Time Tech’s 50 Best Sites & Services of 2013

TIME magazine gives an annual salute to “sites and services that keep you entertained and informed, save you time and money—and maybe even change your life.” Some of the recommended sites that may be of interest to educators are:  the TWiT (This Week in Tech) network, which keeps you up-to-date with what’s happening in technology; Feedly, an RSS reader for sharing what you read/and or saving it to read at another time; MyPermissions that helps you discover what permissions you’ve allowed and lets you revoke them if you want; Office Web Apps, which may be “all the Office you need”; Pixlr, a photo editor that works with your browser; Forvo, like Wikipedia for pronunciations; Super Simple Learning with its focus on math and phonics through video and song; and Distance to Mars, which lets you and your students travel through the universe to Mars—428,000 pixels away.

TED Ed: Lessons Worth Sharing

Take the tour of TED Ed to see how you can use videos that are on the Internet to create super lessons.  On the site, you can also look at lessons others have created, and if you think you can use them in your courses, you can change them to fit your students and your curriculum. Lessons are listed by category such as mathematics, health, literature and language, social studies, and science and technology. Some of those that are called “Best Flips” or exceptional lessons featured are: Atoms from A to Easy!, Pi with Pies, The Secret to Rising Sea Levels, The Dawn of Art, and What is Nano?

Story by Disney

Disney’s free app, “Story," lets you use photos and video on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod Touch to create stories. It’s not a game or related to a Disney product; its purpose is to allow you to organize the media you have on your digital devices. Your stories, once complete, can be shared on social media and will look like a book complete with “fluid page turning and animation.” Leah Yamshon of MacWorld in her piece, “Disney Interactive Launches Story, a Non-Disney-Centric Photo App”, says that Story is “very intuitive to use with nice in-app editing features and a stunning final product.” This looks like a great app for schools using iPads in the curriculum.

Google Glasses in Schools?

In a few years just about everyone will probably have Web-connected watches and Google Glasses.  Students are already bringing mobile devices to school that can capture images and actions in our schools, but as “wearable technologies” become more popular, teachers and administrators will need to place additional emphasis on privacy and etiquette issues. Questions such as —Where will the devices be allowed?, How will teachers know if students are using the devices if all it takes to take a picture or start a video is the literal wink of an eye?, What information must be added to digital citizenship programs?, How might the devices be used to enhance the curriculum?, and What educational apps are available for reality-augmented devices?—will need to be addressed.

iCivics by Sandra Day O’Connor

Retired Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor was worried about students’ lack of knowledge about our government. Deciding to do something about it, in 2009, she founded iCivics. O’Connor says she wanted to make learning about civics motivating for students, so her company created, according to Common Sense Media, “an engaging educational site cleverly disguised as a gaming spot, with innovative games, cute animated characters, and a real-world reward component.” Topics covered include: Citizenship and Participation, Separation of Powers, The Constitution and the Bill of Rights, The Legislative Branch, The Judicial Branch, The Executive Branch, and Budgeting. You and your students can access iCivics on its Website.

Teacher Core for PBS Learning Media

Twenty-eight K-12 educators and library media specialists comprise the PBS LearningMedia Teacher Core. These are teachers who work with their local PBS stations to promote digital learning in their communities. Teacher Core members take part in a two-day Digital Education Summit at PBS, which helps them with  learning about tools and techniques designed to enhance learning.  Current Core members come from Washington, Florida, Texas, Tennessee, Georgia, Missouri, Massachusetts, North Dakota, Montana, Minnesota, North Carolina, New Mexico, New Hampshire, Kentucky, Wyoming, Arizona, Illinois, Ohio, California, and Michigan. If you are interested in promoting online media in schools and homes, you might want to become a Teacher Core member.

Educreations: iPad Lessons

Educreations has free computer and iPad software that helps you create and save iPad lessons and make use of lessons created by others.  Your lessons may include photo slides, diagrams, animation, and audio.  You can set who will be allowed to view your lessons. At Educreations you’ll find Featured Lessons, and subject area lessons in mathematics, science, Social studies, English, world languages, and the arts. Originally for teachers, this software may now be used by students to create reports and study notes.  The software is very easy to use, useful for teachers and students wanting to create iPad files, and convenient for learning from the lessons of others.

Making Web Videos

It seems that everyone is making and posting videos today. Some of them may contain good content but often home-made videos need sprucing up. Now that so many educators are creating their own interactive etexts and materials that link to video, it would be wise if they considered how to imbue their work with personality, great screen shots, good lighting, and engaging, but not overly engaging, audio. If you and/or your students are video enthusiasts or simply have to create video for lessons and projects, take a look at The New York Times Dos and Don’ts for Successful Web Videos. This resource uses video to make its points. Warning: Although the content is valuable, the links contain advertisements and some of the video segments go on to other YouTube videos.

Adobe Youth Voices

Check out Adobe Youth Voices ESSENTIALS for free curricula and materials that will help you motivate students to put their creativity to use. You’ll find multimedia resources related to video production, digital photography, graphic and web design, animation, audio production, and print production. You can register to take part in the learning, collaborating, and sharing of Adobe Youth Essentials.

Why Hasn’t Project-Based Learning Caught On?

First of all, it takes time, energy, and lots of planning on the part of a teacher. If a project is to be cross-curricular, how do teachers of different courses find the time for collaboration.  Second, when it’s happening, it looks messy and seems too noisy. Students are not in their seats working in the traditional manner. They’re bored, according to 17-year-old Nikhil Goyal, author of the book, One Size Does Not Fit All: A student’s Assessment of School. Goyal calls for anti-disciplinary education, not interdisciplinary education. “The bottom line is that you don’t have to learn the boring stuff before you start applying it. Start rolling around in the dirt from the get go.”