As I sit here on a Saturday morning tackling my income tax returns, I look around at the technology on my desk and am actually a little embarrassed. How many ways am I connected?

I’m using Turbo Tax on my personal (desktop) computer while my work laptop is open and booting up because I need to post some documents on the web. I need to use my work laptop because it has applications I need to use that I don’t own for my personal computer.

My iPhone is nearby because I just made a couple of calls and am expecting a text.

My iPad is at the other end of my desk, because occasionally I’ll break from work (and work) and play a word in one of my several Words with Friends games.

I just moved my Kindle out of sight so that I would not be distracted from work (and work and games) by the thought that I am in the middle of a good mystery novel.

Later today, when we drive out to Amherst for a visit, I’ll have today’s Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me episode on my iPhone so we can listen to that on the ride. When we get close to Amherst I’ll text my son to let him know we’ll be arriving soon. And when we decide where to go for dinner, one of us will use Open Table on our iPhone to try to get a reservation.

And some schools are still debating one to one? It’s really hard to remember when I had just one internet-connected device. I think it will be sooner than we can imagine that we will be looking back on the question of one to one and laugh at how ridiculous that question is.

I’m a big fan of the Fablevision Newsletter ~ see the February 2012 edition here.

This month’s poster, that you can download and print,  is nice depiction of our collective voice.

There is also a free poster for your classroom with ideas for making March the creativity month – enjoy!

ThinkB4U is a good site for learning about digital citizenship.

It hosts a series of web safety videos and tutorials from Google and its partners, Common Sense Media, ConnectSafely and the National Consumer League. The site includes three main components that are meant to be explored together. Each location—Home, School, Mall—includes several video shorts about a modern family’s online experiences. The videos, resources, and interactive portions of the site teach about important topics like identity protection, fraud detection, and digital citizenship.

http://www.thinkb4u.com/

In getting caught up on some blog reading that has been on my “to read” list for a while, I caught this post on the Olin College Blog – 20 Ways Siri May Forever Change Education.

Some of the impact statements are much broader than Siri, and apply to all mobile computing and the rise of BYOT. Educators who haven’t already made the move away from “standard” assessment questions and papers and essays that are based on someone reciting back facts are increasingly worried about the cheating and plagiarism opportunities that students have. Well, if a student is carrying Wikipedia and Google in their pockets, assessments and performance tasks have to focus on critical thinking, essential questions, and applying and transferring knowledge and skills.

The author, Melissa Venable, raises some interesting visions of the future, using Siri to improve accessibility, instruction and practice for English language learners, and coaching on homework. She pictures the day when voice recognition is common on most of our technology devices and when Siri is conducting oral exams. It’s an exciting time to be in technology and education.

What else do you see Siri helping with in the future?

Are students in your schools going to submit a doodle? Students are invited to submit a redesign of the Google homepage logo. The theme for 2012 is, “If I could travel in time, I’d visit…”

Visit doodle 4 google to learn more about the rules, judging, and prizes.

One of our students was a finalist a couple of years ago and it was very exciting!

I think we’ve all either been part of this IT solution-finding method or have witnessed it!

As a part of our Leading Innovation-Driving Change Conversation, MassCUE and METAA are co-hosting, with EdTechTeacher, a special webinar series prior to the spring conference annual event.

We are so excited to have Angela Maiers, co-author of The Passion-Driven Classroom joining us for a conversation in this FREE webinar, January 26, at 4 pm (ET).   REGISTER

Educators will be inspired by her story and her work. She describes educators as expert learners and passion practitioners. I love the concept that, as educators, one of our primary jobs is to share our passions and help students to discover their own passions and become more passionate about their learning.

Join us on Thursday and hear from Angela, herself.

The Passion-Driven Classroom on Amazon

Eye on Education
There is a handy (free) study guide to The Passion-Driven Classroom here.

Cult of mac, the all-Apple-news all the time web site, forecasts that the announcement about iBooks 2 and iBooks author will be followed by a sub-$299 iPad.

I’m not sure if that’s going to happen any time soon, but I suggest there are ways to get this technology into the hands of students. In Massachusetts, we have started talks with wireless providers and some of our local business partners to investigate the possibilities around providing 3G capable devices to students via parental purchase or lease. We are in the very early exploratory phase, but our vision feels sound.

Elements of our vision include:

• Choice of 3 G capable device – iPad or other (maybe a netbook?)
• Choice to lease or purchase
• Package that includes a choice of a set of apps (or applications) (Package A or B or C)
• A filtering solution
• Reduced monthly recurring service cost
• Schools ready to implement BYOT
• Service of devices facilitated through pick-up and drop-off at school

We want to bring together several partners to make this a reality. So far, we have a couple of statewide organizations in on the ground level, have begun doing some of the reaching out, and are energized around making this happen.

These are exciting times to be in our field!

In this video teachers talk about textbooks and then Apple shows what is now possible.

iBooks 2
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/ibooks/id364709193?mt=8
iBooks Author
Incredible new publishing tool – works on your computer to create books for the ipad and it is FREE.
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/ibooks-author/id490152466?ls=1&mt=12

Apple in Education

Apple hits it out of the park with iBooks2 and iBooks author.

Apple just keeps on innovating. They are reinventing the textbook.

They released 2 new tools that will help schools move to electronic, educator-created, texts.

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/technology/2012/01/apple-announcement-ibooks-2-ibooks-author-for-digital-textbooks/

excerpt:
“Schiller and his Apple colleagues showed off two new applications to take the information in textbooks and put it, in interactive form, on iPads and computers. One is called iBooks 2, a free download for iPads, available from Apple’s app store starting today. The other, iBooks Author, is a tool he said authors and publishers — as well as students and others with an interest in education — can use on a computer to create interactive iPad lessons.”