Eclectic Technology

What happens when you take a kindergarten class and create a project-based learning opportunity on a local issue? In this case amazing success.

What is critical is to provide appropriate scaffolding so that all students (included English Language Learners) are comfortable and able to help with the presentation.

If you have concerns about implementing PBL in your classroom this article may help you realize that it can be done, even in kindergarten. Click through to the post to read this uplifting article.

This post shares another visual that provides one model of learning in the 21st century. Specifically, it prioritizes six ideas:

* Disciplinary Knowledge - "Build and apply content knowledge to think deeply and act as a practitioner of the discipline"

* Self-Knowledge - "Experiment and create, while embracing failure as an opportunity for growth in order to design new ideas and solutions."

* Innovation Creation - "Recognize one’s emotional, physical, and learning needs, strengths, and challenges to nurture personal growth and resilience"

* Collaboration - "Share knowledge and resources, building on a diversity of ideas and experiences to achieve group goals and interdependence"

* Responsibility - "Understand one’s impact and influence in a local and global community; cultivate compassion, and take positive action"

* Communication - "Express ideas effectively through varied means of presentation; understand one’s audiences, actively listen; and build connection"

Additional information on each of these six ideas is included in the post.

This ThingLink image created by Susan Oxnevad is chock full of resources in the following categories:

* Online Learning Platforms

* Finding Information

* Understanding Information

* Using Information

* Writing Today

* SAMR Model of Tech Integration

* CCSS Vocabulary

* Build a ThingLink Classroom and The ThingLink Toolkit

* Google Forms: Create an Assignment Tracker to Collect Work

* Avatars and Internet: Using Avatars to Teach Internet Safety

There is also a ThingLink on Digital Differentiation, 2014 edition.

If ThingLink is new to you as you scroll over you will see a variety of symbols appear. Each links to a specific resource.

Are you using Google Docs? This post explores many of the options available to you in Google Docs including:

* Google Docs for Research - Look under Tools to access Research. As well as allowing you to research within Google Docs this tool streamlines " the process of creating hyperlinks and appropriately formatting citations."

* Google Docs for Collaborative Writing - Some of the features of this tool include sharing and commenting, built-in dictionary, smart spell check and grammar check, one click footnotes and citations, Easy Bib connection and revision history.

The Common Core stresses the need for students to collaborate. Google Docs may assist your students in the process. The post also contains quite a few screenshots.

A look at how "21st century learning vernacular" has created some oxymorons such as:

* Scripted Curriculum Maps

* Student-Centered Classroom

* Partial Understanding

Each of the oxymorons has a short description. What are your thoughts on this? Do you believe that these are oxymorons? Can you think of  other 21st century vernacular that describe education that are oxymorons?

Check out this infographic that explores the difference between traditional teaching and learning, and contemporary teaching and learning. Where is your classroom in this continuum...and where to you think teaching and learning will be 10 years from now?

Not too long ago I posted an article that suggested we move from the KWL chart to the KWHL chart...and here is another post that suggests we make it more in-depth by adding the letters A and Q.

What do all these letters stand for?

K - What do I know?

W - What do I want to know?

H - How do I find out?

L - What have I learned?

A - What action will I take?

Q - What new questions do I have?

More in-depth discussions of these new letters are included in the post.

Gamification...do you ask yourself if this will work in your classroom? In this post Vicki Davis shares her experience of bringing games into the classroom. You will learn how games may be the tool for some students to break through barriers, and also that the language used by games is not always up to school standards.

She shares five elements of gaming that should be considered as gaming and education come together.

1. Game Mechanics (think game theory)

2. Bartle Test of Game Psychology (more information on this in the post)

3. Gamification is a Process - In this section she shares the experience of another teacher whom has gamified his classroom, including an embedded video from a Google Hangout he hosted. Take the time to watch the video and learn from his experience with his 6th grade class.

4. Serious Games can be Used Anywhere - from elementary through college level (and some businesses are using games to help train future employees).

5. Serious Games can Tackle Serious Issues, and serious issues may help us promote rigor in our classrooms.

6. We Can't Trust App Stores to Curate our Games

Click through to the post for more information. After reading the post do you think that gaming has the potential to be a "powerful 'killer' tool in a 21st century teacher's toolkit?

Check out how one might design a technology course for 6th graders if your goal is to use "LEARNFLOW which supports the unconscious, smooth and effortless flow of learning."

This post provides a visual of how a course designed with LEARNFLOW in mind might be organized. It is based on Alan November's work on tutorial creation which "empowers learners...to become creators and contributors."

The image above may provide you with ideas on how you might work with students this school year with technology.

There are many ways we may look at 21st century learning and this post suggest that there are six channesl of learning. In fact the post notes that there are more than six channels but that "these six are emerging or have always existed as powerful players in how learners make meaning."

The image above provides a visual view, and the six key areas are listed below.

* Dialogic Response

* Community Interaction

* Abstraction and Creativity

* Media Literacy

* Play

* Self-Directed Learning

Are there other areas you would define as channels of learning?

Ross Parker has posted another infographic that ties into an earlier one (that looked at Style Comparison and was posted in this Scoop.it). This one looks at mindsets and how there are similarities today in the mindsets of teachers and students. He states "The two visualisations below are part of an ongoing attempt to define my views on education, and make these accessible to my students, fellow teachers, parents and leaders."

If you click through to the post you will also see the first infographic and you may download them in a variety of formats.

Many students choose to use Wikipedia as a primary resource and many teachers tell students they should not use Wikipedia...but what if you require that they confirm all information from other primary resources? Gleeson notes "I believe starting with the much maligned site had several benefits that will transfer over to the students’ use." 

He discusses four issues that students often face when searching online:

* Where do I begin? (Based on my discussions with students most students tell me they use Google, but that does not mean that they look beyond the first page of results, or know how to do searches.)

* Key word search - Do your students know how to use key words? Wikipedia may help with this.

* Secondary source drives me to primary source - Allow the secondary source to provide some foundation, but confirm with primary sources.

* Effective time management for checking sources.

Additional information on each point may be found in the post.