Andrew Fuller: Improving academic outcomes

Andrew Fuller recently presented at an ISASA conference. Andrew works with many schools and communities in Australia and internationally, specialising in the wellbeing of young people and their families. There are some resources that he has shared on his site that you may find of interest.

Grade 8 Laptop Programme Implementation

The Grade 8 Laptop Programme is now up and running and all the Grade 8's are now using this technology in their lessons at Bishops.

Here is a copy of a news item that was sent out to all the Grade 8 parents about the laptop rollout and the type of ICT activities their sons are currently engaged in.

8 Classroom Apps to Use - from The Edtech Roundup - written by Michael Karlin

http://www.edtechroundup.org/1/post/2013/08/8-classroom-apps-to-try-this-fall.html

EduClipper - Clip Everything, Share Anything

EduClipper, also known as the "pinterest for education," is an absolutely awesome tool for collecting, sharing, and organizing digital information.  It's great for students and teachers and it can be used to create a digital bulletin board of useful links, articles, pages, and you can even upload your own documents to share.  It's incredibly easy to use and to top it all off, it's free!

    [ The Complete Roundup Review of EduClipper ]

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Class Dojo - Digital Classroom Management

Class Dojo is a free classroom management app that can be used on the web, iOS, and Android devices. Within the app, you can store all of your student information and with the click of a mouse, you can easily award students negative or positive points for their behavior in class.  The app records and tracks all that behavior data so that you can view, graph, and analyze it whenever you want!  

      [ The Complete Roundup Review of Class Dojo ]

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TouchCast - The Web Inside a Video

TouchCast is an awesome new iPad app that allows you to create videos with interactive web content inside of the video.  Within the videos you can integrate maps, images, links, polls, questions, and even live Twitter feeds.  Plus, it's free, fun, and incredibly simple to use.  If you've got iPads you can use in your classroom, definitely give it a try!

      [ The Complete Roundup Review of TouchCast ]

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Metta - Flip Web Content into Video Lessons

Metta (formerly Soo Meta) is a web-based tool for creating flipped video lessons.  Teachers can use the tool to take images, audio, and video from their computers (or the web) and easily mix it all into a video lesson that can be sent out to students.  You even have the option to create interactive polls and questions that students can answer while they're watching the lesson!

         [ The Complete Roundup Review of Metta ]

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Brickflow - Hashtag Based Slideshows

Brickflow is a web-based tool that instantly builds slideshows based on hashtags (#).  You can easily integrate content from YouTube, Instagram, Tumblr, and Twitter to create a slideshow in seconds.  And if you need to, you can also upload your own content as well, so you don't have to be connected to the social media sites.  It's a great, free tool that I think students will enjoy using!

       [ The Complete Roundup Review of Brickflow ]

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Moby Max - Online Math & Language Curriculum

The only reason Moby Max isn't at the top of this list is because I don't teach English anymore, so I won't be able to use this app this fall.  But, for the Language and Math instructors out there, you should absolutely check out the site.  Moby Max is a completely free, standards-based, online curriculum that even determines exactly what indicators your students have trouble with.  It's awesome.

      [ The Complete Roundup Review of Moby Max ]

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EduCade - Find, Create, and Share Lesson Plans

Despite being a relatively new resource, EduCade has a ton of free, standards-based, lesson plans to try out.  You can easily search by grade-level or subject-area to find any lesson you might need.  All the lessons come with the resources you need, a step-by-step lesson plan, and even reviews from other teachers who have tried it out.

       [ The Complete Roundup Review of Educade ]

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Answer Pad - The Free Student Response System

And last, but certainly not least, The Answer Pad a free web, iOS and Android app that is perfect for the BYOD environment.  Remember "clickers," where a question would appear on the board and then the students would press their answer on a remote?  The Answer Pad takes that idea and improves on it a million times over.  If you have a BYOD policy at your school, definitely check it out.

[ The Complete Roundup Review of The Answer Pad ]

Guardian Data - GSCE results - Girls vs Boys

Here is a Guardian data vine. You may wonder what this means. In laymen's terms a data vine is a data rich 6 second video that is shared normally via Twitter.

A picture speaks a thousand words - the power of Infographics

Infographics are visual representations of ideas, concepts and data. Representing data in a visual way has the power of changing one's perspective. One can often get clarity or an answer to a simple question very quickly.

Infographics can be simple or complex, but it allows kids to demonstrate deeper meaning while teaching aspects of design thinking at the same time. It helps reinforce the idea that facts are fine, but placing them in context creates meaning and learning.

WHAT IS AN INFOGRAPHIC?


1. It's a visual explanation that helps you more easily understand, find or do something.
2. It's visual, and when necessary, integrates words and pictures in a fluid, dynamic way.
3. It stands alone and is completely self-explanatory.
4. It reveals information that was formerly hidden or submerged.
5. It makes possible faster, more consistent understanding.
6. It's universally understandable.


http://communicationnation.blogspot.com/2007/04/what-is-infographic.html

http://ivancash.com/

Learning, Visualized
By DIANA LAUFENBERG

"It feels like we’re all suffering from information overload or data glut. And the good news is there might be an easy solution to that, and that’s using our eyes more. So, visualizing information, so that we can see the patterns and connections that matter and then designing that information so it makes more sense, or it tells a story, or allows us to focus only on the information that’s important. Failing that, visualized information can just look really cool."

The Beauty of Data Visualisation

Watch this TD talk video by David McCandless on The Beauty of Data Visualisation

http://ed.ted.com/lessons/david-mccandless-the-beauty-of-data-visualization

10 Tips for designing Infographics by Randy Krum

http://digitalnewsgathering.wordpress.com/2010/04/24/10-tips-for-designing-infographics/