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"Mommy, I have a stomach ache because I got a 90." That is one of the last things my first grader said to me before she went to sleep tonight. I've never written a post from the parent perspective before. This is new territory and I've avoided it until now because my expertise and experience lies in secondary education. I didn't feel it was my place to comment on elementary education without studying and experiencing it. The thing is, I have an expertise at being a mother of two little girls who are just starting school–one is in first grade and the other is in preschool. My daughters’ game of choice is "playing school" with a little easel and some books and paper and a class made up of dolls and stuffed animals. They teach through singing, drawing, and encouragement. They build in rest time and quick chats with the pretend parents who pick up their stuffed animal students at the end of the day. It's funny how my 4 and 7 year olds have intu...

Issues of data privacy, school-home communication, and equity are hard to ignore in the new climate of education. Communities are hashing out how to best use technology as a tool in education, especially in a job market that is forever changing and increasingly utilizing technology at every turn. From the classroom, school-wide, and district-wide educators' perspectives there are a few essential elements policymakers should hear. At SXSWedu, educators like  Jose Fausto ,  Matt Worthington , and me had the opportunity, alongside moderator Governor Beverly Perdue , to share our experiences and insights on these challenging, but exciting, topics during our panel . Here's a quick summary: Teacher-Tested Effective Uses of EdTech Exist Teachers love technology that gives them a chance to create and curate content; give students a learning experience that is fitted to their personal needs; provide a feedback loop between students, teacher, and parents instantly; and wh...

Note: A teacher at my school stopped by my office this morning to tell me this quick story, and it ended up being so inspirational that I felt moved to write about it and share it. I have her blessing, of course. Drawing by a middle school teacher from when she was in middle school herself. Middle school students are a wonderful combination of curious, mischievous, and sweet. Sometimes it seems as though the mysteries they are most curious to investigate are the personal lives of their teachers. At this adolescent stage they have finally come to realize that their teachers don't sleep under the desk each night. Since our students now have devices in their hands that can quickly find information, they tend to search for anything they can dig up to help unlock the teacher mystery. One of our middle school teachers comes from an artistic family and was eager to create her own art when she was in her own adolescence. She was hungry to get feedback on her work and to learn from...

We are in the midst or a revolution in information and we have an opportunity. Collectively, we are building the information repository of the future by posting, remixing, liking, and sharing online. Even this post is contributing to that future. This is a chance, if we do it right, to create a place where future generations can find thoughtful, accurate, and positive information. Simultaneously every selfie, snarky tweet, and dub-smash teens and twenty-somethings are posting is also contributing to the online world. While researchers, policy makers, parents, and educators discuss the future of safety and privacy online, these younger contributors should have a seat at the table. Other stakeholders can agree on best practices and even regulations – well maybe they can – but that will do no good if young contributors to the online world have no input and no interest in following them. There are three imperative interests: Safety : Protect users of connected technology from preda...

By Sarah Thomas A Big Change August 2015 marked the beginning of the most transitional year of my career. First, a position opened at the district level, coordinating technology with a team that had inspired me to become a teacher leader.   Almost simultaneously, I was offered a high school position that everything in my gut screamed “YES” about.  I accepted (after disclosing my pursuit of the other opportunity).  This was one of the scariest choices I had ever made. It was my first time in high school since 1999, when I actually was a student. It was my first time teaching Technology Education, which I soon found out was very different from Technology Integration. I had taught the latter for six of the previous seven years, and had thoroughly enjoyed gamifying a curriculum of our (the students and my) choice, which included any and everything that we could get our hands on. We coded with Sphero, learned basic photography and video editing, created podcas...

Communication via social media may be new, but it is not a passing fad. While it is crucial for our children to learn formal language used for business, they must also learn how to communicate using expanding digital platforms. Need proof that it isn't a fad? Look at Pew's results tracking teen social media use from 2006 to 2012: Source: Pew Research Center Concern #1: Privacy Our children need to learn how to protect their geolocation and contact information. Once that information is available, any savvy tech user can find out a great deal about their lives. It takes only some sly text messages, voicemails, and emails to gather the information needed to steal an identity. A more talented hacker can take only name, address and a few other bits and get everything they need. Concern #2: Photos These go along with privacy, but we also need to dig deeper. What are the photos teens are posting? Are they all positive? Are some potentially embarrassing? What about the phot...

By Ross Cooper According to EdTechTeacher , “ App Smashing is the process of using multiple apps to create projects or complete tasks.” According to Wikipedia , inquiry-based learning “starts by posing questions, problems or scenarios – rather than simply presenting established facts or portraying a smooth path to knowledge.” The Problem On many occasions, I have seen/read about App Smashing being leveraged in a way that is entirely anti-inquiry. In instances such as these, an overly contrived and smooth, risk free process is followed, all for the sake of a “cool” product. Here are directions I pulled from a real project: Using iMovie , shoot a scene of two actors portraying characters from a novel. Use the speed editor in iMovie to speed the video up slightly. Save the video to your Camera Roll. Open 8mm , pull the previous video from the Camera Roll, and use the “1920s filter” on the video and resave to the Camera Roll. Open Tellagami and use a...