From the Ask a Tech Teacher team: ideas on a student-run genius bar:

How to Help Students Run a Genius Bar

Modeled after Apple’s popular tech support stations, a Genius Bar in a school setting is a student-run help desk where peers provide tech support, advice on digital tools, and assistance with various tech-related issues. Teachers play a crucial role in guiding students to run this service effectively, ensuring it becomes a valuable resource for the entire school community.

By providing the necessary support and structure, teachers can help students develop leadership, teamwork, and problem-solving skills through the Genius Bar. (more…)

AI has the potential to revolutionize education for better or worse–jury’s still out on that. No one denies it can make student testing more efficient, faster, possibly leading to better educational outcomes for all learners. Key positives:

1. Tailor personalized learning paths
2. Adapt testing to challenge students at their appropriate level of knowledge 
3. Provide instant feedback
4. Reduce bias
5. Analyze data quickly to find learning patterns and trends.
6. Identify plagiarism or cheating

But there are drawbacks educators must watch for and may take time to resolve. Check out these concerns:

1. Bias and fairness
2. Privacy and data security
3. Reliability and accuracy
4. Dependency on technology
5. Digital divide
6. Loss of human connection
7. Ethical considerations

Here’s a good article from The Hechinger Report that offers an overview of current thinking on how AI is likely to reshape student testing options:

AI has potential to upend student testing

As AI advances, student testing could become highly personalized and dynamic, offering scenarios like empathetic avatar interactions and adaptive questions. While experts acknowledge risks such as bias and access disparities, they foresee AI-driven assessments reshaping education by tailoring tests to individual needs and promoting deeper learning. (more…)

6 Key trends in education to be looking at, from the Ask a Tech Teacher team:

Key Digital Innovations for Today’s Education Professionals

The digital transformation is underway, and while its impact on society is undeniable, education is among the most disproportionately affected areas. It’s not just about ditching blackboards for tablets – education today is undergoing a paradigm shift in teaching methodologies.

It’s not far-fetched to claim that technology is reshaping the philosophical and practical underpinnings of education. This article brings an overview of key trends that are leading the charge. (more…)

Education has come a long way since the focus on “reading, writing, ‘rithmetic”. In Ask a Tech Teacher posts, we’ve covered many teaching strategies:

• Behavior Learning Theory
• Depth of Knowledge (DoK)
• Flipped Classroom
• Frayer Model
• Growth Mindset
• Habits of Mind
• Mindfulness
• Orton-Gillingham
• Project-based Learning (PBL)
• Socratic Method
• Standards-based Grading
• Understanding By Design
• Unschool
• VARK model
• Visible Learning
• Whole Brain Teaching

Any of these might be perfect for your classroom. Today, we offer one more: Universal Design for Learning (UDL) (more…)

Artificial Intelligence–AI–has been around a long time, but caught everyone’s attention with the launch of generative AI, ChatGPT, and DALL-E. These made using AI easy enough for anyone and a viable tool for educators and students.

Or is it? Let’s see what the Ask a Tech Teacher team says:

Pros And Cons of AI in Education

Artificial intelligence (AI) is making major inroads into education. AI tutors, virtual assistants, and adaptive learning platforms are being adopted by schools, colleges, and universities around the world. In addition, many students are using AI to write coursework and essays, which has caused a lot of outrage.

Proponents argue AI can make education more personalized, engaging, and effective while reducing costs and workload for teachers. However, critics worry about the risks and limitations of relying too heavily on AI in education, as well as the problems caused by students using AI rather than penning work themselves.

Here we explore some of the key pros and cons of the increasing use of AI in education, from an education professional’s perspective.

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The Ask a Tech Teacher team has written a great article on behavioral learning in the classroom. You’ll find out:

• What it is
• Keys to unpacking it
• Why it matters in education
• Examples in the classroom
• Techniques for applying it
• Challenges

Behavioral Learning Theory & Its Applications In Class

If you’re an educator or a parent, equipping yourself with knowledge of behavioral learning theory can transform your classroom dynamics and alter how you perceive the process of learning itself. If the entire concept is alien to you at the moment, hold tight as we talk you through the main aspects, and how they can hold relevance in modern teaching environments.

Introduction to Behavioral Learning Theory

Behavioral learning theory can sound complex, but it’s actually quite straightforward. It stipulates that all behaviors are learnt through interactions with the environment.

While biology may play a part, this theory focuses on acquired behavior and how your responses can change over time.

Conditioning is at the center of this theory, and it posits that humans learn by developing associations between their actions and the consequences they experience in real-time.

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Left-brain or Right-brain Dominant? Explore the Ideal Subjects to Nurture your Strengths

Choosing what to study after high school can be tough. A popular theory that aids some students in their decision-making process is the left-brain vs right-brain theory. It suggests that people have a dominant side of their brain, which influences their thinking and learning styles. While it’s important to note that this theory has been debated and may not be entirely accurate, it can be helpful to understand your strengths when choosing subjects to study. This article will explore the ideal subjects for individuals who are left-brain or right-brain dominant.

Subjects for People Who Are Left-brain Dominant

If you are left-brain dominant, you are likely to be more analytical, logical and detail-oriented. You excel in subjects that require problem-solving skills and have a strong understanding of numbers and patterns. Here are some ideal subjects for left-brain dominant individuals:

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Let’s start by clearing up a misconception: Rigor isn’t unfriendly. Adding it to your class doesn’t mean you become boring, a techie, or overseer of a fun-free zone. In fact, done right, rigor fills your class with Wow, those epiphanies that bring a smile to student faces and a sense of well-being to their school day. Rigor provides positive experiences, is an emotional high, and engenders a pervasive sense of accomplishment students will carry for years–and use as a template for future events.

It is NOT:

• lots of homework
• lots of projects
• lots of resources
• lots of rules

When those are used to define rigor, the teacher is flailing–thinking quantity is quality. Rigor is not about adding a column of data or remembering the main characters in a Shakespeare novel. It’s seeing how that knowledge connects to life, to circumstances and to daily problems.

Simply put, adding rigor creates an environment where students are:

• expected to learn at high levels
• supported so they can learn at high levels
• cheered on as they demonstrate learning at high levels

It helps students understand how to live life using brain power as the engine. Sure, it will ask them to collect evidence and draw conclusions that may find disagreement among their peers. It will insist they defend a position or adjust it to reflect new information. And it will often move them outside their comfort zone. It will also prepare them to solve the problems they will face in the future.

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It’s easy to confuse ‘using technology’ with digital tools. Your school passed iPads out to all classes. Some of your colleagues think having students read in this tablet format means they’re integrating technology into their curriculum. Kudos for a good start, but they need to use the tablets to differentiate for student learning styles, enrich learning materials, and turn students into life-long learners.

That’s harder than it sounds. Technology hasn’t been around long enough to beget standards that work for everyone (not withstanding ISTE’s herculean efforts), the set-in-stone of settled science. Truth, that will never happen. Technology tools populate like bacteria in a culture. Every time you turn around, there’s another favorite tool some teacher swears has turned her students into geniuses and her class into a model of efficiency. After fifteen years of teaching technology, chatting with colleagues, and experimenting, I can assure you there is no magic wand. What there is is a teacher not afraid to try new ways, test them out in a classroom environment, toss what doesn’t work and share the rest. Her/his success doesn’t come without lots of failure and mistakes, widgets that sounded good but were too complicated or non-intuitive for a 21st century classroom.

Which of these nine mistakes do you make? Then, see how to fix them:

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When I first wrote this article seven years ago, remote teaching was something done on snow days, teaching from home short-changed student learning, and parents were too busy to get involved in their child’s education. So much has changed. Here’s an update on this popular post to reflect what my grad students tell me they now face.

Education today is characterized by rapid technological advancements, globalization, and changing workforce demands. As a result, traditional teaching methods may not prepare students for the challenges and opportunities of the post-High School world.

Key characteristics of teaching today include:

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