20 Tips for Creating a Professional Learning Network Networking is a prime form of 21st century learning. The world is much smaller thanks to technology. Learning is transforming into a globally collaborative enterprise. Take for example scientists; professional networks allow the scientific community to share discoveries much faster. Just this month, a tech news article showcased how Harvard scientists are considering that “sharing discoveries is more efficient and honorable than patenting them.” As educators, we aim to be connected to advance our craft. Learning networks are based on the theory of connectivism, or learning from diverse social webs. What are some ways to grow your PLN and improve the quality of your interactions? 10 Tips For Using PLN’s Keep the spirit of collaboration as your driving force. 10 Tools & Strategies for Establishing a Productive PLN Use Diigo, Evernote, Pocket, or Delicious to bookmark links. PLNs are a powerful change agent. Tagged as: digital tools, free professional development, PLN, teaching
Starting the Year on a Positive Note Back in May, I asked readers to think of five things they'd done well over the last school year. I followed it up with a post on my personal blog reflecting on what I thought I did well. Now it's time for the school year to rev up again, and I'm hoping to not only keep doing what I did well, but also set some goals for the coming year. As this blog is a tech integration blog, I want you to think about something you want to do better or something new you want to try this year. With the proliferation of Web 2.0 tool lists, blogs about successes teachers have had with particular endeavors, webinars, wikis, online communities and more, it can be easy to get overwhelmed. Don't Try to Be a Superhero Pick one new tool or site to try with your students during the first report period (making sure, of course, that it fits nicely with what you will be teaching). Some Ideas for Implementation see more see less
Value of Student Work A student self-portrait from Ron Berger's student work portfolio Photo credit: Ron Berger I travel with a heavy suitcase. Over my 35-year career as a public school teacher and educator at Expeditionary Learning, I have been obsessed with collecting student work of remarkable quality and value. I bring this work with me whenever I visit schools or present at conferences and workshops, because otherwise no one would believe me when I describe it. The student work in my giant black suitcase is exemplary -- beautiful and accurate, representative of strong content knowledge and critical thinking skills -- but it's not from "exceptional" students. Student self-portrait Photo credit: Ron Berger When I work with educators around the country and pull this work out of my suitcase, it changes the vision of what is possible when students are allowed, compelled and supported to do great things. Seeking Value Student-designed Greenprint Austin's Butterfly The Greenprint Snakes
Top 7 Guides on how to Use iPad in your Classroom iPad is definitely a gadget of huge potential in education. Many schools in the States and Canada are adopting it as a learning tool within their curriculum. Developers have already started creating e-textbooks with enhanced mobile compatibility. More important, there are now several apps that are easy to use and that enable teachers to create their own teaching content to go on iPad. Given this growing important of iPad in education, Educational Technology and Mobile Learning deemed it crucial to provide its readers with some of its best guides and posts we have published here during this year. 1- 12 Questions to Ask before Using iPad with your Students 2- 62 Ways to Use iPad with your Students 3- 100+ Tips on how to Integrate iPad into your Classroom 4- Excellent Slides on The Use of iPad in Education 5- iPad in The Classroom A Great Free eBook 6- 29 iPad Resources, Tutorials, and Guides Every Teacher should Know about 7- 8 Free Resources on The Use of iPad in Education
3 Great Tools for Collaborative Brainstorming Collaboration is an essential feature of the 21st century education. Students are encouraged to work together and benefit from their collective wisdom.There are several ways teachers can use to foster collaborative habits among their students and most important of them all is through group work or classroom group projects. While working together, students get to discover different ways of thinking other than theirs and they also share and build a healthy learning environment. Working together on projects does require pulling ideas from different resources and this is probably one of the problematic things about collaborative brainstorming. 1- Real Time Board This is a web tool I have already reviewed in an earlier post here in this blog. 2- Lucid Chart This is another awesome web tool that students can use for collaborative brainstorming. 3- Spider Scribe SpiderScribe is an online mind mapping and brainstorming tool.
Reframing Worksheets Worksheets matter! I know we hear a lot of talking points that tell us to get rid of them, but I think it's much more complicated than that. That call for "no more worksheets" comes from a place where that is all there is. By that I mean classrooms where students do nothing but worksheets. Often these worksheets are de-contextualized from relevant work, and this is where there's an opportunity to reframe and refine the traditional worksheet. There is a time and place for drill and practice or individual practice -- even in a PBL project. A recent visit to a PBL school jumpstarted my brain on this issue. Worksheets That Model a Career Tool Students consistently worked on a piece of paper shown below. As we design worksheets, let's consider making them look like the real-world work that students are doing -- or could be doing. Worksheet used at ACE Leadership Academy Credit: Andrew Miller Other Tips for Worksheets Include the Driving Question Where Students Can See It Rubric and Reflection
Videos Suggested for Back to School Faculty Meetings and other educational audiences This post could be almost infinite: there is most certainly an extraordinary array of options for videos which expand educators’ understandings and inspire advances in 21st century learning. But curation is about choice and selection, and while I know I will leave out many, I thought I’d offer up a set of 15 of my favorites for your consideration for video screening at at back-to-school or beginning-of-the-year faculty meetings (and/or parent and board meetings). I’ve starred those that might also serve as useful and engaging videos to share with students at back to school or other assemblies. I am sure every reader will have their own opinions about the videos I’ve left off this list, and please: add them below using the comment box, or, post yourself your own set and share the link from this post to your own. 21st century learning generally: 1. 1b. 2. 3. 4. 5. * 5b. 6. 6b. 7. * 8. Innovation * 9. * 9b. * 10. * 11. Project-Based Learning 12. What PBL Isn’t. What PBL Is. 13. * 14. 15. 16.
EduClipper Launches Its “Pinterest For Education” Back in 2007, Adam Bellow launched a site called eduTecher to aggregate and surface the best educational resources and content on the web. A high school teacher, Bellow set out to highlight new technologies and educational tools that could be used in the classroom to improve the learning experience. When a new generation of community curation tools began to take hold on the web, like Pinterest, Bellow decided to leverage the increasing popularity of crowdsourced curation to take eduTecher to the next level. This week the teacher-turned-entrepreneur officially launched eduClipper, a platform that allows teachers and students to explore, share and contribute to a library of educational content. The idea behind eduClipper, Bellow says, is to give students the same power of social curation they would have with Pinterest, allowing them to locate and publicly broadcast the best learning resources. For more, find eduClipper at home here.
Vocabulary Instruction We know that there is a strong relationship between vocabulary and reading comprehension. Systematic vocabulary instruction is an integral part of a K-12 comprehensive literacy framework for instruction. I consider it a privilege to have supported many teachers, coaches, & administrators in building a community that values word learning across classrooms and content areas. Common characteristics of effective vocabulary instruction have been documented in numerous professional journals and books. Effective vocabulary instruction across grade levels and content areas is key. I write frequently about vocabulary. You can put this infographic to use tomorrow. Download today’s tool by clicking on the tag at the end of this post. Like this post? Please read our Reblogging and Reposting Policies here before reblogging or reposting. Have you found these posts helpful in supporting your literacy efforts? The following two tabs change content below. Kimberly
21k12 in 2012: My Year in Blogging, including Two Top Ten Lists My fifth year in blogging is now coming to an end. My blog began with in the fall of 2008 over at blogspot, and then I migrated it here to wordpress in late January 2009. Once a year– and only once a year, I like to share some reflections and statistics upon my year here at 21k12. 2012 sadly saw a small dip in the number of postings: down to 120 posts this year, compared to 150 last year, 165 the year prior. But, I do allow myself vacations– and as I completed my third and final year as St. As for total page views, growth continued. But I did double again, for the third year in a row, taking 2012 views to 142,000. Let me be clear here: there is no possibility that 2013 will see a fourth “doubling” in views. In classic 20/80 fashion, it is only a very small number of posts and pages which generate the view rates in the five figures that support the high overall totals. The 21st century videos post I pulled together in a couple of hours in August, sitting on my couch watching the Olympics.