Top 18 in 2018

Dec 28, 2018 2018-12-28

By Julia O’Connor

Each month we publish blogs and several newsletters full of digital learning, funding, professional growth, social media, and STEM resources. Below are items from our blogs and newsletters that educators turned to the most in 2018.

1. One Educator’s Journey in Creating a Choir to Roar About

The student body at Crystal Lake Central (CLC) High School is a diverse community of students from a variety of backgrounds, abilities and interests, including students enrolled in the Life Skills program. These students may struggle with emotional connections, physical limitations, or cognitive understanding. Regardless of their individual challenges, they bond through their school experience as Central Tigers.

2. Formula for a Perfect Grant Application: Part 1

If you don’t know a lot about grant writing, you’re in good company. Over the course of my years as a grant writer, many of the educators I’ve worked with have admitted they don’t know what makes a “good” proposal and what constitutes a “bad” one. I use the following formula for laying the groundwork for a fundable grant proposal.

3. Videos of Careers in Engineering

Those Amazing Professions has launched Those Amazing Engineers, a website to inform young people about careers in engineering through real-life examples of what engineers do and where they work.

4. Digital Storytelling: 20 Revelations Part 2

Here is the second set of Jason Ohler’s revelations about digital storytelling. From using digital stories to educate students and letting them pursue their goals, he explains how digital storytelling can be a powerful education tool to help students mature, grow, and think critically.

5. Aspects of Effective Project-Based Learning

Project-based learning (PBL) is a topic many teachers are interested in, but are unsure of how to implement or understand if it is working.

6. Emotional Intelligence: The Skills Our Students Deserve – Part 2

In Part One of our series, we looked at Roni’s research on what emotional intelligence is and why it’s so important. Today, in Part Two, we’re focusing on how emotional intelligence skills can be implemented in the classroom.

7. IEP Goals and Objectives with Common Core Standards

The National Association of Special Education Teachers (NASET) has designed an app for iOS to assist educators in creating a list of students who have received IEPs and in planning lessons and goals for each of the students.

8. Computer Science Learning Experiences

Students can combine the magic of making with the power of programmingacross a variety of different products using Microsoft MakeCode, a free, open-sourced platform for creating engaging computer science learning experiences that support a progression path into real-world programming.

9. 3D Virtual Tour of Egypt’s Historical Sites

Describing Egypt offers visitors a growing bank of 360-degree virtual toursshowcasing some of Egypt’s historical sites.

10. Videos Connecting Math and Science to the Real World

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology developed BLOSSOMS (Blended Learning Open Source Science or Math Studies) to help students engage in a meaningful way with STEM subjects. BLOSSOMS uses free video segments to build on math and science fundamentals by relating abstract concepts to the real world.

11. Borderless Science Classroom

GlobalCOlab (GCL) connects students and educators from different cultures and religions from around the world to crosscut disciplines, curricula, and traditional subjects and empowers participants through student-led and student-created topics.

12. Reading Curriculum That Embeds Social Emotional Learning

Read to Lead, a free award-winning supplemental reading program from Classroom, Inc., is designed to increase literacy, leadership, and 21st-century skills. This research-based program embeds social–emotional learning throughout its modules by developing students’ decision making, empathy, and goal setting abilities, all while increasing their reading skills. The program is designed for students in grades 5–9, with all lessons aligned to both Common Core and College and Career Readiness Standards.

13. Curriculum Connecting Science Concepts to Language Arts

The K–3 STEM Foundations project is developing NGSS-aligned curriculum units for K–3 students that connect science concepts and guided inquiry activities to reading/language arts, as well as health and wellness.

14. Lessons for Navigating the Digital World

Hosted by Facebook, Digital Literacy Library provides learning resources made available under a Creative Commons license by Youth and Media at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University.

15. How Teachers Use Interactive Technology

Technology has the potential to improve student capacity to learn in new and exciting ways that promote interactivity and deeper understanding of a given topic. In a survey of K-12 Technology newsletter readers, we explored what types of technology tools are currently in use and for what purposes.

16. Game to “Vaccinate” Students Against Disinformation

Researchers have developed an online game to “vaccinate” people against fake news—by showing them how to become a fake news mogul.

17. Making One Student’s Vacation into a Class Field Trip

Every year I have one or two students who are given the opportunity to go on an amazing adventure with their family during the school year. As their teacher, I love the opportunities this gives students. I fully support any chance students have to see more of the world. However, I do not want to create busy work for them to do while they are gone. I want their time doing schoolwork to be as meaningful as their time in my classroom.

18. Augmented Reality Word Game

With Catchy Words, an interactive augmented reality word game, students create specific words with 3D letters that float around the room. Students can engage in the immersive experience without touching the screen of their mobile device.

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