Author: Jacqui

Jacqui Murray has been teaching K-18 technology for 30 years. She is the editor/author of over a hundred tech ed resources including a K-12 technology curriculum, K-8 keyboard curriculum, K-8 Digital Citizenship curriculum. She is an adjunct professor in tech ed, Master Teacher, an Amazon Vine Voice, freelance journalist on tech ed topics, contributor to NEA Today, and author of the tech thrillers, To Hunt a Sub and Twenty-four Days. You can find her resources at Structured Learning.

How to Use Excel to Teach Math Arrays

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Grade Level: 5th (or whichever grade you teach arrays)

Background: None. This is an intro to MS Excel or spreadsheets

Time: About 30 minutes

Steps

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What You Might Have Missed in July–What’s up in August

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Here are the most-read posts last month:

Here’s a preview of what’s coming up: (more…)

Tech Ed Resources–Lesson Plans

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I get a lot of questions from readers about what tech ed resources I use in my classroom so I’m taking a few days this summer to review them with you. Some are from members of the Ask a Tech Teacher crew. Others, from tech teachers who work with the same publisher I do. All of them, I’ve found well-suited to the task of scaling and differentiating tech skills for age groups, scaffolding learning year-to-year, taking into account the perspectives and norms of all stakeholders with appropriate metrics to know learning is organic and granular.

Today: Lesson Plans

There are lots of bundles of lesson plans available–by theme, by software, by topic, by standard. Here are a few with links to more detail:

STEM Lesson Plans
Coding Lesson Plans
By Grade Level
110 lesson plans–integrate tech into different grades, subjects, by difficulty level, and call out higher-order thinking skills.
singles–for as low as $.99 each. Genius Hour, Google Apps, Robotics, STEM, Coding, and more.
Holiday projects–16 lesson plans themed to holidays and keep students in the spirit while learning new tools.

Who needs this

These are for the teacher who knows what they want to teach, but need ideas on how to integrate tech. They are well-suited to classroom teachers as well as tech specialists.

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What You Might Have Missed in June–What’s up in July

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Here are the most-read posts last month:

Here’s a preview of what’s coming up: (more…)

We Honor July 4th in America

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Like every year, I exuberantly celebrate America’s birthday. I’d say times are tough here in the US, but that seems to be true everywhere in the world. So, I won’t complain. I will enjoy the love of America as all of my international friends love their homeland.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ke4gRMowvQg]

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Tech Ed Resources–K-12 Tech Curriculum

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I get a lot of questions from readers about what tech ed resources I use in my classroom. I take time every summer to review them with you. Some are edited and/or written by members of the Ask a Tech Teacher crew. Others, by tech teachers who work with the same publisher I do. All of them, I’ve found, are well-suited to the task of scaling and differentiating tech skills for age groups, scaffolding learning year-to-year, offering inclusive solutions to the issue of tech tools–taking into account the perspectives of stakeholders, with appropriate metrics to ensure learning is organic and granular.

Today: K-12 Technology Curriculum

Overview

technology curriculum

The K-12 Technology Curriculum is Common Core and ISTE aligned, and outlines what should be taught when so students have the necessary scaffolding to use tech for grade level state standards and school curriculum. You can purchase just the teacher manuals or student workbooks to serve a 1:1 environment, Google Classroom, and hybrid teaching situations.

Each grade-level PDF or print book (both are available) is between 175 and 252 pages and includes lesson plans, assessments, domain-specific vocabulary, problem-solving tips, Big Idea, Essential Question, options if primary tech tools not available, posters, reproducibles, samples, tips, enrichments, entry and exit tickets, and teacher preparation. Lessons build on each other kindergarten through 5th grade. Middle School and High School are designed for semester or quarter grading periods typical of those grade levels with topics like programming, robotics, writing an ebook, and community service with tech.

Most (all?) grade levels include keyboarding, digital citizenship, problem solving, digital tools for the classroom, and coding.

The curriculum is used worldwide by public and private schools and homeschoolers. (more…)

What’s Trending on Ask a Tech Teacher

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I calculate what’s trending on my blog by which of my posts are popular in a particular time period. Here’s the run-down so far this year:

Tech Tips to End the School Year

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Wrapping up your school technology for the summer is as complicated as setting it up in September. There are endless backups, shares, cleanings, changed settings, and vacation messages that — if not done right — can mean big problems when you return from summer vacation. If you have a school device, a lot of the shutdown steps will be done by the IT folks as they backup, clean, reformat, and maybe re-image your device. If you have a personal device assigned by the school but yours to take home, the steps may be more numerous but really, not more complicated.

Here’s a list. Skip those that don’t apply to you and complete the rest. I won’t take time in this article for a how-to on each activity so if you don’t know how to complete one, check with your IT folks or DDG (Duck Duck Go) or Google it:

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