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.

Keyboarding

In recent years, there has been a noticeable resurgence in teaching K-8 keyboarding skills. This revival stems from the widespread adoption of 1:1 devices—accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic—and the shift toward writing tasks that demand efficient typing.

Many districts, such as Orange County Public Schools in Florida, have renewed focus on touch-typing instruction because students raised on smartphones often default to inefficient thumb typing. This slows them down on full keyboards during tests and assignments. Leaders at that District note that students and teachers enjoy the practice and view strong keyboarding as essential for classwork, tests, and future jobs.

Progressive curricula integrate short, consistent practice sessions starting as early as kindergarten, sometimes through engaging games, apps, or dedicated software rather than isolated classes. While debates persist, the consensus is growing that explicit keyboarding instruction remains a foundational digital literacy skill in an increasingly screen-based learning environment.

We at Ask a Tech Teacher have a solution…

K-8 Keyboard Curriculum

Overview

K-8 Keyboard Curriculum (four options)–teacher handbook, student workbooks, and help for homeschoolers

2-Volume Ultimate Guide to Keyboarding

K-5 (237 pages) and Middle School (80 pages), 100 images, 7 assessments

K-5–print/digital; Middle School–digital delivery only

Aligned with Student workbooks 

Delivered print or digital

Student workbooks sold separately

__________________________________________________________________________

1-Volume Essential Guide to K-8 Keyboarding

120 pages, dozens of images, 6 assessments

Delivered print or digital

Doesn’t include student workbooks 

(more…)

Education has changed. No longer is it contained within four classroom walls or the physical site of a school building. Students aren’t confined by the eight hours between school bells or the struggling budget of an underfunded program. Now, education can be found anywhere — teaming up with students in Kenya, Skyping with an author in Sweden, or chatting with an astrophysicist on the International Space Station. Students can use Google Earth to take a virtual tour of a zoo or a blog to collaborate on class research.

Learning has no temporal or geographic borders and is available wherever students and teachers find an Internet connection. This vast landscape of resources is offered digitally, often free, but to take that cerebral trek through the online world, children must know how to do it safely, securely, and responsibly. This used to mean limiting access to the Internet, blocking websites, and layering rules upon rules hoping (vainly) to discourage students from using an infinite and fascinating resource. It didn’t work.

Best practices now suggest that instead of cocooning students, we teach them to be good digital citizens, confident and competent. Here are projects to teach kids authentically, blended with your regular lessons, the often complicated topic of becoming good digital citizens, knowledgeable about their responsibilities in an Internet world.

(more…)

It sounds easy, but to a five or six year old, holding the mouse, clicking that left button, dragging and dropping while holding a finger down is darn difficult. Here’s a list (click for updates):

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One of the best ways to get students interested in technology is allow them to personalize their work area. That starts with placing wallpaper of their choice on their desktop. (more…)

I get a lot of questions from readers about what tech ed resources I use in my classroom so I’m going to take a few days this 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 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: K-8 Keyboard Curriculum

Overview

K-8 Keyboard Curriculum (four options)–teacher handbook, student workbooks, and help for homeschoolers

2-Volume Ultimate Guide to Keyboarding

K-5 (237 pages) and Middle School (80 pages), 100 images, 7 assessments

K-5–print/digital; Middle School–digital delivery only

Aligned with Student workbooks 

Delivered print or digital

Student workbooks sold separately

__________________________________________________________________________

1-Volume Essential Guide to K-8 Keyboarding

120 pages, dozens of images, 6 assessments

Delivered print or digital

Doesn’t include: Student workbooks 

(more…)

Here are 50 animal websites for grades K-5, everything from Dinosaurs to the wildly popular Wolfquest (click here for updates):

1. 3D Toad—3D science study
2. Adaptations—game
3. Animal Adaptations
4. Animal games
5. Animal Games II
6. Animal games II
7. Animal Games III
8. Animal Habitats
9. Animal homes
10. Animal homes
11. Animal Homes II
12. Animal Homes III
13. Animal puzzle games–cool
14. Animals
15. Animals—San Diego Zoo Videos
16. Barnaby and Bellinda Bear
17. Bembo’s Zoo
18. Build a habitat
19. Build a habitat II
20. Butterfies and habitats
21. Classify animals
22. Cockroach—virtual
23. Dino collection
24. Dino Fossils then and now
25. Dino Games
26. Dino Games II
27. Dinosaurs
28. Dinosaurs II
29. Dinosaurs IV
30. Dinosaurs V
31. Dinosaurs VI
32. Endangered species collection
33. Food chain
34. Food Chains
35. Frog habitat
36. Google Earth—African Animals
37. Google Earth—endangered animals
38. Habitat Game
39. Habitats—create one
40. Habitats—match them
41. Life Cycles
42. Life—the Game–colorful
43. Ocean Currents—video from NASA
44. Ocean Safari
45. Ocean Tracks
46. Video Safari
47. Virtual Cockroach
48. Virtual Farm
49. Virtual Zoo
50. Wolfquest—simulation–DL

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Create a holiday card for Thanksgiving or Christmas in KidPix or another drawing program and reinforce early writing skills while teaching mouse skills, toolbars and tool use: (more…)

Education has changed. No longer is it contained within four classroom walls or the physical site of a school building. Students aren’t confined by the eight hours between school bells or the struggling budget of an underfunded program. Now, education can be found anywhere — teaming up with students in Kenya, Skyping with an author in Sweden, or chatting with an astrophysicist on the International Space Station. Students can use Google Earth to take a virtual tour of a zoo or a blog to collaborate on class research. Learning has no temporal or geographic borders and is available wherever students and teachers find an Internet connection. This vast landscape of resources is offered digitally, often free, but to take that cerebral trek through the online world, children must know how to do it safely, securely, and responsibly. This used to mean limiting access to the Internet, blocking websites, and layering rules upon rules hoping (vainly) to discourage students from using an infinite and fascinating resource. It didn’t work. Best practices now suggest that instead of cocooning students, we teach them to be good digital citizens, confident and competent. Here are eleven projects to teach kids authentically, blended with your regular lessons, the often complicated topic of becoming good digital citizens, knowledgeable about their responsibilities in an Internet world. (more…)

Many people in the United States, particularly students, parents and teachers, join forces on Read Across America Day, annually held on March 2nd to coincide with the birthday of Dr. Seuss. Let’s celebrate with this take-off of his writing style, but about technology, reprinted with permission of Gene Zigler at Cornell University:

If a packet hits a pocket on a socket on a port,
and the bus is interrupted as a very last resort,
and the address of the memory makes your floppy disk abort,
then the socket packet pocket has an error to report.

If your cursor finds a menu item followed by a dash,
and the double-clicking icon puts your window in the trash,
and your data is corrupted 'cause the index doesn't hash,
then your situation's hopeless and your system's gonna crash!

If the label on the cable on the table at your house,
says the network is connected to the button on your mouse,
but your packets want to tunnel on another protocol,
that's repeatedly rejected by the printer down the hall,
and you screen is all distorted by the side effects of gauss,
so your icons in the window are as wavy as a souse,
then you may as well reboot and go out with a bang,
'cause as sure as I'm a poet, the sucker's gonna hang!

When the copy of your floppy's getting sloppy on the disk,
and the microcode instructions cause unnecessary risk,
then you have to flash your memory, and you'll want to RAM your ROM.
Quickly turn off the computer and be sure to tell your mom.

Copyright © Gene Ziegler

Email: Gene_Ziegler@Cornell.edu

--reprinted with permission © 6-28-09

Here are thirteen great reading websites for students K-5: (more…)

Before you start this project, you might want to visit How to KidPix I and How to KidPix II.

There are a lot of graphic art options for youngers. We choose KidPix because it is user friendly, easily understood, and doesn’t clutter up the screen with anything other than what new graphic artists need.

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