Year: 2015

Need a few websites and apps to fill in sponge time? Here are Thanksgiving sites that will keep students busy and still teach them:

1. Canadian Thanksgiving
2. Online/Offline Thanksgiving activities
3. Plimoth Plantation–a field trip of a Pilgrim’s life. Included on this real-life site is a video of the Pilgrim’s crossing to the New World.
4. Primary Games Thanksgiving Apps
5. Starfall–Silly Turkey
6. Thanksgiving Coloring Book App
7. Thanksgiving edu-websites–CybraryMan
8. Thanksgiving Games
9. Thanksgiving games–Quia
10. Thanksgiving information–history, more
11. Thanksgiving Jigsaw
12. Thanksgiving Jigsaw II
13. Thanksgiving Lesson Plans
14. Thanksgiving puzzle–by Digipuzzle
15. Thanksgiving Tic-tac-toe
16. Thanksgiving video–Brainpop
17. Thanksgiving Wordsearch
18. The First Thanksgiving

If you’re looking for projects, you’ll find two on Ask a Tech Teacher:

• A Holiday Card
• A Holiday Flier

(more…)

Greeting cards are easy enough for second graders–even early readers. Using MS Publisher, pick a template, add a picture to personalize, add their name–and they’re done. It takes about 15 minutes. Kids always feel great about creating these greeting cards: (more…)

In the USA, Veterans Day annually falls on November 11. This day is the anniversary of the signing of the armistice, which ended the World War I hostilities between the Allied nations and Germany in 1918. Veterans are thanked for their services to the United States on Veterans Day.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLjOP-tITak&w=420&h=315]
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K65CRWTaE8s&w=420&h=315]
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DxipGYkYuy8&w=420&h=315]
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0s8Z4DspcO0&w=420&h=315]

As a working technology teacher, I get hundreds of questions from parents about their home computers, how to do stuff, how to solve problems. Each Tuesday, I’ll share one of those with you. They’re always brief and always focused. Enjoy!

Q: Where’s the caps lock on Chromebooks? There’s a ‘search’ button where that key is on my normal keyboard.

On Chromebooks, caps lock is a shortkey: Alt+Search. Search is the magnifying glass located where the the caps lock is on other keyboards. To turn it off, tap Shift.

If you’re like me and never plan to use that Search key, you can remap the Search key by visiting the Settings > Device > Keyboard settings.

(more…)

Here are ideas of apps and websites that teachers in my PLN used successfully in the past during Hour of Code:

Kindergarten

Start kindergartners with problem solving. If they love Legos, they’ll love coding

1. BotLogic–great for Kindergarten and youngers
2. Code–learn to code, for students
3. Daisy the Dinosaur—intro to programming via iPad
4. How to train your robot–a lesson plan from Dr. Techniko
5. Kodable--great for youngers–learn to code before you can read
6. Move the Turtle–programming via iPad for middle school
7. Primo–a wooden game, for ages 4-7
8. Program a human robot (unplugged)
9. Scratch Jr.

1st Grade

1. Code–learn to code, for students
2. Hopscotch–programming on the iPad
3. Primo–a wooden game, for ages 4-7
4. Scratch Jr.
5. Tynker

(more…)

This is the only project that’s easier than the holiday card in Publisher. There’s no folding and the templates are bright, colorful and exciting for kids as young as second grade: (more…)

I took a Classroom 2.0 Live webinar last year on rolling out the Hour of Code in the classroom. There were so many great things about that webinar, but one I’ll share today is why teachers DON’T participate in Hour of Code. Here are what the webinar participants said:

How about you? Why are you NOT doing Hour of Code?

(more…)

Coding–that mystical geeky subject that confounds students and teachers alike. Confess, when you think of coding, you see:

…when you should see

December 7-13, Computer Science Education will host the Hour Of Code–a one hour introduction to coding, programming, and why students should love it. It’s designed to demystify “code” and show that anyone can learn the basics to be a maker, a creator, and an innovator.

(more…)

As a working technology teacher, I get hundreds of questions from parents about their home computers, how to do stuff, how to solve problems. Each Tuesday, I’ll share one of those with you. They’re always brief and always focused. Enjoy!

Q: Why would I use airplane mode when I’m not flying?

Airplane mode stops your phone from searching for an internet connection. If you don’t use it on a long flight, you’ll find your battery drained by the time you land because your phone ran through its power searching constantly for a signal that didn’t exist.

If you know you aren’t using the internet for a period of time, switch your phone to airplane mode. It’ll save your battery.

Why else?

(more…)

Keyboarding is always a concern with educators, and one of the most questions is–how do you teach it? Adam  Fort, an education strategist at Ratatype, has five ideas:

Typing tutors are aids that enable users to increase their own typing speed, skills and touch typing techniques. There are different types of typing tutors including online typing tutors, typing tutor programs and typing tutor software. These can help you to improve typing as well as other aspects of life like salary increases, job satisfaction, improved posture and many other things which will come as a result of mastering the art of typing. Here is a list of 5 best typing tutors for everyone.

There are a number of free typing tutors on the web which are most useful when it comes to typing lessons, typing practice and typing tests. Most of these sites are free online sites which are useful to both learners and teachers. Among the most notable typing sites include TypingWeb and Ratatype.

TypingWeb Online Typing Tutor

TypingWeb is a renowned free typing tutor on the web that consists of a teacher’s portal which acts as a classroom aid for teaching the appropriate touch typing skills. It is a free typing platform although ads are enabled but can always be removed when the need arises and this does not cost a lot of money.

(more…)