supposed to make it easy to airprint all of your printers so you can print from iPad or iPod ir iPhone. It uses Bonjour and comes highly recommended. My sister is a graphic designer and says all of her friends are raving about it right now. Worth a try as her friends are super picky.

tags: education eduapp edapp ipad

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

Learning about Learning: Research and Edreform News and Views 02/24/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 08:32:15 PST

KS3 Shakespeare Schemes of Work - Resources - TES

This is a fascinating holistic through through Shakespeare by English teacher, John Field. Including Much Ado about Nothing and Romeo and Juliet. He calls these his "tudor hall shakespeare units." If you teach Shakespeare, you may want to look at this and the other items here. Here's a tip: If you look at the classification at the bottom KS3 means high school and then you can click on Plays by Title and click on just about any play you will teach to find a lot of lesson plans and information for that play. If you're a beginning teacher or looking for new things, you'll want to drill down. I hope you'll share too.

I'm having a love thing this February. ;-)

tags: education teaching learning shakespeare literature engchat

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

Daily Education and Technology News for Schools 02/24/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 02:31:24 PST

OpenScholar | drupal.org

Open scholar is a drupal module that lets you build academic and research sites. I'm looking for a CMS system for our school website and had a friend on TWitter recommend look at OpenScholar. This is a great option from what I'm seeing. I think schools should move out of Dreamweaver type systems into CMS (Content management) systems in order to have accurate, up to date content.

tags: education news drupal cms websitedesign
Graduation Rates Increase Around The Globe As U.S. Plateaus | WAMU 88.5 - American University Radio

Graduation rates aren't just a statistic, they may spell economic success or downfall for the US in the next 30 years. It is time to engage students. We can't make it easier to graduate, we actually have to work and help students learn.

This series of articles about graduation rates is a good set of articles posted this week on wamu.org (American University Radio.)

"The United States used to be number one for high school graduation. But times have changed. In 2009, the U.S. ranked 21st out of 26 OECD countries when it came to high school graduation rate, according to Andreas Schleicher, Deputy Director for Education for the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). "

"Basically the completion rate is pretty low, by international standards, in the United States," Schleicher says. Portugal and Slovenia were tied for first in the rankings, Japan and Finland hold the number two spot, and the Czech Republic ranks 17th.

tags: education graduation news trends

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

Teach This! Teaching with lesson plans and ideas that rock #teaching 02/23/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 11:31:01 PST

Top 10 things teachers need to STOP DOING! « CLOUDUCATION

A thought provoking challenge to teachers.

tags: education teaching
Flipped Classroom

A guide to flipped classrooms with some great downloadables. NOte that this guide is from Techsmith, the makers of some of the best screencasting software available so they have a vested interest. Even so, this is a great set of resources for teachers who want to start flipping.

tags: education learning teaching

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

Edu app news: apps, ebooks, and sites for your classroom #mlearning 02/23/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 09:30:44 PST

Zoo Trip by jlmorris1988 | Blurb Mobile | Blurb

Blurb Mobile is a site that some are using to create stories. Here's a teacher's zoo trip. You could use blurb mobile to make stories for field trips.

tags: eduapp edapp mobile

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

Learning about Learning: Research and Edreform News and Views 02/23/2012

coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher) — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 08:31:46 PST

What is Gamification? | Gamification.org

This wiki is about the gamification of websites including those in education. The entire wiki is dedicated to this technique. This was also one of the trends in the 2012 HOrizon Report.

tags: education news gamebasedlearning game_based_lng
Flipped Classroom

A guide to flipped classrooms with some great downloadables. NOte that this guide is from Techsmith, the makers of some of the best screencasting software available so they have a vested interest. Even so, this is a great set of resources for teachers who want to start flipping.

tags: education learning teaching
The Littlest Schoolhouse - Magazine - The Atlantic

This article is one people still point to when discussing personalizing learning for students. It is a great op-ed in the Atlantic. Software customizes the learning process so that students learn in ways that help them and progress at their own pace.

tags: edreform education personallearning

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

Cool Cat Teacher Blog

Edu app news: apps, ebooks, and sites for your classroom #mlearning 03/03/2012

Daily Education and Technology News for Schools 03/03/2012

Daily Education and Technology News for Schools 03/02/2012

Teach This! Teaching with lesson plans and ideas that rock #teaching 03/01/2012

Edu app news: apps, ebooks, and sites for your classroom #mlearning 03/01/2012

Daily Education and Technology News for Schools 03/01/2012

Elearning and global competency #flatclass #globaled 03/01/2012

Teach This! Teaching with lesson plans and ideas that rock #teaching 02/29/2012

Learning about Learning: Research and Edreform News and Views 02/29/2012

Simple Pinterest for Beginners

Daily Education and Technology News for Schools 02/29/2012

Clear your Google web history NOW! Why and how educators should do this.

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