Would you like to… Meet new people? Discover new cultures? Connect with classes from around the world? …all without leaving your classroom? Then check out Skype in the Classroom (beta). Setting up an account is easy and should take just a few minutes. To do so you will need to enter a screen name*, e-mail address*, avatar, categories*, location*, description*, website / blog URL, and select student age ranges. Required fields are marked with an [...]

I have been helping educators manage their own classroom blogs for a few years now. Most of them use the software to post announcements, assignments, reminders, etc. But a few are now engaging students in public responses to their blog posts, and a few more are exploring ways to engage students in writing the blog. In case you are in a similar situation, this resource might help you decide how to run a group-authored blog: [...]

In the January 2011 issue of the Journal, author Bridget McCrea writes about five free professional development resources. One of those five resources is Teachers’ Domain. McCrea writes, “Teachers’ Domain is an online library of more than 1,000 free media resources from public television. Featuring content from Frontline, American Experience, Nova, and other public broadcasting programming, the site is run by the WGBH Educational Foundation, a Boston-based organization that operates the local PBS affiliate, and [...]

Looking for another way to use a wiki? How about having the students take class notes? I came across the concept from this post: The Salt-Box » Wikified class notes In the post, the author outlines the first attempt at having college students enter class notes on a wiki and then provides the criteria for the second version: Creating a 75-100 word statement of the main idea or unifying theme of the class.  (For a [...]

SimpleBooklet claims to be “The web’s simplest booklet publisher.” Well, I like to consider myself a simple person, so if they made the claim, I was going to test it. And I did. There are several levels of accounts but I, of course, chose the free demo which did not require registration and offered unlimited booklets and up to 20MB content storage. To begin, you enter a name for your booklet and then choose the [...]

21 Skype Resources posted by Shelly Terrell on www.techlearning.com and cross posted on Teacher Reboot Camp. Skype in Education Technology 4 Kids Wiki: Skype Resources Using Skype at School (The Dummies Series) Skype in School Wiki 50 Ways to Use Skype in the Classroom Student Inter-school Debating with Skype by Lois Smethurst Giving Students Skype Jobs by Langwitches Skype an Author Wiki 10 Ways to Use Skype in the Classroom Motivating Adult Learners: Skype an [...]

I came across this image recently and wanted to share. This visual is courtesy of Southern Indiana University. What other digital tools would you add to each level of the pyramid. Please share!

Have you seen these things? If you haven’t yet, you will. The image on the left is an example of an emerging technology called a “QR” code. QR stands for “quick response” and can be thought of as  a bar code on steroids.     Want to learn more? Then watch this video from cnet.com   Okay, so what does this have to do with Teachers, Technology, and Transforming classrooms? Well, the answer is in [...]

I love the services, like bit.ly and tinyURL, that shorten lengthy URLs for use on blogs, web sites, and in social media. But have you ever wanted to create one short URL for multiple links? Well now you can through a service called BridgeURL. BridgeURL allows you to list all the URLs that you want to share in a box and then creates a single link for you to share. That’s it. That easy. Since [...]

David Kapuler put together this list of sites for creating digital comics. Which ones do you use? Pixton – Has an educational portal (paid) that is ideal for schools (no student email account necessary). Also, there are a ton of options such as voice recording, drag-n-drop interface, and importing/exporting features. ToonDoo Spaces – One of the most popular online comic creators that is very similar to Pixton, with the ability to create a private space [...]