Just got back from a relaxing weekend on the Island of Hainan. Took some time to catch up on some reading that IÂ’ve been meaning to do. Ian Jukes “Education at the Crossroads” “Moving the Educational Debate” “Beyond Technology to the New Literacy/Shifting Gears Workshop” Marc Prensky “Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants” “Do They Really Think Differently” Carr, David, K. (1996) […]
My 5th graders have been blogging for about 2 weeks now. As much as I understand and read about this generation of digital kids, they still amaze me. I use the Blogmeister software which has been a great and easy way to manage my student blog entries. Today I came into school to find 34 blog articles waiting for review. […]
Last week I put the final touches on our new moodle site for my school as well as set up a blog sub domain to house the hopefully expanding blog sites. Our first blog is a literacy blog where teachers will post and comment with a literacy specialist in Beijing. I am excited to have these sites set up and […]
An article on September 22 from techlearning.com looks back at predictions made about technology and education. ItÂ’s amazing how close and how far off some of the perditions were. An interesting article to read and ponder.
A recent article at missoulian.com discusses at what age should schools start teaching typing. Some schools wait until as late as 5th or 6th grade to teach typing, while other schools start at grade 2. “The quandary is: Are we creating a world of hunt-and-peck keyboard users by waiting too long to give formal typing instruction? Or might keyboarding lessons […]
For the 5th Wednesday in a row now I have sent out what I call Wacky WednesdayÂ’s Websites (WWW). This is basically an e-mail to teachers explaining some sort of tech tip and a couple web sites I feel might be interesting to them. I started by only sending the WWW to the grade level teachers I taught, word got […]
In a recent article: Mind the Gap, Jeffrey Piontek writes: “We must refocus our efforts to address the new sets of skills and deficiencies that children of the information age are bringing into our schools. Whether or not we use computers to do this is irrelevant. We must be conversant with the language of the information age – not to […]
When was the last time you wrote a rough draft out long hand? Or the last time you edited a document without using a spell check feature? A teacher came to me the other day and asked “Why do we still make kids write out their stories on paper, edit them on paper, and only use the computer to ‘publishÂ’ […]
I just finished reading the article Schools try to draw the line for wired kids. I found the article quick interesting on the different approaches school districts are taking on trying to encourage or discourage use of cell phones, mp3 players, and other technologies. As I finished reading the article, my 5th grade class happened to walk in, so I […]
I came across this site the other day when I was looking for examples to show teachers how blogging can be used even with elementary students. My hat is off to Mr. Roemer and his 5th grade Polar Bears. This class is using technology the way it should be used, not as “another subject” but as a tool to help […]