How to Use Games to Juice up Science Lessons

The use of gaming for student-centered learning eliminates constraints, increases engagement, boosts collaboration and empowers students to find answers through deep and rich experiences.

High Teacher Stress Leads to Poorer Student Outcomes

High levels of job-related stress are more common among teachers than previously thought, according to a new study, and may be affecting student outcomes.

Making Space for Makerspaces

Pop-up makerspaces have allowed project-based learning to grow and blossom. Using higher-order thinking skills, students are given the opportunity to problem-solve, ask questions, think, create, innovate, fix and revise. A new set of learning theories have popped up as well. Innovation and design theory have become a way of learning, with entrepreneurship at the helm.

How California's Student Privacy Law Protects Against Targeted Advertising

In 2014, California signed into law the most comprehensive student-data-privacy legislation in the country. The success of this landmark legislation in California has sparked a national conversation on the importance of protecting our students' data, and has been the inspiration for similar legislation across the country.

Student Data Privacy: Building Trust Through Collaboration

A community of trust encourages a healthy conversation between school systems and community members that moves from fear-based to fact-based about the school practices and educational progress of students.

BLC18: Come to the Best Little Conference on Educational Technology!

Alan November has run the Building Learning Communities (BLC) Conference since 2000, each year drawing almost 1,000 educators from all over the world to "be challenged and be affirmed." In this week's blog post we describe the "Pixie Dust," the formula, that Alan and his team use to create a unique venue for educators to come together and immerse themselves in "education and technology."

Grant Spotlight: $10,000 Teacher Grants for Blended Learning

Educators have until the end of the month to put their best online and blended learning ideas forward as possible recipients for grant money from the Foundation for Blended and Online Learning.

Shuttered Online Charter Being Sued by State of Ohio

The school was founded in 2000 and by 2015 had a student enrollment of 14,453, making it the Ohio's largest charter. By 2016, while ECOT had the "single-largest graduating high school class" in the country, it also had the worst failure rate.

Teachers Too Busy to Collaborate

While collaboration is a 21st century skill for students, teachers aren't modeling the behavior much. In a typical month, 44 percent will never visit another teacher's classroom in the same school to get ideas for instruction or offer feedback.

Math Teachers: Dump Tracking of Students; Focus on Essentials

A major association of math teachers has issued a call for rethinking math education in pre-K–12.

Skills Deficit Will Imperil U.S. Economy by 2030

For all the talk of technologies such as artificial intelligence and robotics doing away with the human element in corporate life, well trained human beings are still an essential ingredient. In fact, if the current skills gap remains unplugged, by 2030 the world will see "tens of millions of unfilled jobs and trillions of dollars in unrealized revenue," according to a new study.

Fewer STEM Courses in Minority-Majority High Schools

The 2015-2016 Civil Rights Data Collection is a survey of all public schools and school districts in the country that measures student access to courses, programs, staff and resources affecting education equity and opportunity for students.

K–12 Tech Orgs Praise Senate Net Neutrality Vote, but Does It Matter?

If passed into law, the bill would reverse the Federal Communications Commission's December decision to end net neutrality rules put in place by the Obama administration. Those rules, set to expire June 11, bar companies from charging more for some content and from slowing down or outright blocking some content.

New Nonprofit Will Focus on Flipped and Active Learning

A new nonprofit has formed to focus on "identifying and supporting global standards for flipped learning and related active learning instruction." Known as the Academy of Active Learning Arts and Sciences, the organization was created out of the Flipped Learning Global Initiative's Global Standards Project, an effort to establish an international framework for flipped learning.

$14 million Chan Zuckerberg Grant Expands Personalized Learning in Chicago

Already, 120 of Chicago's schools have embedded personalized learning into the classroom. The latest investment will enable the school system to expand that through an opt-in application process that begins in the fall. Priority will be given to low-performing schools.

Blackboard Introduces Web Accessibility Checker

Blackboard today introduced Blackboard Ally for Web, a solution for assessing and improving the accessibility of institutions' websites. The tool expands on Blackboard's Ally product (launched last year), which focuses on the accessibility of course materials in learning management systems.

Emerald Release of D2L Updates Interface, Activity Feed, Parent Edition

D2L has updated its learning management system. The "Emerald Release" of Brightspace offers new analytics features, improvements to the user experience, functions to expedite use of the LMS by educators and updates to a parental version of the software.

Sensory Room Provides Focus for Autistic Students

The room features a swing structure with multiple swings, a touch wall for tactile input, a squishy corner, multiple sensory bins, light-up bubble tubes and an outdoor garden area.

Gale Adds LTI Compliance for Learning Resources

Gale has updated its resources to be compliant with Learning Tools Interoperability 1.0 standards and Deep Linking from the IMS Global Learning Consortium. The move enables single sign-on and allows instructors to embed content from their library's Gale collections to into any learning management system that supports the standards, including Blackboard, Canvas, Moodle, Schoology and more.

Newsela to Add Social-Emotional Learning Collection

SEL is the name given to the process that people — both kids and adults — undergo as they acquire and use attitudes and skills for understanding and managing their emotions, setting and pursuing productive goals, feeling and showing empathy for others, maintaining healthy relationships and making wise decisions. These touch on many of the soft skills students are encouraged to acquire as part of 21st century learning.

Report: How to Meet Students 'Where They Are'

A new report on competency-based education explores how to know where students are; what to do once teachers know that; and which strategies will help teachers navigate "systemic constraints."

Research: Effective Communication Can Reduce Absenteeism 10 Percent

Telling parents that absences matter and offering suggestions for eliminating them reduces absenteeism by as much as 10 percent, according to a new study from researchers at Harvard and Berkeley.

Sony Intros 10-Inch Digital Paper Model

Sony today introduced a 10-inch version of its Digital Paper device. The new model is "notebook-sized," compared to the original 13-inch "letter-sized" model.

VR Ed Company Targets Low-Cost Oculus Go for Science Units

VictoryVR, a company that creates virtual reality curriculum for grades 5–12, will be making its science content available for the Oculus Go beginning this summer.

Adobe Changes Licensing for K–12 Schools, Now $4.99 per Seat for Creative Cloud

Adobe is drastically reducing the price of Creative Cloud licenses for K–12 schools and districts. Starting May 15, annual licenses will cost $4.99 per user for U.S. schools, providing full access to the Creative Cloud suite, which includes professional graphics, motion graphics, video editing, web development and other applications geared toward creative production.

Gen Z Prefers an App over an Actual Flashlight

Technologies such as typewriters, analog cameras and cassette tape players are fading from human awareness. A new report from YouGov, a consumer data firm, examined generational differences regarding technology and found that most Gen Zers — those born in this millennium — wouldn't know how to use a fax machine, rotary phone, floppy disk or beeper. For example, just 17 percent of young people said they were comfortable using a rotary phone; 15 percent said the same about fax machines; and just 7 percent said so about pagers.

D2L Pursues Usage for LMS as K–12 PD Platform

Learning management company D2L has tweaked its learning management system to accommodate professional development management for K–12 teachers as well. In April the company announced a similar offering for the higher education edition of its cloud-based Brightspace platform. Among the features: a dashboard to manage teacher PD and new kinds of assessment support.

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