Coping With Tragedies

With news of the recent Boston bombings, I wanted to remind you that I had posted resources on coping with tragedies back in December after the Sandy Hook massacre.

Click here.

How Do You Motivate Teachers to Use Technology?

It is great time to be alive. Technology is constantly changing the way we do things, making it easier than ever to stay organized. I have always embraced change, but there are many teachers who are still resistant. It's hard to sell technology without one key ingredient: reliable Internet access. Without the necessary bandwidth, any talk of a 1:1 initiative is impossible. At my school, we have been promised an upgrade this summer, but I'm still wondering how to push that motivation into overdrive in September. I found several resources online and hope you will share your own stories in the comments section.

11 Reasons Teachers Are Not Using Technology- post by John Spencer

Encouraging Teacher Technology Use- from Education World

A Few Ways to Motivate Teachers to Use Tech- from Larry Ferlazzo

How Can We Motivate Our Teachers to Use Technology?- EdTech Chic's posting includes links to technology newsletters.


If Technology Motivates Students, Let's Use It- from Edutopia
Technology Incentives: Motivating Teachers to Attend Professional Development Training

Understanding Tech-Savvy Teachers: Identifying Their Characteristics, Motivation and Challenges- 20 page PDF file

18 Fun Resources to Help Kids With Vocabulary

Brainy Pics- upload a picture and write a sentence; use any of the pictures already uploaded to explain the meaning of a word

BubbaBrain- interactive vocabulary practice for elementary, middle, high school and college levels

Flashcard Stash- registered teachers create vocab flashcards and can share with their students

Free Rice- each correct answer generates a donation of 10 grains of rice through the World Food Programme.

Graph Words- online visual thesaurus

Knoword- helps boost vocabulary and spelling

Learning Chocolate- vocabulary learning platform includes a huge array of interactive lessons

Learning Vocabulary Fun-vocabulary games, English vocabulary word games, including Slang Game, Hang Mouse and Letter Games

MyVocabulary.com- root word lesson plans, puzzles, word lists and SAT/ACT test prep

PBS Kids Vocabulary Games- from Radio Martha to the Great Word Quest, a nice listing here

Professor Word- add the bookmarklet to Chrome, Firefox, IE or Safari and when reading a webpage; SAT and ACT words will be identified; can also give the definition to any words on the page which are not understood

Spelling City- teachers can save vocab lists, learning activities and games

VocabAhead- SAT and ACT vocabulary building

VocabGrabber- "VocabGrabber analyzes any text you're interested in, generating lists of the most useful vocabulary words and showing you how those words are used in context."

VocabSushi- " VocabSushi provides thousands of sentences that demonstrate any vocab word's contemporary usage in news articles."

Vocabulary Worksheets- from the Lesson Corner

Vocabulary Worksheets and Printables- filter by grade level


Wordia- includes videos of students and teachers explaining the meanings of certain words, many games

Website Evaluation: Resources

Checklist for Evaluating Web Resources

Credible Sources Count- view a 10-minute tutorial about how to find sites you can trust. EXCELLENT!

Critical Evaluation of Information- Kathy Schrock's guide by grade level; covers elementary through secondary 

Evaluating Internet-Based Information- from Media Smarts

Finding Reliable Information Online- slide presentation from middle school teacher Sean Hinger

The Five Ws of Website Evaluation- from Kathy Schrock

Museum of Hoaxes- bogus web sites from A to Z

University of Berkeley Library- an excellent tutorial on finding information on the Internet

Website Evaluation- I have put together three important links for your students

First Browser for Autistic Children: Zac Browser

Zackary Villeneuve's grandparents created Zac Browser so that he could interact with his computer in a calm way. It is the first browser created for kids with autism. Download to PC or Mac, and your child can access games, activities and videos in a safe environment. Here's a short video tutorial about Zac Browser:

Have You Heard of Summly? A Teen Just Sold it to Yahoo!

Until today, I had never heard of Summly, yet it was one of the best iPhone apps for 2012.  The app streams information you are interested in with a simple interface in no more than 400 characters. Created by Nick D’Aloisio when he was only 15, it was acquired today by Yahoo! in what is being described as a multi million dollar deal. With so much information out there, it's nice to be able to receive your own personalized edition, right? Take a look at what Summly has to offer and within the next year let's see what Yahoo! does with it.

Google Keep: Can it Replace Evernote?

In an effort to compete with the popular Evernote, Google recently unveiled Google Keep, an Android app which allows you to bookmark sites, make notes, record memos, add graphics and color-code notes for sorting. The Android app syncs with your Google Drive account. The first thing I thought of when I read about this was, could this really be used instead of Evernote? After all, my iPhone has always had notes. I could make a list of things there. My calendar alerts me to events. Without an Apple app, Google Keep can be used only by Android users. Strike one. But rather than make the decision for you, I will present information about both Google Keep and Evernote, with a few reviews I found online. One thing I will say is that I LOVE Evernote, so if Google wants to compete, they will have to up their game. What do you think?




6 Reasons Google Keep Can't Replace Evernote- GIZMODO

Google Keep Challenges Evernote for Top Android Note Taking App- GottaBeMobile

Google Keep: Worth Trying With Caution- TIME article

Google Keep, an Overdue Answer to Evernote, Arrives- Wired

Hands on with Google Keep: Can it Slay Evernote?- PC World