Twitter Educational Hashtag Help

For guidance in educational Twitter resources, check Jeff Dunn’s A-Z Dictionary of Educational Twitter Hashtags. You’ll find the following lists: Most Popular Hashtags (global, teaching, kindergarten, etc.; Technology (apps, mobile learning, game-based, etc.); Subject Specific (math music, arts, history, etc.); Specific Areas/Roles (bullying, chat, homeschool, play, etc.); and full list (nearly all educational hashtags). According to Dunn, the educational hashtags on the list were curated by Cybraryman and the Creative Education blog, tweetsmarter.com, and hashtags.org.

Looking for Classroom Videoconference Opportunities?

Polycom, Inc. offers a database of programs, which are available from content providers such as the Smithsonian, historic sites, Presidential sites, NASA, National Archives, zoos, PBS, and universities. You can search for the programs you want by selecting from categories like Free Programs, New Programs, HD Programs, Award-Winning Programs, and Programs for Teachers. Examples of some of the 300+ free programs are “DNA and Your Health” (WVIZ/PBS ideastream), “A House Divided: Civil War” (Smithsonian American Art Museum), “Analyzing Primary Sources” (Library of Congress), “Rainforest Connection Live”, “Time Travel with Fossils (Badlands National Park),  “Videoconferencing 101 Teacher Tutorial (Smithsonian American Art Museum) and “Around the World in Eighty Bones” (Canadian Space Agency).

For Teens Who Prefer to Study Online

The article, Teens Take Studying Online, by Jason Koebler of U.S. News Education, describes different ways students study online. Some students study with others throughout the world by using social networking study services such as Grockit.com and Openstudy.com.  Some use Skype to connect, and some study on their own on a site like Quizlet.com, which offers millions of flash cards for curricular subjects and SAT prep. Teachers use Moodle, Edmodo, Blackboard, and other services to interact online with students and to set up student group chatting. Leaders at Grockit created an internal study to see how students were studying using this online network. The findings included: students in groups studied three times longer than students who studied on their own and covered twice as much material.

Connecting with Other Schools Through Skype

Have you tried Skype in the Classroom? It’s an online educational area that helps teachers find partner teachers and classrooms. Real-time chats with other classes is exciting for students, but teachers often have a difficult time finding partner teachers in other parts of the United States and world.  With Skype in the Classroom, you can join another project or set one up for others to join, you can use Skype’s resource library and add your own resources to it, and you can find teachers throughout the world who have interests and needs similar to yours.

Where Are Teens Getting Health Info?

When teens and preteens are looking for health information, according to the article “Technology Trend: Teens and Online Health Research” in CYFERnet, only about 3% of teens go to sites like Mayoclinic.com, Plannedparenthood.com, and Health.com for answers. Instead they do a Google or Yahoo search, use Wikipedia; check with online friends; and post questions in online discussion areas and confessionals. About half of the teens surveyed said they go online to learn about mental health, sexual issues, and general health. “Their top worries were sexually transmitted diseases, followed by drugs, unplanned pregnancy, unhealthy relationships, depression, alcohol use, eating disorders and cyberbullying.”  These interests differed from a Pew study in which adults said their main medical interests were: nutrition, fitness, specific diseases and treatments, diets, and supplements. Considering the differences in interests between teens and adults concerning health, teen-related health information needs to be readily available to young people and should be in places they are likely to frequent online. (CYFERnet is network that features practical research from leading universities.)

Microsoft and ePals

Microsoft Corporation and ePals will be working together to “deliver communications, collaborations and digital learning technologies to the global education market” through a program called Microsoft [email protected]. Calendar and email options will be available. Later the features of Microsoft’s on the Web version of Microsoft Office, Microsoft Office Web Apps will be added to the collaboration. [email protected] is free to educators and students.  For additional information on the agreement between Microsoft and ePals, read Christopher Dawson’s article, ePals + Microsoft [email protected]=K-12 Game Changer.

Cyber Communication: Progress or Problem—What Kids Say

This year’s Optimist International Oratorical Competition for students focuses on the topic: Cyber Communication: Progress or Problem. After listening to many student speeches, these thoughts went through my mind. (1) Students, at least the ones participating in this competition, know the dangers of the Internet. (2) They know social networking sites have a minimum age, but they ignore it—it’s like it’s not there and doesn’t matter. (3) They realize cyber communication is here to stay and say people should get used to it and learn how to use it correctly. (4) They have no idea what to do about the problem of cyberbullies, but they know that it happens and feel for those who have been victims. (5) Although they text and video chat mostly, and still use email and instant messaging, many love to get written letters—one speaker even wrote an obituary of a love letter and then recited from one of Abigail Adam’s letters to John.  (6) They can’t imagine carrying a dictionary around or having to look words up in a dictionary. (7) It’s foreign to them not to be able to type their essays into the computer. “I couldn’t just sit down and write my stories on paper,” one commented. (8) They see cell phones as a necessary part of their lives, but they do not think parents should give cell phones to young children. (9) They are not sure about the option of technology to locate where they are. “That’s scary,” according to some. Others thought it could be useful for parents but noted that parents might purchase a cell phone for young children for this reason and not realize the other dangers present in cell phone options. (10) They see that cyber communication can be a powerful force for good in our world even though they realize that everyone doesn’t use it as they should—one speaker said, “You’ve got to remember that everyone isn’t nice.” Another said, “Alexander Graham Bell didn’t invent the telephone so that people could make crank calls or threatening calls. We must step forward with the technologies we have today thinking how we can help our world.”

 

ISTE Conference In Denver 2010

The International Society for Technology in Education will hold its annual conference June 27-30 at the Colorado Convention Center in Denver. This year’s theme “Exploring Excellence” will include sessions on just about everything you need to know about technology in education.  On the ISTE conference site, you can use the Program Planner to select sessions that are appropriate for you. For example if you want to learn about iPhone apps for mathematics, the impact of e-book readers, LEGO Robotics, or 3D animation; just log on to the Planner. Early-Bird registration closes on 5/1 and mail-in registration on 6/11.

Virtual Community for ELL Students

ePals and Heinle ELT have created The Heinle Community, a safe virtual workspace in which students practice using English while working with other students and instructors online. Teachers use the Heinle Community to partner with schools around the world in order to do projects together. Web 2.0 tools are provided to help students with their projects. According to Heinle ELT, there are more than one billion English language learners worldwide who could be helped by this type of online community.

Homework As An Excuse

Most kids like to spend time online, and many parents and teachers worry about the time students spend at the keyboard. As teachers move to assigning homework that may require use of the Internet to access and complete assignments, kids have a perfect excuse for staying online.  All they have to do is to tell parents, “I’m doing my homework,” when perhaps they’ve finished what was required an hour or so ago.  This is just another way kids are finding to circumvent what we want them to do. The answer is parent and teacher communication so parents will be aware of assignments and teachers will be aware of how long students are taking to “do assignments” at home. We need to help parents learn how to monitor their children’s online activities and how to find out what’s actually assigned.