Category: Holidays

What are You Doing for Valentine’s Day?

red-37308_150Thursday’s are my busiest days at school. I barely get a lunch break–the 5 free minutes between classes I must use for the restroom. Eat or pee? Hmmm…. Not really a choice.

So by the time I get home this Thursday, I’ll be exhausted, not interested in fighting the holiday lovers for a place at the Restaurant Table. My husband of 29 years and I will eat in, chat, catch up, and likely go to bed early (although maybe Elementary is new on the Telly).

But, I realize most of you would like a bit more so I have a few ideas for you.

First, go to my post last Friday and you’ll find 20 Great Valentine Websites for your students. If you already finished these, read on:

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teacher gifts

Happy Holiday!

1372575_modern_christmas_treeI’m taking off for a few days. I’ll be back after the New Year, refreshed, with new ideas, ready to go. I wish all of you a wonderful holiday season. May all of your wishes come true.


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, webmaster for four blogs, an Amazon Vine Voice, CSTA presentation reviewer, 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.

christmas project

Book Review: 16 Holiday Projects

holiday projects16 Holiday Projects (Structured Learning 2011) is a 45-page student-tested collection of year-round holiday-themed projects for kindergarten through eighth grade using Word, Excel, Publisher, KidPix, TuxPaint, Web 2.0 tools and more. They’re from the team of Ask a Tech Teacher technology teachers, designed to be fun and festive while teaching important tech skills.

Use them for any holiday. They’ll fill your year with pictures, calendars, wallpaper that kids will love making and want to give to family as gifts.

Where to purchase:

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Happy Labor Day

Have a wonderful, safe Labor Day. If you’re looking for activities for your K-5, click 7 Great Labor Day Websites.

If you’re wringing the last moments out of summer, I’m with you. Tomorrow, it’s back to school! Here’s what’s coming:

[caption id="attachment_9544" align="aligncenter" width="603"] Credit: Randy Glasbergen[/caption]

Jacqui Murray is the editor of a K-6 technology curriculum, K-8 keyboard curriculum, creator of two technology training books for middle school and six ebooks on technology in education. She is the author of Building a Midshipman, the story of her daughter’s journey from high school to United States Naval Academy. She is webmaster for six blogs, an Amazon Vine Voice book reviewer, a columnist for Examiner.com, Editorial Review Board member for Journal for Computing Teachers, Cisco guest blog, Technology in Education featured blogger, IMS tech expert, and a bi-weekly contributor to Write Anything. Currently, she’s editing a thriller that should be out to publishers next summer. Contact Jacqui at her writing office or her tech lab, Ask a Tech Teacher.

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Happy July 4th!

It’s America’s birthday and I’m celebrating. What I write today will be… anything I want–gibberish, a short story, guest articles on crazy topics. I have no idea. My son’s in Kuwait protecting America’s distant shores. My daughter’s in San Diego preparing her LPD for some future battle. I’m here, thanking both of them and every other service member who accepted the calling to protect our nation’s freedoms.

God be with all of you.

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Monday Freebies #21: Another Holiday Card

This year more than any before, classroom budgets have been cut making it more difficult than ever to equip the education of our children with quality teaching materials. I understand that. I teach K-8. Because of that, I’ve decided to give the lesson plans my publisher sells in the Technology Toolkit (110 Lesson Plans that I use in my classroom to integrate technology into core units of inquiry while insuring a fun, age-appropriate, developmentally-appropriate experience for students) for FREE. To be sure you don’t miss any of these:

…and start each week off with a fully-adaptable K-8 lesson that includes step-by-step directions as well as relevant ISTE national standards, tie-ins, extensions, troubleshooting and more. Eventually, you’ll get the entire Technology Toolkit book. If you can’t wait, you can purchase the curriculum here.

I love giving my material away for free. If everyone did, we would reach true equity in international education.

A Holiday Card

Create a holiday card using Publisher’s templates. Make it simple (don’t edit text, add only one picture) for youngers. Let olders change as much as they wish. Use this lesson to teach youngers about templates and olders about design, and menus. This project is very easy so shows students how fun and simple computers are.

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