Today I was blessed and touched by something really remarkable. I was invited to attend an Eagle Scout Court of Honor Ceremony. What was really special about this ceremony was that two of my former students were receiving the highest honor a Boy Scout can attain, Eagle Scout! Statistics vary, but only 2%-4% of the boys that venture into Boy Scouts, end up achieving Eagle Scout. You might ask what this has to do with technology, and for the most part, absolutely nothing. However, it has everything to do with being a teacher and providing students with every ounce of effort that we have. You see, I do not think these two students reached this honor because I single-handedly made the difference in their lives to push forward and attain such a great honor, but what I do know is that I gave them everything that I had in the classroom. I was a role model. I preached and portrayed consistency and effort. I made sure to work hard so they could make up their minds for themselves, who I was, and whether or not they wanted to take a little piece of me and place it in their life portfolio. I am so proud of these two young men and as they continue to shape their lives, I have a small piece of their courageousness in my life portfolio. It keeps me going and your personal triumphs in education, no matter how big or how small, should keep you going to provide small pieces of yourselves to the students that you serve. Technology is the tool that I use to engage, promote, excite and ultimately deliver content, but it is the embodiment that you put on display each day that makes a difference. Congratulations Sean and James! It was my honor to have shared part of my life with you. Mr Diaz. Do you have a story that you would like to share?  

Choosing an eLearning vendor partner is a big decision. The way you arrive at that big decision will most likely involve a Request for Proposal (RFP) and may even include a Request for Information (RFI). What’s the difference between these two tools? And how do you know whether you need to use one or both?

Founded in 1943, ASCD (formerly the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development) is an educational leadership organization dedicated to advancing best practices and policies for the success of each learner. Source: www.ascd.org See on Scoop.it - Educational Books and Scholarly Articles

I recently watched a TED Talk video, titled "Math class needs a makeover," by Dan Meyer. It inspired me to re-think the way I teach my students in 6th grade. You see, we have had one formula for teaching kids, for as long as I can remember, the math T.E. (teacher’s edition). I use it everyday, whether it be to plan my lessons or to go over the homework problems. Somewhere deep inside me, I know that I am better than this. I am the planner and the person in charge to decide how my class is going to learn content for the day and synthesize it for it for a lifetime. Now, no one expects students to remember every last breath that a teacher makes in an effort to explain content, however, the process and the journey should very much be a appreciated and highlighted to the fullest extent. I could go on and on, but you have to buy in and work that much harder to get the results that you wish for. Simply wishing is actually not enough, so put your hard hat on and work to improve your craft so that students become the thinkers that we long for them to be. I am along with you for this journey, for I am a teacher who is constantly looking for avenues to improve my skill set and more importantly, the skill set of my students! Watch the video and let me know if you think that you need to make a change in your instruction?

CODING: a key for brain development, fun, gamification and gamecodization.These days plenty of words are being uttered about the importance of computer programming teaching at school. It is indeed important, but this post goes not about that, but about what choices we have as teachers to conduct it and about my conclusions on what programming languages should be used to teach coding in secondary school. And these thoughts are mainly based on: 1st, my own experience as a Computer Scientist; 2nd, my experience as a teacher of LOGO; and, 3th, a throughout analysis of several programming languages.That said, some good features a PL should have are:An easy syntax, closer to the human language one (pro BASIC, con C).A loose variable declaration system (pro BASIC, con LOGO).An IDE (integrated developing environment, so you can have full control of the code, its execution and debugging).A rapid way to execute the code (avoiding compilations, assembling...).Lots of resources/libraries.If you do a quick research on the Internet, you'll find that not many of the recommended languages fulfil those features. Python, Java, even Logo have complex syntaxes and the learning curve could be harsh, not to speak about the bad experience for students.So, my nominees are:Scratch: visual, doesn't need any previous programming skills, attractive, shareable, kid-oriented (#3, #4, #5). Logo: great for geometry and spacial intelligence, similar to robot controlling, but using its full potential can be difficult for the students (#1, #3, #4).Basic256: really easy to learn language, it even has sprite control functions for game developing (#1, #2, #3, #4). Visual basic 6: an old but still used language, the concept of "objects" can be worked, real application development, utilization of controls like windows, buttons, textboxes and so (#1, #2, #3, #4, #5).Now, the next stage should be to decide what concepts should be taught to your students. More on that in the next post.Note: some interesting books to have a look on.So you want to learn to program? Basic 256: this is the official book, so nothing is left out.Help your kids with Computer Coding. Scratch: very visual and easy to follow; the book’s format is absolutely attractive. A-must!Logo programming language: I wrote this book, so feel free to use it for your lessons, but take in count it’s written in Basque.

Evaluate these thoughts: Legislation destroys creativity Standardized testing has become an obsession The thought has been to learn things in school that lead to jobs Industrialization has shaped modern education For math and science, the question is asked, "how can we make it better." For art, there needs to be a space created for dialogue and discussion to even take place. Why? Our current system is obsolete Promote innovation and creativity Education+Culture+Commerce Organizations are having trouble with complexity Promoting creativity is a bottom line imperative For most of human history we have led local lives and communicated primarily with those around us. Today we act differently Technology is in its infancy Within the next ten years, computers may go from algorithms to rewriting their own operating systems We direct people to jobs we believe will be available Misconceptions: Only special people are creative We can’t wait to change education, children cannot postpone their lives There are three types of people (trying to change education): Immovable: you are never going to change their thoughts, do not bother Movable: might be able to be persuaded Movers: those who create change Create the right conditions Encourage students at what they are good at Special knowledge is a complex set of disciplines Do attempt to teach "academic disciplines" through the arts, because what you are saying is that art is not academic and then not worthy to stand side by side next to such things as math and science. Not seen or heard Sir Ken Robinson in action? I highly recommend the following talks: Changing Education Paradigms   Schools Kill Creativity Two books I am reading: Out of Our Minds: Learning to be Creative   The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything

If you don’t manage your online presence, you are allowing search engines to create it for you. Source: chronicle.com See on Scoop.it - FootprintDigital

Beware of false teachers...The other day a representative from Google came to my school to give us a presentation about Google Apps for Education. I was feeling quite curious about the visit, and I think I was expecting something like... big, taking in count the all mighty Google was coming.Well, an apparently lovely woman came inside the room, sat down in front of a laptop and tried, for nearly 10 minutes, to log in in her Google account. She couldn't do it, in her own words because Chrome wasn't installed, and Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox weren't prepared enough to provide Google's full experience. That was her first lie, as I knew what was going on technically (one of Google's new features, so multiple prelogged accounts are shown in a list). But, she was the expert, so I preferred to stay quiet (not to bother her), as she continued wandering inside the mess, explaining nonsense, and getting more and more nervous. As she couldn't log in by any means, she plugged a pendrive and started a flash presentation. And, off we went...The whole Google package was presented: Drive, Gmail, Calendar... Apparently the only difference between the free account and the paid one was that that package would be running privately inside of our own domain, only for some fee she wasn't prone to clarify.But the best thing was her speech's style quite general and manipulative:1. Google has proven experience with educational tools: in my humble opinion Google has just packaged a bunch of common tools. Moodle, for example, does have it. In fact, Google's strategy's been to redecorate its products to resell them, but they just can't offer an integrated solution for school's daily management.2. The best educational institutions (no specific name was mentioned) are using this package: I wish she had given us any figures supporting that sentence.3. Google is the best solution for web designing. What about CMSs like Mambo, Joomla, Drupal and the like? 4. Google+ is the largest social site with thousands of Educational groups. Someone forgot to mention Facebook is, in fact, the real largest one, and that Twitter is the best site to share information about Education. Fireworks started when she asked me about my opinion. She didn't get it well, as she didn't know how to respond appropriately. Well, I suppose people selling things have to overrate their products to mesmerise their clients, even when they don't know well what field they are dealing with. I'm not saying I'm not pro Google (check my other articles), but I've been organizing my lessons, students and grades with Moodle for several years, combining it with Google Drive and other sites like Isuu, Youtube, etc. And believe me Moodle does work! What's the moral of this story? 1. There's not a single solution for everything, and as teachers we have to weave several products in an integrated useful fabric.2. Beware teachers! There are thousand of options to choose from, and sellers will tell you miraculous things about theirs.3. We teachers have to be constantly researching, analysing and testing products to know first hand what serves best for the purpose and what doesn't.4. Don't make a single trademark your favourite option. Google, Microsoft, Android... there's an interesting spectrum.5. Try always to choose an OpenSource one.6. And, to end, companies should be careful about what representatives they choose to represent them.

I recently visited our local mountains with my 6th grade class for outdoor science school and decided that I wanted to communicate some of the activities to our parents and families. So, I decided to produce a nightly, video enhanced podcast/movie that parents could view from my school website. Myself and another teacher shared the task of capturing still images and video throughout the day and I would create the podcast so it would be available to the parents. I really enjoyed producing the files and we had great interaction and feedback from the parents. About midweek I received and e-mail from my school district that asked if I knew what "copyright" was and that I needed to change or remove the music that I had used in conjunction with my images and video. Of course I knew what copyright was and is! I would like to think I am above the curve in techie-ness. I would agree in a heartbeat that I cannot recite verbatim the music copyright and fair use laws. My main focus was to create an experience that the parents could enjoy and obtain a glimpse into their kid’s lives at science school. I did not think I was supposed to be following a rubric and that my product was somehow, some grand assault on the music industry and that I was going to cause a major lawsuit against our district! But in the end folks, I was speeding and I was wrong. Have you ever been driving along and did not notice that you were speeding? You were breaking the law, but you slowly apply the breaks and continue about your day. You knew that you were not supposed to be driving faster than the posted speed limit, you know the law, so you self-corrected and all was well. I too, knew that there was a copyright law but I was distracted and did not focus on this aspect. I just wanted to get a video out and to our parents, so they might enjoy part of the experience. Again, this is not an excuse, I was speeding and I was wrong. I learned a valuable lesson and I will utilize this as a teachable moment. So, when the students walk into my classroom on Monday morning, I will explain to them how I had made a mistake and utilized popular music that was copyrighted in my project. Note, not a single student of mine has ever utilized copyrighted music in their projects but somehow that law did not pertain to me at outdoor science school. It is obvious that I need to teach by example and I believe I am. Here are is an example of a website that offers Royalty Free Music (Creative Commons Music).I was going to bore you with copyright music law, but instead I want to share this amusing video:

Viruses, search boxes, trojans, adware… your computer only lacks bacteria or even fungi! Your students’ pendrives stuffed with primordial soups of life, your Internet researches with showers of malicious cookies… and all of the sudden your computer’s overall performance plummets and your files start to fade away mysteriously.No problem. We’ve just to apply a combined approach using different tools to get rid of all the rubbish. A teacher’s computer is the perfect element to be Pasteur’s lab desk (it usually happens to me), and every other week it’s recommended to deep clean the system following these next four steps.First, sweep your computer out with these freeware software packages:Trojans: Definition (Wikipedia) a Trojan horse, or Trojan, in computing is a generally non-self-replicating type of malware program containing malicious code that, when executed, carries out actions determined by the nature of the Trojan, typically causing loss or theft of data, and possible system harm.Solution: Superantispyware.Viruses: Definition: (Wikipedia) a computer virus is a malware program that, when executed, replicates by inserting copies of itself (possibly modified) into other computer programs, data files, or the boot sector of the hard drive.Solution: you have plenty of options. You can try Windows Defender (included in Windows), or other options as Avast or McAfee.Adware: Definition: (Wikipedia) advertising-supported software, is any software package which automatically renders advertisements in order to generate revenue for its author. The advertisements may be in the user interface of the software or on a screen presented to the user during the installation process. The functions may be designed to analyze which Internet sites the user visits and to present advertising pertinent to the types of goods or services featured there. Solution: adwcleaner, adwareremovaltool (use both).Second, throw away other sort of dirt with CCleaner.Third, tidy up your harddisk with Disk Defragmenter (Windows).And, fourth… reboot to start afresh. Voilá!