Wednesday 3rd September 2014 Stay up to date with the activities in 1/2S at Caves Beach Public School – located south of Newcastle, on the coast of New South Wales, Australia. Visit 1/2S and leave a comment >>>
LEGO stop motion video – quick how-to
Tuesday 2nd September 2014 Anyone can make a stop motion video using an iPod and the LEGO Movie Maker app. This app has so many curriculum applications, for any age group…. Watch the video below,and download the app here >>>
3/4C with Miss Bell
Thursday 28th August 2014 3/4C at Caves Beach PS are now online. Click on the What we are learning menu to explore their activities in Literacy, Maths, Creative Arts and Science. Drop by and say ‘Hi’ with a comment on 3/4c’s blog >>>
National Science Week
Thursday 21st August 2014 Has your school been involved in 2014 Australian National Science Week activities? Shows, talks, festivals and more! There are still plenty of local and online activities in which you can participate with your class this week. (Just a pity that it clashes with Book Week!) Learn more at the National Science Week website >>>
Skaffl – 1:1 iPad classroom workflow
Tuesday 19th August 2014 Skaffl allows teachers to distribute and collect assignments electronically from students using iPads. Skaffl is free until the end of the year. With Skaffl….Teachers can:– Create activities for students to complete;– Plan ahead and save activities for distribution when you need them;– Collect student work;– Annotate and grade student assignments. Students can:– Receive their assignments and keep track of … Read More
3C at Broulee PS
Friday 15th August 2014 What has been happening in class 3C at Broulee PS this week? How about baking pikelets and then cutting them into fractions! Check out 3C’s class blog – hosted at Weebly >>>
Firefox YouTube Video Downloader
Thursday 14th August 2014 Ever had a lesson prepared, needed to display a YouTube video, and right at the crucial moment you discover that the Internet is down? Fear no more! Use the Firefox YouTube Video Downloader to save the video as an MP4 file so it is ready to go, right when you need it. Install the Video Downloader Firefox … Read More
Google launches Classroom
Wednesday 13th August 2014 Google yesterday officially launched Google Classroom. Classroom is now available for schools using Google Apps for Education – though I expect that there will be a ‘rollout period’ over the next month or so. Google have added a number of new features to Classroom, following feedback from the trial that has been underway since May. No doubt … Read More
BYOD at East Hills Girls THS
Tuesday 12th August 2014 All students in Years 7 – 9 at East Hills Girls Technology High School now use their own iPads across all Faculties in the school. The teachers in each Faculty have contributed to an iBook, outlining ideas for integrating the iPad within their Faculty’s curriculum activities. To access the iBook you will need to enrol in the school’s related iTunes U course….. … Read More
Google Drive updates for teachers
Monday 11th August 2014 Over that past few weeks Google have announced a number of updates to Drive. Many of these updates are significant for K-12 teachers. These updates include new ‘Suggested Edits’ in Google Docs, editing Microsoft Word docs in their native format, and a number of new features in Google Slides. Check out a summary of the new ‘teacher features’ … Read More
Stop Motion in the Classroom
Tuesday 5th August 2014 Stephanie Castle, an Australian teacher, has posted some ideas about using Stop Motion Studio on iPads with her high school students. Stop Motion Studio is available in the App Store >>>
Check out Haiku LMS
Monday 28th July 2014 Use Haiku to create an online learning environment for your class. Create classroom pages, add and organize content blocks, change layouts, embed content from YouTube, Google Docs, Maps, Skype, etc. Resource sharing in Haiku lets you share your classes, pages, and content blocks with any other Haiku user–and use content in your own class created by other teachers. … Read More
Solutions for the cross-platform classroom
Thursday 24th July 2014 The modern tech-savvy classroom can be a complicated mix of devices and software. As technology becomes more ubiquitous both at home and in the classroom, schools find themselves in a more blended world. As educators in the 21st century, we must be prepared to tackle education in an environment that is cross-platform and multi-device. How do we provide an effective, innovative and … Read More
Have new technologies brought new learning opportunities?
Monday 14th July 2014 Today is a ‘student free day’ in local schools, with many teachers involved in professional learning activities focussed on the use of new technologies to support the curriculum. But are these new technologies bringing new learning opportunities to classrooms, or simply providing students with a new typewriter interface? The SAMR model provides a framework to define the impact of technology in the … Read More
Follow ISTE 2014
Monday 30th June 2014 While we are relaxing during the Winter holiday break here in Australia, the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) is presenting one of the biggest education technology conferences in the world. Around 20,000 educators are attending the ISTE conference in the summer warmth of Atlanta, Georgia, from the 28th June to 1st July. If you are … Read More
Hapara v Google Classroom
Wednesday 25th June 2014 Google are currently trialling the new Classroom app, due for release to all GAFE schools in September 2014. But what is the difference between the new (free) Classroom, and Hapara, the well-regarded commercial provider of GAFE integration and management? Watch the videos, and read the comparison >>>
32,000 Chromebooks: Virginia school system adopts Chrome OS
Tuesday 24th June 2014 Milwaukee Public Schools rolled out 11,400 devices, Edmonton Public Schools rolled out 13,000 devices, and Chicago Public Schools topped them both at 16,000 devices. Now Virginia’s Chesterfield County Public Schools (CCPS), one of the largest school systems in the US, announced that it will be switching to Chromebooks in some of its schools. The rollout will begin … Read More
Improve Writing Skills Using Digital Writing and Google Docs
Monday 23rd June 2014 Would you like to improve your students’ writing skills and help them bridge the gap between writing in school and writing in the real world? One way of doing so is by using digital writing and Google Docs, the documents editor available in Google Drive. Since Google Docs is collaborative and available 24/7, students using Google … Read More
Un-Googleable questions in the classroom
Friday 20th June 2014 Creating class projects that develop higher order thinking skills, by focussing on un-Googleable questions….. Teacher: What are we learning about this week? Class: EGYPT!! Teacher: Wrong. We’re learning about how to make and answer better questions, remember? We’re just using Egypt as an example when we do it. Class: *Nervous shufflings.* Can’t we just do a project … Read More
BYOD and SAMR
Thursday 19th June 2014 Darcy Moore discusses the implications of a BYOD program at Dapto HS, in the southern suburbs of Wollongong (NSW). The school is moving to a BYOD model in 2014. Darcy considers BYOD models, technical issues, and the pedagogical underpinnings of a successful 1:1 ICT program. Check out Darcy’s blog >>>
Google Classroom – first look
Tuesday 17th June 2014 Classroom is a new Learning Management System (LMS) environment being developed by Google to operate in conjunction with Google Apps for Education (GAFE). Classroom is currently available for trial schools, and will be available for all schools using GAFE in September 2014. Classroom will be free for schools. Classroom builds on GAFE to create and organize assignments, provide grades … Read More
K-12: GAFE v OneDrive v iCloud Drive
Monday 16th June 2014 With collaborative cloud apps rapidly becoming an accepted ‘norm’ for file creation and storage, ICT discussion in schools often turns to which of the popular online file-editing and file-sharing packages is the most suitable for use in a K-12 environment. Microsoft, Apple and Google all offer a combination of remote ‘cloud’ file storage, and the usual suite of online, browser-editable ‘office’ applications, as well … Read More
Merrylands HS – BYOD
Friday 13th June 2014 This site provides a comprehensive overview of the BYOD program at Merrylands HS, in the western suburbs of Sydney. Includes an overview of the BYOD program, information for students and families, student agreement documents, frequently asked questions, and evaluation information from the school’s trials of BYOD. Check out the Merrylands BYOD site for more info >>>
iPads in Action K-6: Literacy and Mathematics
Thursday 12th June 2014 Think3 will present a workshop on integrating iPads in the Curriculum, at Helensburgh PS on Tuesday 24th June 2014. Participants will be introduced to a wide variety of apps throughout the day to showcase the number of ways iPads can be used to successfully support and engage students in their learning. This workshop will involve a … Read More
Transitioning school technology to the new era
Wednesday 11th June 2014 Rather than spending limited school budgets on computers and software licenses, which need to be renewed every few years, savvy schools are now focusing their technology planning on the deployment of infrastructure that can support student-owned and teacher-owned devices, leaving the cost of device renewal to the owners of those devices. The key technology planning considerations for schools in the … Read More
Going BYOT? – Improve your Internet access
Thursday 5th June 2014 When schools rolls out a BYOT program they might be adding hundreds of new devices to their network. All using the school’s existing bandwidth to access the Internet. You will definitely need more bandwidth to support BYOT. But you can make better use of your existing bandwidth using a proxy server. Every time a student clicks on a link to a … Read More
Back to school BYOT buying guide
Wednesday 4th June 2014 This brief guide, published by the consumer advice group Choice, provides an insight into the dilemma facing parents in choosing the most suitable device for BYOT schools. (And the dilemma facing schools in communicating those requirements to parents!) Read the Choice guide >>>
Kathy Schrock’s Bloomin’ Apps
Monday 2nd June 2014 Would you like to focus on the use of new technologies in your classroom to support higher order thinking skills and creative learning activities? Kathy Schrock has published a page suggesting suitable iPad, Google, Android and web apps to support each level of Bloom’s Revised Taxonomy. These apps are also linked to the SAMR model of the use of … Read More
Google’s Reading Level Filter
Friday 30th May 2014 A class web page can be used to share links to web sites and other resources that support your class activities – but how do you find sites that are suitable for your students’ reading level? Google can filter your search results based on the reading level of the pages in the results…. Learn how to filter search … Read More
Chromebook and Google Apps Showcase
Wednesday 28th May 2014 Arthur Phillip High School invites Principals and Technology Coordinators to a showcase of digital learning. This event is an opportunity to hear the story of the school’s journey from DER to BYOD with Chromebooks and Google Apps for Education. Following morning tea in the Governor’s Room, school principal Lynne Goodwin will lead a presentation describing the circumstances and … Read More