Free Webinar On Scratch… A Free Program From MIT… Imagine, Program, Share!

Are you  itching for ways to engage and empower students and their inherent creativity? Scratch will bring instant relief to a classroom of kids  ready to collaborate, innovate, and create! Please join me as I present some Scratch Basics while informing educators how to get students Scratching across the curriculum! This Scratch Webinar sponsored by the awesome people at the  Siemens Stem Academy and the Discovery Education Network is bound to create a rash of enthusiasm. I also wish to thank in advance both Steve Dembo and Hall Davidson, two of the very best, for the moderation they will be providing. The date and time is Tuesday, November 30 at 7:00 PM EST! Please join me, and while you are at it, subscribe to this 21centuryedtech Blog by either RSS or email. You can also check out my 21centuryedtech Wiki or follow me on Twitter. Most of all, please register for this free Scratch Webinar and join me for a journey into 21 Century Learning! Have a great week! – Mike

When was the last time you got a good smell of a Crayola Crayon? It really doesn’t matter the color! Just the scent will turn on the imaginative juices possibly lost since Kindergarten!  Or perhaps you remember the hours you spent with Tinker Toys. An adventure filled with a constant flow of  unchecked time  building, tweaking, and tinkering!  Then there was the Easy Bake Oven. A true childhood dream of combining, remixing, and creating. The brilliant inventors at MIT’s Life long Kindergarten Group have found a way to repackage, reinvent, and integrate these same concepts and come up with an ingenious package called Scratch. It is a mix of on-line experiences,  computer programing, animation, game creation, multi media, fine arts, science, social studies, language arts, math, and collaboration. Join me in this Scratch Webinar to discover why Scratch is a must for every 21st Century classroom!

Do you want to build a game? Scratch can do it. Do you want to create a work of art. Count on Scratch to allow you to fit together the Master Pieces! Do you want to discover mathematic? You can count on Scratch to make sense out of numbers and number theory. Do you want to tell a story? Scratch can do that with pictures, sounds, and movement! Do you wish to experience sound and music? Scratch will carry quite a tune!  There is simplicity for elementary, challenges for middle school, and complexity for the older students. Educators can help students Scratch their way through any level and curriculum.

Perhaps your school is fascinated by STEM, or intent on pulling in the fine arts by creating STEAM! Possibly your classroom is venturing into the world of Project and Problem Based Learning. It may be the 21st Century Skills that you are building with students each day. Scratch can be used as a tool to promote all of these awesome  avenues that promote student centered high level learning!

This really is a must attend webinar where you will learn…

1. Scratch basics

2. Why you must incorporate Scratch

3. How to get the free program and more

4. How to get students started

5. How to get students far ahead of you

6. Opportunities in every curriculum at all levels

7. Ways to promote 21st Century Skills

8. Methods to promote community and on-line collaboration

9. The art of creating, remixing, and innovating

10. Ways to explore resources at MIT and beyond

You will discover how to get students a basic beginning and later get them involved in animation, drawing, interactive art, games, math, music, simulations, and even a possible contest. You will view student creations while listening to their experiences. Most of all this webinar will introduce you to a vast amount of resources and ideas to send you and your students on a quest that will allow them to imagine, program, and share! I will even show you ways to bring Scratch outside of the computer’s environment allowing interaction in awesome, inspiring, and relevant ways!   While this webinar will only “Scratch” the surface, it will provide the foundation to incorporate Scratch into your curriculum and get students excited about STEM education and opportunities.

Please send and retweet  this post to educators across the internet and share with other colleagues in your building! When you sign up for the Scratch Webinar, be sure to also subscribe to this Blog. Be on the look out for my up-coming post  bringing you links to resources uncovered in the Scratch Webinar. In fact, that is just one more reason to turn on the RSS feed or email subscription to my 21centuryedtech Blog. You will also find information and resources at my 21centuryedtech Wiki and I hope you are itching to follow me on Twitter at mjgormans!  Again, please join tthe educators that will participate in this free Scratch Webinar from Siemens, Discovery Education, and yours truly! I look forward to sharing and learning from you! I am also excited to view your comments, replies, and back channel chat on Tuesday, November 30 at 7:00 PM EST! As always, thanks for stopping by and keep progressing, as you continue to transform your classroom for the 21st Century! – Mike

Part 3 … Amazing And Valuable Techniques Using Google Advanced Search

Welcome to the third post in my  Googal In Google Series giving an in depth view of the Google Advanced Search Engine. In this third of a three part posting, I will cover some great techniques many people do not know or seldom use in the Google Advanced Search.  As always,  feel free to subscribe to this Blog by RSS or email, follow me on twitter at (@mjgormans), and also discover some great resources at my 21centuryedtech Wiki!  You will also find my other postings at Tech and Learning Magazine. Also please mark November 30, at 7PM on your calendar. I will be presenting a free webinar about MIT’s free program, Scratch, in conjunction with Discovery Education. Please click here to learn even more! Now let’s advance our knowledge and uncover even more great techniques in using the Google Advanced Search!  Have a great week – Mike

I sure hope you enjoyed the other three posts in this Google Search Series. If you missed them then check out the links below.

Ten Items All Should Know When Using Google Basic Search…. Far From Basic!

Part 1… The Google Advanced Search.. Basic Student Skills And Learning

Part 2 … The Google Advanced Search.. Uncover Awesome Searching Secrets For Teaching And Learning

This is the third in a series of articles on the Google Advanced Search. In this post I wish to cover that part of the advanced search you see when clicking on the blue highlighted area called Date, usage rights, numeric range, and more. You will find a host of valuable tools to help make any search, even better.

Date (How Recent The Page Is)

This is very valuable for finding timely information. Students looking up a current event or news breaking story may want to use this feature. Remember, the default is (anytime). It is also a great way to emphasize whether currency of information is relevant to the research topic.

Usage Rights

This is a goal mine for those wishing to use, share, modify, or remix information.  Also, a great way to teach students about copyright and creative commons rights. It is important to observe the rules governing how an item may be shared, and to make students aware of this. This is especially helpful when searching for pictures in the Advanced Image Search. It allows the user to search for pictures that can be used in their own publications. Please note that even with permission the creator of any material should always be credited.

Where Your Keywords Show Up

This is a tool that can be real useful in narrowing down results. First, the default is (Anywhere In Page).  This includes all the possibilities, but may actually be to broad in scope. When getting a large number of returns, one could narrow down returns by requesting that keywords be listed in title. This will narrow the search and possibly lead users to a more specific subject, since keywords in a title tend to emphasize content in an article. In the same way, URL and Links to a page may lead the researcher to a more specific and relevant information.

Region

This is one of my very favorite tools in the Advanced Search. This is a great way to teach students about bias and regional differences. This part of the search engine allows the student to look up web pages published in a specific region or country. This technique is great for current event, allowing the searcher to get information from the country of origin. A teacher should encourage students to compare and contrast the same news story coming from two different areas or regions. Students can study a subject, such as the American Revolution, from a British, French, Russian, or United States perceptive. What is Russia’s take on the Space Race,  Cuba’s thought’s on the Bay of Pigs, or China’s research on Global Warming?  This really is a  tool that a teacher can build a unit around and is very valuable for teaching 21st Century skills.

Numeric Range

Perhaps a researcher wishes to search between a set number of years, such as 1800-1900. Specifying a dollar amount such as $250 – $500 or searching for a distance range 10 miles – 100 miles could be valuable in finding needed information. A student may even wish to look  up a range of page numbers. These are just some of the ways that numeric range can be used in an Advanced Search.

SafeSearch

As the name implies, Google attempts to determine the integrity of a web site. If a website is considered unacceptable Google will not list it. This is a good tool to have turned on for students at both school and home.

Page Specific Tools

These are both very useful tools. A user that really finds a particular site useful may want to enter that pages’s URL into the Find Pages Similar To The Page line. This may lead to other sites that provide needed research information.

Using the Find Pages That Link To The Page may also lead the user to other useful sites. This Link To The Page tool can also be used to evaluate a website by determining the number, and type of pages linking to it. In fact, I teach people to use Find Pages That Link To The Page when evaluating Web Pages using what I call  Good Links.  (Starting with a space before entering the address in the Find Pages That Link To The Page form  will yield different and sometimes better results)  You can also learn more about web evaluation in my upcoming Evaluating a Web Page Series. I am certain it will be a series you will want to share with your students and other teachers.

Thanks for joining me in this third article uncovering the Google Advanced Search. Feel free to print this and use it with your students. Please share this posting URL with other educators and encourage them to subscribe!  Prepare yourself for my Evaluating a Web Page Series which I promise will be a hit. Please take a moment to comment and subscribe to this blog by RSS or email, share with others, and as always follow me on twitter (@mjgormans). Please remember to join me at Discovery Education for my webinar entitled Learn, Create, and Innovate with Scratch. Until next time… transform, educate, and inspire! – Mike

Part 2 … The Google Advanced Search.. Uncover Awesome Searching Secrets For Teaching And Learning

Welcome to the second post in my  Googal In Google Series giving an in depth view of the Google Advanced Search Engine. In this second of a three part posting, I will cover some great techniques many people do not know or seldom use in the Google Advanced Search.  As always,  feel free to subscribe to this Blog by RSS or email, follow me on twitter at (@mjgormans), and also discover some great resources at my 21centuryedtech Wiki!  You will also find my other postings at Tech and Learning Magazine. Also please mark November 30, at 7PM on your calendar. I will be presenting a free webinar about MIT’s free program, Scratch, in conjunction with Discovery Education. Please click here to learn even more! Now let’s advance our knowledge in using the Google Advanced Search!  Have a great week – Mike

In the last posting we checked out some of those tools that can be used in the Advanced Search to teach students how to better use the basic search. That’s right, use an advanced tool in order to simplify the basic. If I got your interest, then check out the last post.  In this post, I will cover four important tools that will provide students more focused research, and teachers amazing new resources… read on! I am sure you may discover some interesting ways to implement these valuable techniques. I will introduce these resources one tool at a time.

Results Per Page

OK, no big deal but by using this tool you will have less need to hit the enter button.  You may find yourself using the scroll down just a little more. Please note in the image below that you are allowed up to 100 results a page.

Language

Time to get a little more interesting. Perhaps you want to find an article or website written in a foreign language. Perfect fit if you are teaching foreign language or social studies. Note that there is a drop down menu that allows you to scroll, revealing over 45 languages.

This really can be a lot of fun. For instance, I look up Apple Computer in Simple Chinese.  I get pretty awesome results as displayed below. Notice that I can even translate the pages. This allows me to get a primary source of a current event, or even past events, right from the area of origin.. I may not understand the language, but I can translate it back to English! Think of the lessons that could incorporate this idea involving relevancy and engagement for twenty-first century learners.

Also note that when landing on a foreign language page there is often a language translation tool at the top. As a side note, Google provides a great Language Tool in fine print next to the Google Basic Search Engine. Take a look!

File Type

This is one of my personal favorites in the Google Advanced Search. In a typical search Google is finding HTML Web Pages. Some of the real neat stuff is buried hundreds of pages beyond those first pages of returns. This includes files such as Power Points, Google Earth Files, PDF Files, Excel Spreadsheets, Word Documents, and even Flash Files!

Looking for a great educational Power Point on Mars… enter Mars in the search box and select Microsoft Powerpoint (.ppt) as the File Type. Your return pages will be Power Points that have something to do with Mars. How about a 3d Journey of Rome using Google Earth? Enter Rome 3D in the Search Box and Google Earth KML or KMZ in the File Type Box! Not only will this method help your students, it will also allow you to find some pretty awesome resources to engage students in their learning!

Search Within A Domain Or Site

This is a very valuable tool in helping narrow down a topic and drill down within a domain or site. By putting in a domain name, the search will be limited to only sites within that domain. Perhaps information such as state populations maybe best found in a government doc.  Then the domain gov would be put in this Search Within box. Domains can lead the searcher to areas that they feel may be most reliable or supply information that compliments their research.

Domains include: gov – government, org – organization, com – commercial enterprises, int – international, edu – higher education, k12 – public schools, mil – military

The Search Within also allows the user to specify a web site to search, including all the pages within that web site. An example may be searching for moon exploration. In this case the user may place nasa.gov in the Search Within box. Perhaps a video at Youtube would require the searcher to put youtube.com in the Search Within box.

Combining Advanced Search Techniques

The image above represents a search that  has been constructed to find an Excel Document from the US Census Department in regards to state populations. This would require the Exact Phrase state population, with a File Type of (Microsoft Excel .xls), and a search within of http://www.census.gov. Your return may look much like this. See image below.

As you can see, there is so much we can teach our students about finding valuable resources on the internet. The tools in the Advanced Google Search allow students to not just find valuable materials, but to engage in a reflective thinking process necessary for proper research. The Google Advanced Search really does provide an avenue to go beyond the searching basics by providing students a resource to not just retrieve great information, but learn how to find it along the way!

Thanks for joining me in this second article uncovering the Google Advanced Search. Feel free to print this and use it with your students. Please share this posting URL with other educators and encourage them to subscribe! Be on the lookout for my next Google Advanced  Search Post that will take advanced searching one step further. Also prepare yourself for my Evaluating a Web Page Series. Please take a moment to comment and subscribe to this blog by RSS or email, share with others, and as always follow me on twitter (@mjgormans). Please remember to join me at Discovery Education for my webinar entitled Learn, Create, and Innovate with Scratch. Until next time… transform, educate, and inspire! – Mike

Reinventing…Transforming…Remixing Educations Best Lessons

A time out from my series on Advanced Google Searching for a moment on reflection and reform. In my over thirty years in education I have encountered many educators from a wide range of disciplines that teach using outstanding and powerful lessons that truly promote student learning and success.  It is important to recognize members of the teaching profession for these great ideas that have had a positive impact on generations of students. Our culture and society continues on a journey from industrial, to informational, to the age of innovation at an ever increasing rate. Educators, one of the best professions in the world, continue to work hard at the amazing goal of educating ever child to their full potential.  As our society enters this digital age of innovation, so must education. Educators must integrate 21^st century skills, Project Based Learning, STEM education, and the National Educational Technology Standards (NETS) into past lessons that have already provided success and achievement. It is this remix and reinvention using  today’s technology, that will  make past lessons  new 21st century learning experience for students!  Please take a moment to read and reflect on the role that new technology can assist in assisting all educators in taking those very first steps towards transforming what is already one of the best, and making it even better!

Transformation is a process whereby an earlier idea goes through change in order to remain relevant and effective as other things around the original idea also change. Often in my presentations, I have posed the question of whether education is closer to the Jukebox or the iPod. Are our lessons emulating the Industrial Age, Information Age, or the Age Of Innovation?  I bring this up because as educators we must  transform practices that have been valuable, instead of always coming up with something new. There are many great lessons and educational units of study that may just need an injection of 21st Century Ideas. How can you as an educator transform ideas, practices, and lessons with the technology you may already have?

First, lets take a look at the history of creating an on-demand music collection for public use.  The jukebox was one of the first devices that allowed for the instant play of music, on demand, from various artists, from a large collection of databases. The jukebox was invented in 1889. It was referred to as the Nickel-in-the-Slot Machine and was invented by Louis Glass and William S. Arnold who placed a coin-operated Edison cylinder phonograph in the Palais Royale Saloon in San Francisco. An Edison Class M Electric Phonograph in an oak cabinet was refitted with a coin mechanism patented (U.S. 428,750) by Glass and Arnold. There was no amplification and patrons had to listen to the music using one of four listening tubes. Sure sounds like today’s iPod and its reliance on the ear-bud in the early stages.  In its first six months of service, the Nickel-in-the-Slot earned over $1000. Over one hundred years later Apple Computer transformed this same idea with the technology of the 21st Century. Launched on October 23, 2001 the original iPod had a 5 GB hard drive that put “1,000 songs in your pocket.” As of September 2008, more than 173,000,000 iPods had been sold worldwide. The 2008 120 GB model allowed for instant retrieval of over 24,000 songs. Apple did not invent the idea, they transformed an excellent and proven idea  already in existence!

As educators, we must enlist our collective database of lessons and practices and adapt it with technology that is already in our schools. This concept allows us to make immediate transformation happen. I would like to share one example. Many of us have been part of a NASA lesson that had us work in a group to decide what we would need  to survive on the moon We were given a list and as a group we worked collaboratively to prioritize it. Many time the bell would then ring and the lesson ended, trapped inside of the physical walls of the classroom. It is now possible to transform the lesson and go beyond the physical classroom using the technology that is available today. The lesson could be put in a Moodle or Edmodo, both are a free collaborative on-line virtual classroom. Students could collaborate online through chats, Google Docs, Wallwisher, and TitanPad. I recently found a tool available for free from Intel called “Thinking Tools”. It allows students to collaboratively prioritize and examine the “wisdom of their classroom crowd”. They compare their rankings with others and with the class average through teacher-made accounts. In this process they also share information and reasoning with the teacher. The results can be shared through a Power Point presentation or Prezi, and a visual ranking of the data can be displayed using a spreadsheet. How about a video conference or online chat to compare with experts in the community? Students could put it all together by word importance in a “Wordle” that illustrates their findings. Most schools have the technology, connection, and software to make this Old Lesson transform into a 21st Century experience. Remember,  Open Office can even serve as a no cost alternative to Microsoft Office. Feel free to check out my 21centuryedtech wiki for more information.

Teachers have a wealth of resources and proven lessons. It is time for educators to explore new possibilities by transforming what has always worked. Do not wait for a new purchase in order to engage students in 21st Century Learning. You already have what it takes to transform the educational jukebox into an iPod. The result will be educational experiences that are more productive, efficient, connected, authentic, and engaging to the digital generation. It will facilitate important 21st Century skills that are essential to our students’ future.

Thanks for taking a moment to read and reflect. I invite you to join me on an educational journey to the 21st Century. Please take a moment to follow and subscribe by RSS or email and also explore the vast amount of resources at my 21centuryedtech Wiki. You can also follow me  on twitter at @mjgormans. I would like the opportunity to learn from your comments to this post and ask that you join the conversation. Be sure to join me in my future post that will reveal parts of a Google Advanced Search that you or your students may want to learn more about!  Until next time… transform, educate, and inspire! – Mike

Part 1… The Google Advanced Search.. Basic Student Skills And Learning

Welcome to another post that is a new entry in my Googal In Google Series. In fact, I was ecstatic about the enthusiastic responses from my  Ten Items All Should Know When Using Google Basic Search… Far From Basic posting. (If you didn’t see it, give it a click.) In this first of a three part posting I will cover some great things to know about Google Advanced Search. I will even try to convince you that perhaps you will increase student understanding by teaching them to search with the Advanced Search Page! As always,  feel free to subscribe to this Blog by RSS or email, follow me on twitter at (@mjgormans), and also discover some great resources at my 21centuryedtech Wiki!  You will also find my other postings at Tech and Learning Magazine. Now let’s take a moment and advance to some of the advanced search strategies using Google Advanced Search! – Have a great week – Mike

Many of us never get beyond the Basic Search Page. In fact, if you use the suggestions from my posting Ten Items All Should Know When Using Google Basic Search… Far From Basic,  the Basic Search Engine should serve you and your students well! However, I invite you to take the plunge and prepare yourself and your students to advance in Google. In fact using the Advanced Search Page can actually provide students with a more concrete learning example even before using the Google Commands in a Basic Search. I highly suggest starting students out with the Advanced Search because it can really help in developing this true understanding. As you begin to use it I am sure you will see the point I am trying to make! Getting to the Advanced Search is easy, just click the Advanced Search Text, and you will magically enter a land of extreme, but highly understandable searching! In this first of three articles I will cover the basics of an advanced search. The next two posts will go beyond the basics by explaining tools, ideas, and techniques to use the Advanced Search to its very fullest. First, let’s sees what you encounter after you push the button!

The Advanced Search Part One – The Basics And Student Learning

So you clicked the button! Good for you! At first you will note some choices that help drive home concepts I detailed in Ten Items All Should Know When Using Google Basic Search… Far From Basic. Under the Find Web Pages That Have and the But Don’t Show Pages That Have sections; some important techniques are used that are helpful in finding good web site (see image below). Not only that, the skills learned here are transferable to the basic search page. Starting students with the Advanced Search may help them better understand how to search and make their search much more productive and reliable! Let’s take a look.

Let’s explore the section entitled: Find Web Pages that have…

In this section you will note that there are three areas to enter text. They include;  All these words, This exact wording or phrase, and One or more of these words.

1. All these words – Google looks up all the the words and finds web pages that have all of the words in them. (Note that small words such as articles are omitted – a, the, of, an, as… etc). Google is not concerned with putting these words in order next to each other. It is only concerned that all major words are somewhere in the article. Note that Google never uses the command AND in either the Basic or Advanced Search.

Example – I enter the blue bird of paradise (I did not capitalize anything because Google does not pay attention to upper or lower case) Since the and of are minor common words I might as well have just entered blue bird paradise.

Google will return pages that have blue, bird, and paradise anywhere in them. The words do not have to be together or even close to each other in the site.

2. This exact wording or phrase – Google will look at websites and will return only pages that have the words next to each other in the order stated. This is called a phrase or string and is used with quotes in a basic search. No quotes are needed in the advanced search.

Example: I enter the the blue bird of paradise (I included the and of because it is part of the phrase I am looking for.

Google will return any page that has the blue bird of paradise as a group (or string) of words all together in the same order.

This is a great method for looking up names, books, movies, famous sayings, places, and anything else that may rely on a phrase.

3. One or more of these words – Google will look for web pages that include one or more of the words, but the page does not have to include all of them. This is the same as using OR in a basic search

Example – I enter blue bird paradise. Since the and  of are minor common words I did not include them.

Google will return pages that contain just blue, just bird, or just paradise, and also pages that contain all three. In this way, you will find a common bluebird, and a Blue Bird of Paradise, a bird that flew through through the blue sky, or just a blue sky with no bird.

Now lets explore the section entitled: But Don’t Show Pages That Have

This portion of Advanced Search will prove to be real useful. It is important for students to learn that “Less is More”. The goal is to have less quality web pages that reveal essential information

This is the section that eliminates web pages that may have a word in them that is returning  unnecessary or undesired results in a web search.. The Basic Search engine does this by putting  a minus (- ) in front of the word. In the Advanced Search Engine the words are typed in the But don’t show pages that have … any of these unwanted words section. This is used  in conjunction with the Find Web Pages that have… section that is found above it and discussed earlier. Words must be put in to one of those three sections first ( Three sections are: All these words, This exact wording or phrase, and One or more of these words.)

Example: The below graphic illustrates how the two sections are used together. When searching for the Blue Bird of Paradise, I only want to find information, but was getting too many pages with pictures of the Blue Bird of Paradise. I would use the two sections together in this way:

Another example – I am looking for the country Turkey but do not want to find articles about the bird. (Note that any article about birds in the country Turkey will be eliminated.)

This concludes the very first posting of the Google Advanced Search. Having students practice in this portion of an Advanced Search will help them understand such statements as OR, NOT, AND, and STRING, build the importance of how to properly use the Basic Search Engine, and give them a better understanding of the importance of constructing a well thought out search.

Thanks for joining me in this first article uncovering the Google Advanced Search. Feel free to print this and share it with your students. Please share this posting URL with other educators and encourage them to subscribe! Be on the lookout for my next Google Advanced  Search Post that will reveal some of the real power in a Google Advanced Search. Also prepare yourself for my Evaluating a Web Page Series. You can also find a variety of my postings under Blogs at Tech & Learning Magazine.  Please take a moment to comment and subscribe to this blog by RSS or email, share with others, and as always follow me on twitter (@mjgormans). Until next time… transform, educate, and inspire! – Mike

Changes At Glogster… Great Info and Links For All Levels Of Users

First there were Blogs, then even Phlogs, and of course there are Glogs. While many educators are aware of Glogster, they may not know of the changes that have come and are coming to this awesome tool.  The basic edition is still free, although there is even a change coming to the free edition. As always,  feel free to subscribe to this Blog by RSS or email, follow me on twitter at (@mjgormans), and also discover some great resources at my 21centuryedtech Wiki!  You will also find my postings at Tech and Learning Magazine. Now lets take a moment to check out some good gab from Glogster! – Have a great week – Mike

OK, I Am New – What is Glogster? (Or, Just Skip Down To Next Bold Heading  Because  You And Your Students Are Already Glogging)

What do you get when you mix up the whole genre of  multimedia, smack it into a blog, and then artistically arrange it into an awesome interactive on-line poster. The results as all of you may know is a Glog, made popular by the people at Glogster!  The benefits of using Glogster in the education include the opportunity for students to use a dynamic, multi-sensory learning program that fulfills Universal Design for Learning (UDL) principles, enables standards mastery, provides differentiated instruction and so much more. Are you a newbie to Glogster, or just want to get your class started?  Then be sure to visit Glogster EDU, because that is where the free sign up resides for educators. What are the educational benefits of Glogster?  First, students can become engaged in any curriculum by  creating a Glog (interactive poster). Let your lesson plans run wild! It could be a book review, a science fair project,  a biography of a famous person, a timeline, or an interactive report on anything! Perhaps you wish to work on the 21st Century Skill involving collaboration. Then start a class project Glog involving a project based learning activity or a unit of study!  Glogster allows for school-level teacher management of students and classes claiming a private and safe student environment.  Glogster really does allow for engagement of students in fun and creative activities which can be aligned to national educational standards along with those ever-important ISTE NET-S Standards. Take a moment and make your own test Glog and then more importantly, sign up!

The First Big Change … 50 Reasons To Sign Up Now For A Free Educational Glogster Account!

The free Educational Glogster Account allows teachers to create accounts for 100 student users! Beginning in November 2010 Glogster is lowering the number of student accounts to 50 per teacher. Sign up now and you have 50 more student accounts then in November. That really is 50 reasons to get a Glogster Edu Free account Now!

Most Gloster Changes Are In The Premium Account… And They Look Not Only Good… But Great!

OK, not everything is free… although the free version of Glogster really is pretty amazing! If your school or classroom wants to step its Glogging experience up a notch then you may want to investigate Glogster Premium For Education.  In addition to the Free Version’s 100 student accounts, student account management, comment management, profiles management, and a public for all feature; Glogster Premium For Education includes a host of extra features. Some of these include direct teacher access to student work and nicknames  along with classroom, project, and assessment management resources. There are also tools for presentations, portfolios, and class messaging.

The Other Changes!

On September 15, 2010  edu.glogster.com launched a new product interface and partnerships that will now allow teachers to share students and projects with each other at the school level. As part of this new solution, teachers and students can now be interconnected in a school-based educational network enabling them to work on collaborative cross-curricular projects within dynamic teacher accounts. Teachers can even share students with other teachers, create class projects, construct engaging homework assignments, and encourage the building of student portfolios.  Glog presentations can be produced by teachers and students and better yet,  teachers can invite students to participate in projects at the school-level as well as expanded classroom activities. Glogster claims these changes allow for a real school virtual environment, but in a safe, online setting. Martin Santorcl, Co-Founder & Product Director at Glogster states, “Our new Portfolio & Presentation features allow educators to file and sort many Glogs in one Digital Glog Book. This is the next step for digital literacy because now schools can easily create curriculum utilizing appropriate interactive multimedia books and then archive them for future teaching.”

Still More Changes… Glogster Has Also Enlisted New Partners

Are your students  creating wikis? In its latest integrative application, Wikispaces users can now add a Glog to their wikis with one click from any Glogster EDU account. Now teachers, students, librarians, and other educators can make their Wikis even more powerful, and do it with ease. Are you an Edmodo user?  Glogster EDUcators can now move their Glogs into their Edmodo live feed clicking the  button under each Glog (“Edmodo this Glog”). This allows educators to easily showcase their multimedia content.

Ten Glogster Links To Check Out

Glogster Education Resource Library – The Glogster EDU Educator Resource Library is a 29 page PDF document of outstanding examples of Glogsterlesson plans and rubrics, standards alignment activities, and Glog building media resources. It has been built by and for the Glogster community of educators.

Glogopedia – The very best of educational Glogs. A great place to get inspired  and create Glogs to be used in the classroom and activities for students.

Glog Categories – Check out thousands of Glogs by subject. A lot of wonderful ideas reside in these teacher and student works.

Certified EDU Glog Ambassador – Are you already working hard teaching students to Glog and providing Glog expertise to other professionals? Take a look at this program with a lot of perks, including a free premium upgrade!

The G Lab – Great place to share your Glog Experience while learning from others.

Glogster Tutorial – A great five minute tutorial for educators on how to set up an educator account and use Glogster by Traci Blazosky

Discovery Education On Glogster – Great short tutorial presented by Discovery’s Steve Dembo and company.

Adding Video and Audio To Glogster – Short tutorial video on using open source Camstudio to import video and audio into Glogster.

ABC News – An excellent news story on Glogster

Make A Virtual Science Fair – A fantastic way to use Glogster to create a Digital Science Fair project using Glogster.

Hope I was able to provide some new Glogster information for those just starting and those pro gloggers!  While I am a free user, I will saving my pennies to invest in that Premium Account.  Be on the look out for my Advanced Google Search and my Evaluating a Web Page Series. You can also find a variety of my postings under Blogs at Tech & Learning Magazine. Take a moment to leave a comment and also subscribe to this blog by RSS or email, share with others, and as always follow me on twitter (@mjgormans). See you soon and happy Glogging! – Mike

Free Yet Powerful 21 Century Quiz Application For Any Classroom

Tests and quizzes are one  necessary means of evaluation when teaching in a 21st Century classroom. This week I bring you an automated quiz application program that that can be used by anyone. It allows for differentiation, online testing and reporting, classroom analysis, custom application, and requires no student email address.  Best of all it is free! As always,  feel free to subscribe to this Blog by RSS or email, follow me on twitter at (@mjgormans), and also discover some great resources at my 21centuryedtech Wiki!  You will also find my postings at Tech and Learning Magazine. Now lets take a moment to check out an evaluation instrument that truly is 21st Century!

I am a big believer in assessment, after all it does determine if students and educators are meeting necessary goals. In a 21st century classroom assessment must include all avenues such as project based, authentic, peer review, reflection, personal inquiry, observation, and all those others non-traditional techniques. In a world of standardized testing to help determine achievement gained, future vocation, education placement, and post k12 track the well known quiz and test is still an important tool. Thus the reason for this post, an introduction to a tool that really does incorporate the everyday quiz with an important 21st century twist.

Welcome to ThatQuiz, a free online non-commercial resources for teachers and students. At first glance you will enjoy the simple and easy to understand interface designed by Andrew Lyczak,  a software engineer with a real understanding of providing for classroom needs. While there are built in quizzes for math, science, language arts, and social studies, please note they are adjustable in both difficulty and length. The interface has not been limited by the pre-built and allows educators to make their own tests covering any subject and set of questions. You may even note that the interface allows for multiple languages. Some of the pre-made quizzes are included in graphic below:

It isn’t until an educator creates a classroom by creating an account that some real power can be put in to action! It is after the log in that teachers can view all the features including how to see tests, view grades, edit class, and create a new class. A teacher can also customize existing pre-built test or design their own test. Tests can be matching, multiple choice, essay, or designed on a unique set of slides. The slide creation option is not difficult to master and offers more flexibility than the simpler multiple choice and matching methods for test creation. Using the set of available tools, a teacher can draw geometric shapes, plot graphs, and create identification quizzes. Best of all there is an awesome tutorial available on-line. When creating  an original or pre-made test the teacher has the ability to set number of questions, difficulty,  prescribe an order , or randomize order for each individual test. There is even the ability to use tests that other teachers have shared on-line.

The classroom set up allows the teacher to create a separate area in their own administrative site for each class. Students can be named (if using last names check your school policy). A code, first names, or numbers could be used. There is no need for student email, students just enter a test code on the main site given to them by the teacher. Teachers can also notify students of the test by email by clicking on the Notify button. After students have tested, the teacher just clicks on the proper link  to check individual or total class results.

Want to try a non networked off line version. It is available for Windows, iPad, and Android phone.  Perhaps a teacher prefers a paper test. This program allows for printing and even scoring the old fashion way! In order for the program to function properly at least Internet Explorer 6+ or Firefox should be installed. Macintosh users (OS X) will have best results from Firefox, but may also use Safari version 1.3.2 or 2.0. Remember,  ThatQuiz is a free website for educational use allowing for increased productivity in this one style of  student assessment. It is important to incorporate many different styles and techniques.  As you evaluate all assessments, take some time to  envision where ThatQuiz has  that unique opportunity to transform today’s classroom into the 21century classroom.

Thanks for joining me on this this quest in uncov ering a 21st Century teaching resourc geared toward student evaluation. Be on the look out for my Advanced Google Search and my Evaluating a Web Page Series. You can also find a variety of my postings under Blogs at Tech & Learning Magazine.  If you know of other outstanding assessment resources please leave a comment! Take a moment and subscribe to this blog by RSS or email, share with others, and as always follow me on twitter (@mjgormans). Until next time… transform, educate, and inspire! – Mike

A National Treasure Of Free And Engaging Resources For All: Podcasts, Simulations, Lessons!

Welcome to the tenth in a series of summer posts dedicated to bringing you the biggest collections of national and international resources you will find anywhere. This being the ninth post in the series, be ready for my super post that brings all the sites in this series together. Also, be on the lookout for my upcoming Advanced Google Post and an exciting Evaluation Of Web Sites Series!  Not only that, I f have found a few more tools over the summer that I am anxious to share. Please be sure you bookmark, copy, RSS, subscribe by email and visit my 21centuryedtech Wiki! You will want to share this site and its information with others !  I will announce each post on twitter at (mjgormans), so be sure to follow. Now lets learn about a fantastic site that is really to big to blog! – Mike

If you have been to the Smithsonian in Washington DC you may have been overwhelmed by its size! I guarantee you will be equally impressed with its Smithsonian Education website. In this review I will cover the area of the Smithsonian Website geared for educators. When first entering you will note that the Education Page has a rich host of options including Art and Design, Science and Technology, History and Culture, along with Language Arts. Take a moment and look at the unique lessons provided in each of the areas. Such interesting titles as Making Friends with Franklin , Every Picture Has a Story , How Size Shapes Animals, and What the Limits Are , and The Music in Poetry are just four selections in a large collection of lessons and projects. Easy to use data bases allow teachers to access more than 1,500 rich Smithsonian educational resources that align with grade, subject and specific state standards. The Smithsonian’s new student web links has a wide range of activities, web sites, puzzles, hand outs, and engaging facts. The Idea Lab is filled with interactive activities, videos, and simulations involving the massive Smithsonian collection.  In this area students are in engaged in activities such as  Sizing Up The Universe, they may take a Prehistoric Climate Challenge,  or relive an engaging Apollo 11 Mission of Walking On The Moon,  and they might just  race for answer on a web mission while Digging For Answers. Smithsonian in Your Classroom Magazine includes lesson plans based on primary sources you can view. In keeping with the spirit of Heritage Months, the Smithsonian offers these thematically arranged teaching resources from across the Smithsonian. The resources have been selected for their relevance to classroom curriculum and national education standards. They include Black History, Asian Pacific Americans, American Indian Heritage, Woman’s History, and Hispanic Heritage. In fact you might enjoy visiting the Top Ten Lessons of the month such as :

	1.  The Music in Poetry
	2.  Teaching with Collections
	3.  Every Picture has a Story
	4.  The Universe: An Introduction
	5.  A Shape-Note Singing Lesson
	6.  WWII on the Home Front: Civic Responsibility
	7.  Introduction to the Nature Journal
	8.  Abraham Lincoln: The Face of A War
	9.  Tale of a Whale and Why It Can Be Told
	10.  Tomorrow’s Forecast: Oceans and Weather

It should be evident that lessons do cross every grade level and subject. You will find amazing material as you search by subject , standard, and grade level.  There are even lessons about making and using podcasts in the classroom along with an amazing collection of unique podcasts. In the spirit of virtual field trips there are live and archived conferences that allows kids to interact, view sessions, watch a multi media event, and even ask a curator.  Here is an archived example titled, Problem Solving with Smithsonian Experts.  You may want to begin your first Smithsonian  lesson as small as a game about the  Cell, or  expand your classroom to the endless boundaries of the Universe. The Smithsonian  is a great resources, its yours, and its free.   It really is time to bring  national treasures, collections, and resources into your classroom, today!

Thus, my focus, to share with you vast resources such as the Smithsonian this summer! Take some time to investigate and possibly implement in the school year,  or tomorrow! Coming soon… my upcoming Advanced Google Post and an exciting Evaluation Of Web Sites Series! Please share with others, visit the 21centuryedtech Wiki,  follow on me twitter (mjgormans), and subscribe to this blog by RSS or email . If you have resources that you feel need to be included please leave a reply!  Enjoy, relax, play, and smile…. also take a moment to transform education toward 21st Century Learning! – Mike

Free Resources… Integrate The Arts In Every K12 Subject Area

Welcome to the seventh in a series of summer posts dedicated to bringing you the biggest collections of national and international resources you will find anywhere. Summer is a  perfect time to examine what you just might want to include in next year’s lesson plans that will engage your students. I plan to share resources that will cover all the curricular areas. Each article will give an in-depth and informative visit to one of these sites. Make sure you bookmark, copy, RSS, subscribe by email and visit my 21centuryedtech Wiki! You will want to share! If it is not summer where you are, then you can jump right in and facilitate learning with some new material  tomorrow. I will announce each post on twitter at (mjgormans) so be sure to follow. – Mike

What could all teachers find on a site devoted to integrating the fine arts? The answer, new lessons to engage students while facilitating Project Based Learning, STEM activities, and 21st Century skill acquisition. ArtsEdge is an amazing site that contains science activities such as, How Many Cells are Born in a Day? and Acoustical Science, plus Language Arts activities with titles like Comparing and Contrasting Fables and Characterization in Literature. Physical Education teachers may want to try Street Games while math teachers have their students discover Melodies & Math: Telephone Improvisations.   With ArtsEdge you won’t forget to put the A in STEM in order to STEAM it in to full power! Language Arts teachers will bring out student creativity through amazing projects, while social studies teachers can make history come alive.  This is an all encompassing resource from the Kennedy Art Center! ArtsEdge, the National Arts and Education Network, has a mission to place the Arts  at the center of the curriculum and further, advocates creative use of technology to enhance the K-12 educational experience. Artsedge claims that it “empowers educators to teach in, through, and about the arts by providing the tools to develop interdisciplinary curricula that fully integrate the arts with other academic subjects.” These are the neccessary ingredients to qualify as an outstanding resource for any 21st Century Classroom intent on student centered learning.

Artsedge offers free, standards-based teaching materials for use in and out of the classroom, as well as professional development resources, student materials, and guidelines for arts-based instruction and assessment.Check out a powerful searchable data base of lessons, standards, weblinks , and how-to’s. All of  this content is searchable by art curriculum, other core curricular content, and grade bands. The lessons under the Art Curriculum include Dance, Music, Theater, and Visual Arts. The Other Subjects include Foreign Language, Language Arts, Math, Physical Education, Science,  Social Studies, and Technology. I invite you to click on your content area in the preceding sentence and guarantee you will be amazed at the creativity found in the lessons. Lessons are also searchable under grade bands that  include elementary, middle, and high school. All lessons are linked to the Arts Standards. Educators must also investigate the over 200 web links of resources divided into the categories of Instructional, Multi-media, and Research. There is also an amazing collection of Teacher How-To’s including such content as Classical Music across the Curriculum, Coaching Youth Storytellers, The Language of Photography, and Filmmaking: Creating and Organizing the Story.

There is an area of Artsedge that allows educators to Connect with Articles/Reports that give valuable information about Arts Education. The Contacts Section can put teachers in contact and provide resources covering over 60 Art related organizations. Advocacy Essentials gives talking points articles on Art promotion for education. A third area allows educators to Explore Artsedge. From here close to fifty activies are available including such titles as, Abraham Lincoln and Music, Corridos, Art/Space, and Art of the Explosion. You may want your students to check out Art Days in history, meet the Artist,  or discover over 250 Art Quotes from various people. There is a small, but growing collection of podcast also available. Be sure to take a look at the Spotlight area and the section entitled Looking Back. Here you will find a collection of their most requested lessons, resources, and activities. Artsedge  is truly a site devoted to Art appreciation and integration and will make all curricular areas  rich in purpose, meaning, and ready to engage your 21st century students.

Thus, my focus, to share with you vast resources such as ARTSedge this summer! Take some time to investigate and possibly implement in the school year,  or tomorrow! I will continue to bring thought, reflection, and amazing web apps along with this summer series. Please share with others, visit the21centuryedtech Wiki, follow on me twitter (mjgormans), and subscribe to this blog by RSS or email . If you have resources that you feel need to be included please leave a reply!  Enjoy, relax, play, and smile…. also take a moment to transform education toward 21st Century Learning! – Mike

Click Your Classroom Into The 21st Century At Kids.gov

Welcome to the fifth in a series of summer posts dedicated to bringing you the biggest collections of national and international resources you will find anywhere. Summer is a  perfect time to examine what you just might want to include in next year’s lesson plans that will engage your students. I plan to share resources that will cover all the curricular areas. Each article will give an in-depth and informative visit to one of these sites. Make sure you bookmark, copy, RSS, subscribe by email and visit my 21centuryedtech Wiki! You will want to share! If it is not summer where you are, then you can jump right in and facilitate learning with some new material  tomorrow. I will announce each post on twitter at (mjgormans) so be sure to follow. – Mike

Kids.gov is the official kids’ portal for the U.S. government. This giant repository links to over 2,000 web pages from various government agencies, schools, and educational organizations, all geared to the learning level and interest of kids. This amazing site is maintained by the Federal Citizen Information Center (FCIC) in Pueblo, Colorado. Learn more about FCIC by visiting www.pueblo.gsa.gov. At first glance you will enjoy a link to the Kids.gov site of the month. In just one click you will enter a high quality site featured each moth of the year. Now this is just one site that Kids.gov points you to! In reality, Kids.gov really is a country of resources and is organized into three audiences: They are Grades K-5, Grades 6-8, and Educators.  High School teachers will still find a large selection of resources in the Educator’s Section. Each of these audience sections is divided into subject area disciplines that include  Art, Careers, Computers and Technology, Government, Health/Fitness/Safety, Math, Science, and Social Studies. This multiple collection of resources across the disciplines really does make Kids.gov a mega site for education. Within each subject, the websites are grouped as either government sites (Federal, state, military) or other resources (commercial, non-profit, educational). The sites listed under the other resources category are maintained by other public and private organizations.

The main point of any post I write is to give you some of the amazing resources that you might not find at first glance. In this case it could be the Free For Teachers Page that is filled with ever changing ideas such as the lesson plan of the month. While you are there you may want to check out all the other free information from the FCIC. This site could provide you with an activity starter or just a great place to garner information for data collection. Explore the Hot Topic Resources that cover  Government , American History , Earth Science – Environment , Games and Activities , Careers , Social Studies , and Money . In fact the State Websites is a great place to begin to facilitate student research and creation of projects based on the fifty states found in the USA. You will even find a link to White House 101, complete with info on Presidents, Fun Facts, and even First Pets. There is even a look at all the ins and outs of this historic residence. Don’t miss an important link to FREE (Federal Resources for Educational Excellence).  At FREE there are links to collections of  animations, primary documents, photos, and videos.  This link is worthy of a post in itself.  Looking for research? There is a link that may lead you to some academic research on education with-in ERIC, the Educational Resource Information Center. An amazing  link to Teacher’s First could find you exploring for resources the rest of the day.  How about data for students  to organize and portray in a graph,, information for a report, exciting lessons and activities, and even podcasts? You will definitely find it, since I have really only covered less then a dozen of the over 1200 links provided. Kids.gov gives you and your students the opportunity to jump in and find great information and ideas to build activities that will connect to almost any content standard!

Kids.gov truly is a gateway that takes your students to a mountain of sites. While the  majority of the links are from government sites, there are some links to commercial and other non-government sites. It may be time for you to take that mouse in hand and click you way through Kids.gov and its many links to classroom adventure. I guarantee that you will find yourself  linking your students to a world of 21st century activities and resources.

Thus, my focus, to share with you vast resources such as Kids.gov this summer! Take some time to investigate and possibly implement in the school year,  or tomorrow! I will continue to bring thought, reflection, and amazing web apps along with this summer series. Please share with others, visit the 21centuryedtech Wiki, follow on me twitter (mjgormans), and subscribe to this blog by RSS or email . If you have resources that you feel need to be included please leave a reply!  Enjoy, relax, play, and smile…. also take a moment to transform education toward 21st Century Learning! – Mike