2013, I Resolve…

New Years–a time for rest, rejuvenation and repair. A time to assess. Do we settle into our life, enjoy where it’s headed, or is it time to grab our purse, our iPhone and keys and get out of there?

As most of you know, I am a K-8 technology teacher, but I have a serious interest in writing. It started with non-fiction technical writing and morphed to novels. I write techno-thrillers, scientific fiction–plots that are based in the cerebral and encourage readers to join my love of intelligent topics. Therefore, my resolutions are far-ranging and varied, so I group them. Here’s how I did last year:

Teaching

• Seek out other tech ed teachers to see what is being done to incorporate technology into the classroom. Tech ed is a chameleon, constantly in flux, changing to suit educational environs. It’s a challenge to stay on top of it and one that requires attention every week of every year.
• Keep pushing my students and colleagues to integrate technology into core subjects and add the exciting Web 2.0 tools to their curriculum. Yes–it’s difficult because it’s not the way they’ve done it before, and yes–it’s worth it.
• Attend ‘a few’ tech ed conferences. Here’s my summary from ISTE 2011.
• I still need to find new ezines and blogs for tech ed. I am active on several social networks for tech teachers, write column for several ezines. I’d like to do more.
• Put more thought into my teaching wikis for grades K-5. I’ll schedule that for this summer, when I’m not so rushed.
  

Check Out My Post at TeachHUB

I write a column for TeachHUB, about twice a month. If you’d like to check out my article, Friday Five: 5 Fabulous Last-Minute Gifts, click and visit. There are some other interesting articles over there, so plan on staying a while.

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Jacqui Murray has been teaching K-8 technology for 15 years. She 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, Editorial Review Board member for Journal for Computing Teachers, Cisco guest blogger, a columnist for Examiner.com, Technology in Education featured blogger, IMS tech expert, and a bi-weekly contributor to TeachHUB and 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.

Check Out My Post at TeachHUB

I’m going to be writing a column for TeachHUB, about twice a month. If you’d like to check out my first article, Friday Five: Top Five iPad Apps for Your Classroom, click and visit. There are some other interesting articles over there, so plan on staying a while.

Follow me

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Jacqui Murray has been teaching K-8 technology for 15 years. She 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, Editorial Review Board member for Journal for Computing Teachers, Cisco guest blogger, a columnist for Examiner.com, Technology in Education featured blogger, IMS tech expert, and a bi-weekly contributor to TeachdHUB and 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.

Check out my Article over at Cisco

Cisco CLUE

…on Does Text Messaging Negatively Impact Student Academic Success? You might find it interesting. If you can’t get over there, no worries. I’ll post it here in a few weeks.

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Follow me

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 officeor her tech lab, Ask a Tech Teacher.

Check out my Article over at Cisco

Cisco CLUE

…on whether Keyboarding is Dead. You might find it interesting. If you can’t get over there, no worries. I’ll post it here in a few weeks.

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Jacqui Murray is the editor of a technology curriculum for K-sixth grade, creator of two technology training books for middle school and three 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 blogger, IMS tech expert, and a weekly contributor to Write Anything. Currently, she’s editing a thriller for her agent that should be out to publishers this summer. Contact Jacqui at her writing office or her tech lab, Ask a Tech Teacher.

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Check out my Article over at Cisco

Cisco CLUE

…on the status of teaching and VNI Service Adoption. You might find it interesting. If you can’t get over there, no worries. I’ll post it here in a few weeks.

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Jacqui Murray is the editor of a technology curriculum for K-sixth grade, creator of two technology training books for middle school and three 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 blogger, IMS tech expert, and a weekly contributor to Write Anything. Currently, she’s editing a thriller for her agent that should be out to publishers this summer. Contact Jacqui at her writing office or her tech lab, Ask a Tech Teacher.

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10 Things My Blog Taught Me

Photo credit: Nemo

When I started this blog three years and 657 posts ago, I wasn’t sure where to take it. I knew I wanted to connect with other tech teachers so I used that as the theme. Now, thanks to the 491,000+ people who have visited, I know much more about the ‘why’. It’s about getting to know kindred souls, but there is so much more I’ve gotten from blogging. Like these:

How to write

We bloggers divide ourselves into two categories: 1) those who write short, under-1000-word posts and 2) those who write in-depth, lengthy articles. I’ve chosen the former. I like pithy ideas that my readers can consume in the time it takes to drink a cup of coffee. As a result, I’ve learned to be frugal with my words. I choose verbiage that conveys more than one-word’s-worth of information and I leave tangential issues for another post. Because I realize readers are consuming on the run, I make sure to be clear–no misplaced pronouns or fuzzy concepts like ‘thing’ or ‘something’.

Prove my point

This part of writing transcends what print journalists must do. Yes, they do it, but my readers expect me to support ideas with interactive links to sources. If I’m reviewing a tech ed concept, I link to other websites for deeper reading. That’s something that can’t happen in paper writing. Sure, they can provide the link, but to put the paper down, open the laptop, copy that link–I mean, who does that? In a blog, I get annoyed if someone cites research and doesn’t provide the link.

Listen

When I write an article, I cross post to other parts of my PLN, sometimes to ezines I contribute to in other parts of the world.

And then I listen. What are readers saying? What are their comments/suggestions to me? Often, I learn as much from readers as what I thought I knew when I wrote the article.

For example, I get many emails from tech ed professionals with questions about our field. I used to answer them based on my experience. Now, I have my Dear Otto series where I share my thoughts and solicit input from readers. Wow–have I learned a lot from that! The flipped blog–teacher becomes student.

How Do I Decide What to Write About?

I’d like to claim that I pick topics of paramount importance in the tech ed community, the pinnacle of edtech conversations and just must be talked about.

But that’s not true. I select the topics that interest my readers. It’s a pull-through approach rather than push-through.

You-all communicate what you’d like to read about in several ways:

• comments–though not often. I have many loyal readers, but most don’t comment. That’s OK.
• Dear Otto–I get many questions through Dear Otto (don’t you love palindromes?). More often than not, they are questions I never considered, like my latest–How Do You Keep Students From Playing with Settings? and my upcoming post What About Teacher Tech Training? (scheduled for April 16th, 2012)
• click-throughs–those are the links I provide in posts that people click to garner additional information

I’m going to share the statistics from my click-throughs today. Amazingly, I get an average of 38% click-throughs from visitors–i.e., if I have 2,000 visitors on a day, 760 of them click through to one of the links. That tells me I’m providing material of interest to readers.

Here are the top sites you the reader clicked through to so far during 2012:

1. libraryspot.com
2. bbc.co.uk/schools/typing
3. factmonster.com
4. jonmiles.co.uk/fingerjig.php
5. kids.nationalgeographic.com
6. kids.yahoo.com
7. tvokids.com/framesets/bby.html?game=66
8. typingmaster.com/individuals/bubbles.asp
9. abcya.com/keyboard.htm
10. ivyjoy.com/rayne/kidssearch.html

2012, I Resolve…

New Years–a time for rest, rejuvenation and repair. A time to assess. Do we settle into our life, enjoy where it’s headed, or is it time to grab our purse, our iPhone and keys and get out of there?

I resolve...

As most of you know, I am a K-8 technology teacher, but I have a serious interest in writing. It started with non-fiction technical writing and morphed to novels. I write techno-thrillers, scientific fiction–plots that are based in the cerebral and encourage readers to join my love of intelligent topics. Therefore, my resolutions are far-ranging and varied, so I group them. Here’s how I did last year:

Teaching

• Attend ISTE this summer. I missed it last summer, but it’s already approved by my principal for this summer. Anyone else going? Went and loved it. Here’s my summary
• Start a technology club at my school. I’ve tried to do this in the past, but I’ll try harder this year Just not going to happen. I think it would work in Middle School, but most of my classes are K-5. Or am I making excuses?
• Participate more in the online communities that encourage technology integration in education. I write a weekly column for Technology Integration in Education and one for Examiner.com on tech tips for Everyman. Maybe there’re more. I need to find new ezines and blogs for tech ed. I am active on several social networks for tech teachers and write a column for an international ezine. I’d like to do more.
• Participate more actively in Computer Science Teachers Association. To that end, they have asked me to serve as a reviewer for their Computer Science & Information Technology Symposium. I’ve already made the commitment. I have done nothing with CSTA since that initial review. I have to ask myself: Why not?

Monday Freebie #27: Internet Skills for K-8: Blogs

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:

• Subscribe to Ask a Tech Teacher by Email
• Sign up to the RSS feed

…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. Thankfully, I have a publisher who supports that. If everyone did, we would reach true equity in international education.

Internet Skills for K-8: Blogs

Create a classroom blog. Show students how to interact on it, answer questions, add their ideas. Include pictures, student schedule, location of your wiki and more

Blogger Humor

3 Ways Twitter Makes You a Better Writer

Twitter will make you a better writer

A few months ago, I wrote a post on how Blogs and Wikis make students better writers–teachers too for that matter–and wanted to follow it up with how tweeting improves writing. In the interest of brevity, here are three quick ways:

You learn to be concise.

Twitter gives you only 140 characters to get the entire message across. Letters, numbers, symbols, punctuation and spaces all count as characters on Twitter. Wordiness doesn’t work. Twitter counts every keystroke and won’t publish anything with a minus in front of the word count.

10 Hits and 10 Misses for 2010

Since I started this blog eighteen months ago, I’ve had almost 150,000 visitors (113,024), 5,521 on my busiest day, visiting the 360 articles I’ve written on

Top 10 hits and misses for 2010

every facet of integrating technology into the classroom. As with most bloggers, I write what’s on my mind. I post 3-4 times a week on a wide variety of topics. It may be about how to use wikis or blogs in your classroom. It may be what I’ve learned from my students as we got through another tech week. I have regular features, like Tech Tip Tuesdays and Weekend Websites. I post a lot of lesson plans that have worked for me and share my thoughts on other ideas that affect teachers trying to tech-ify their classrooms. It’s a fast changing world. I’m just trying to hang on and share the ride.

It always surprises what my readers find to be the most provocative. As surprising is what holds no interest for anyone but me! It’s usually a post I put heart and soul into, sure I was sharing Very Important Information, and I get three readers who slog their way through it. Talk about humility.

Ask a Tech Teacher 2010 in Review

Here are my numbers, compliments of WordPress. Very interesting…

The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its overall blog health:

The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads Wow.

2011, I Resolve…

Last year, on New Year’s Day, I didn’t even make new year resolutions. That is why–IMHO–I didn’t get as much done as I should have. Remember the old proverb about the Captain of the ship with no map–he just headed east? That was me. I thought I’d do as much as I could and call it a success.

Not so good. This year, I’m writing them down so I have to see them and be embarrassed if I make no progress. A little forward motion is all I ask.

As most of you know, I am a K-8 technology teacher, but I have a serious interest in writing. It started with non-fiction technical writing and morphed to novels. I write techno-thrillers, scientific fiction–plots that are based in the cerebral and encourage readers to join my love of intelligent topics. Therefore, my resolutions are far-ranging and varied, so I’ve grouped them. This allows me to keep track of them better. Here they are:

What Happens When Technorati Gives Me Authority?

I don’t know why they even noticed me. I’ve done nothing different. I write 3-4 blogs a week, chat with fellow bloggers, search out a few new ones every week, make sure my content is exciting and interesting. In short, I follow all the rules that should make for a great blog, but Technorati has consistently ranked me right around 25,000-ish with a 120-125 authority. That gets no one’s attention.

#27: Online Blogs for Your Classroom

Create a classroom blog. Show students how to interact on it, answer questions, add their ideas. Include pictures, student schedule, location of your wiki and more.

Click on them for a full size alternative.

What’s it Like to Be a Blogger?

Do you ever wonder who would sit in front of a computer and post articles, day after day, week after week, with no idea how many people are reading them or if they’ll ever make any money doing this? Are they frustrated journalists? Desperate housewives? Just plain bored and in need of a platform?

I’ve got the answers for you. I write five blogs as well as columns for this newspaper and Technology Integration in Education. I’m not paid for any of them (not a salary as a corporate blogger is), yet I happily do it. My reasons are varied, but I’ve been at it for several years, so it seems to be more than a passing fad.Here’s the breakdown:

• If you blog, you’re probably 35-45, or in a broader sense, 25-55 (check for me)

Weekend Website #26: Tagxedo

Drop by every Friday to discover what wonderful website my classes and parents loved this week. I think you’ll find they’ll be a favorite of yours as they are of mine.

A Good Peer Review–Huzzah

I love hearing what works for other ed tech people around the world. I especially like to know what parts of my blog are useful to them. Here’s a review of my efforts from my fellow blogger, vpbast:

Who Reads Blogs?

It’s hard to get noticed. Technorati says they’re tracking over 112.8 million blogs:

• About 120,000 new weblogs each day, or… 1.4 new blogs every second
• 1.5 million posts per day, or…  17 posts per second
• Japanese the #1 blogging language at 37%
• English second at 33%
• Chinese third at 8%

The Ruder-Finn Intent Index says these are the primary reasons why people read blogs:

• Learn
• Have Fun
• Socialize
• Express Yourself
• Advocate
• Do Business
• Shop

Let’s do a test, see if that matches our own informal poll. Vote below and then we’ll compare:

PS BTW, blogs are a great way to encourage reading and writing in kids. More about that later.

Weekend Website #15: A Class Wiki

Drop by every Friday to discover what wonderful website my classes and parents loved this week. I think you’ll find they’ll be a favorite of yours as they are of mine.

My wiki for my fifth grade class

Weekend Website #5: Get Tricky With Wikis

Drop by every Friday to discover what wonderful website my classes and parents loved this week. I think you’ll find they’ll be a favorite of yours as they are of mine.

Ask a Tech Teacher–A Great Review

It means a lot when a fellow blogger posts kuddos about your site. Rick over at WhatsOnMyPc just did that for me–a great review from his perspective as a fellow lover of Tech. Click here for more info:

Reviewed by a Peer--always the most meaningful

While you’re there, visit Rick’s many great posts on techie stuff from basic to sophisticated.

#27: Internet Skills for K-8: Blogs

Create a classroom blog. Show students how to interact on it, answer questions, add their ideas. Include pictures, student schedule, location of your wiki and more

How the World Ranks Your Blog

Part of my job is teaching students effective search tools on the internet. There are many tricks that help students hone in on a topic with relevant, reliable information.

Nomination for Edublogs 2009 Award

My nominations for the 2009 Edublogs Award are:

The Sizzle in Science — as the Best Resource Sharing Blog. Vote for it at Edublogs.

as the most influencial post. Vote for it here.

USNA or Bust as the Best Individual Blog. Vote for it here.

Blogging for Education: Teachers Without Borders as the Most Influential Blog Post

#112: 10 Ways Twitter Makes You a Better Writer

I wrote a post on how Blogs and Wikis make students better writers–teachers too for that matter–and wanted to follow it up with how tweeting improves writing. Then I found Jennifer’s summary. It pretty well covers what I’d say:

• You learn to be concise
• You learn to be focused
• You have time to check for grammar and spelling

But, the more I thought about it, the more reasons I came up with–well beyond my original three:

1. Writing short messages helps you perfect the art of “headlining”
2. Just 140 characters per message builds discipline. You can’t ramble
3. Your message is seen by tweeple that expect brief, bright, pithy, pointed tweets
4. You quickly learn that PhD words are  great for Scrabble but horrible for Twitter and its reading world
5. It often only takes a few words to make our point
6. Tweets need to be written knowing that tweeple can @reply
7. Your messages may be part of a larger theme via #hashtags

If you’re in a hurry and want a quick version, here’s the concise, pithy version by Jennifer:

How Twitter Makes You A Better Writer

By now you’ve most likely joined Twitter (and if you haven’t, you need to, pronto!). Twitter is not only a great place for businesses and marketers, but it’s also a great place to spruce up your writing skills.

Yes. You read that correctly.

Twitter can make you a better writer. Here’s how.

Twitter forces you to be concise

If you’ve ever used Twitter, you know that you have 140 characters to say whatever you want to say. Now keep in mind, I didn’t say 140 words—or even 140 letters—I said 140 characters.

That’s not a lot of room. Letters, numbers, symbols, punctuation and spaces all count as characters on Twitter.

What all of this means is, you have to be concise. You have to know exactly what you want to say, and say it in as few words as possible.

Many writers, however, are “wordy” and often have long, drawn out descriptions and sentences, so it can be pretty difficult to create a message that’s only 140 characters.

Here’s where Twitter comes in again.

Twitter forces you to exercise your vocabulary

Since you only have 140 characters to get your message across, you’re forced to dust off your dictionary and thesaurus and find new words to use—Words that are shorter, words that are more descriptive, and words that get the job done in 140 characters or less.

Crafting a message for Twitter requires you to “pump up” your verbs (replacing adverbs and adjectives with them), and discover a better, clearer and more concise way to say what you want to say.

Now most people won’t hit 140 characters right away. No, they’ll end up with 160 or 148 characters to start out with (Twitter tells you how many characters you need to remove to make your message fit).

This is the final way that Twitter makes you a better writer.

Twitter forces you to improve your editing skills

Every writer needs to be able to edit their work. And by using Twitter, you can really hone your editing skills and make them top-notch.

It’s almost like playing a game; trying to write a 140-character message and still get your point across in a way that inspires your followers to take action, to click on your link or to “retweet” your post.

I like to think of it as a brainteaser, forcing me to think hard and dig deep down into my vocabulary to find a way to shorten my message.

I’ve been using Twitter since January, and my writing skills have not only improved, but I’ve been writing better copy as well.

Yet another reason you should be using Twitter. Not that you needed one.

–from 55 Technology Projects for the Digital Classroom. Preview available on Amazon.com and Scribd.com

How Blogs and Wikis Make Students Better Writers

Tech blogs

Wikis, blogs, social networks and a whole lot more Web 2.0 tools are the most exciting thing to happen to education since public schools.Kids love them. They’re drawn in, want to get involved, thirst to share their thoughts. Here’s the interesting part to us teachers:  If students want anyone to read what they write, they have to do it correctly–and they’re willing to make this effort for a blog.

That’s right. There are rules to follow. You’d think people would tire of posting to oblivion. No readers. No comments. They’d give up and try something new. But they don’t. They buckle down and try to follow the unique rules inherent in blogs and wikis that, if followed, will draw readers. The effort is worth the reward, which seems to be the joy of gaining a following (it sure isn’t the money).

Check out One Cool Site by Timethief. She has post after post of suggestions for increasing the popularing of your blog. It covers mundane, ancient topics like grammar, pithiness of content, exciting headlines. Then scoot over to Problogger for more on the right way to write blogs (different ideas, same message).

As a teacher, I originally thought blogs (and social networks for that matter) were way too modern for rules. Look at texting. It’s developed an entire neologistic vocabulary, complete with spelling and new letters (i.e., emoticons). Boy was I wrong. My blog didn’t get read until I checked it for:

• pithy content
• correct spelling and grammar
• appeal to my readers (a great lesson for students–make sure your voice fits your audience)
• interaction with readers via  questions in the blog and answering comments when there were any
• the three paragraph structure (just like students learn in school): first to attract search engines with a scintillating synopsis, second to appeal to my audience, third to tie everything down to a conclusion (and maybe leave them wanting more)
• mistakes, redundancies, flow by proof reading. I had to verify point of view, confirm facts–just like when students write an essay or story

So get over it parents. These Web 2.0 tools are not going away, which is a good thing. They’re student-centered and pithy. They sneak in volumes of lessons on good writing, and are full of the five-second info kids love.

Education reform: Let’s start by burning all the textbooks

I don’t understand why textbooks can’t be digital. We have the technology. They could be in pdf format–doesn’t have to be on Kindle or one of those readers that cost a lot to own. And, the brilliant American entrepreneurs could create one that reads like a book–my Scribd books can be read that way, downloaded as a pdf, embedded into a digital document.

View this document on Scribd

Why can’t we do this with textbooks?

When I chatted with a librarian friend about this, she was aghast. Why? Well, the librarian associations were against it. I have to believe when she can give me a better answer, she’ll agree with me.

Here’s another man’s opinion on this subject:

Education reform: Let’s start by burning all the textbooks – Computerworld Blogs

Posted using ShareThis

Check out my other posts:

-- 5 Must-have Skills for New Tech Teachers Plus One Extra 16 Memorial Day Websites for Students It’s Here! K-5 Tech Curriculum Aligned with Common Core! Tech Tip #49: The Fifteen Second Slideshow 11 Ways to Make an Inquiry based Classroom Weekend Website #127: Brown Bear Typing You Know You’re a Geek When… 11 Ways to be an Inquiry-based Teacher Tech Tip #48: Quickly Switch Between Windows Dear Otto: How do I prevent printer pandemonium? 15 Great Simulations to Gamify Your Class Subscribers: Your Special is Available CSTA Conference Coming Up! Tech Tip #47: Tool Tips Which is better for schools: iPads or laptops? Weekend Website #126: BrainPop Game Up What’s Trending on Ask a Tech Teacher Why Keyboarding Should NOT be Dead Tech Tip #46: The Easiest Way to Explain Right and Left to (Little) Kids Dear Otto: I need reading resources for ELL/ESL Weekend Website #125: Starfall Math 12 Great Websites for Earth Day Platform for Good Hosts Me Summer Keyboarding Class–How to Win FREE K-8 Keyboarding Curriculum Dear Otto: What’s a good Website program? 42 Great Story Websites You’ll Love Humor that Inspires–for Teachers! Part II 7 Ways Common Core Will Change Your Classroom Tech Tip #45: Your Screen Upside Down? FREE Tech Teacher Training–But Join Quickly Weekend Website 123: Google Gravity Subscribers: Your Special is Available How to Make a Student-created Video Tech Tip #44: Clean Your Computer Weekly Dear Otto: Any Ideas for Tech Ed Benchmark Assessments? Weekend Website #122: Dance Pony Dance 7 Technology Tools Every Educator Should Use–the Movie Subscribers: Your Special is Available Tech Tip #43: Back Up Often Dear Otto: How Do I Teach Citations? 10 Easter Sites For Your Students 13 Easy Spring Cleaning Steps for Your Computer 14 Factors to Consider for Tech Report Cards Tech Tip #42: How to (Re)Set Your Homepage Dear Otto: How Can Students Keep Track of Passwords? 7 Websites That Ring in Spring Ramp up Your iPad Use Tech Tip #41: Repair Your Computer With System Restore 24 St. Patrick’s Day Sites For Students Definition of ‘Teacher’ How to Teach Keyboarding? Ask Bernadette Tech Tip #111: Quick Internet Fix Dear Otto: What Can I Use Besides PowerPoint? 5 Favorite Websites for K-5 Read Across America Day How to Pick iPad Apps for your Classroom Tech Tip #110: Sound Doesn’t Work? Humor that Inspires–for Teachers! Part I Weekend Website #121: Class Badges How to Teach 3rd Graders About Digital Citizenship 7 Common Core Ways to Assess Knowledge Tech Tip #112: Five Second Back-up One Million Hits–Wow Weekend Website #119: 5 Great Website to Teach Letters What are You Doing for Valentine’s Day? Free Lesson Plans–Visit My TeachersPayTeachers Store Tech Tip #40: Where Did Windows Explorer Go? New Literacies Enable Smarter Researching 20 Valentine Sites For Your Students How the Internet Neighborhood is Like Any Other Community Dear Otto: When will the 7/8 Technology Curriculum Textbooks be out? Tech Tip #39: My Computer Won’t Turn Off Subscribers: Your Special is Available Weekend Website #118: Scale of the Universe 5 Favorite iPad Apps 11 Resources to Blend Technology and Special Needs Tech Tip #38: My Desktop Icons Are All Different Now Available: K-8 Digital Citizenship Curriculum Great Websites Updated! Technology in Schools: A Brief History Take Tech into the Classroom Tech Tip #37: My MS Word Toolbar Disappeared 17 Topics to Teach K-8 About Digital Citizenship 5 Tips to Keeping Your New Years Resolutions Weekend Website #120: Spelling Teacher App 10 Top Click-throughs from Ask a Tech Teacher 2013, I Resolve… 10 Most Popular Tech Tips in 2012 Lesson Plans for Martin Luther King Day Top Ten Websites of 2012 Honors for Ask a Tech Teacher 2012 in review New Year’s Gift: 113 Digital Citizenship Links 10 Hits and 10 Misses for 2012 Weekend Website #111: California Missions Subscribers: Your Special is Available Happy Holiday! Tech Tip #36: The Internet Toolbar Disappeared 5 Fabulous Last-minute Gifts Check Out My Post at TeachHUB 5 Great Websites to Teach Letters Dear Otto: Should I stick with age limits on websites? How to Thrive as a Digital Citizen Tech Tip #35: My Program Closed Down 10 Steps to Become a Better Geek 14 Holiday Websites For Your Students Subscribers: Your Special is Available 7 Technology Tools Every Educator Should Use Tech Tip #34: My Program Froze Perfect Gift for the Teacher in Your Life Weekend Website 40: NORAD Santa Dear Otto: PowerPoint or Publisher? Book Review: Talking Back to Facebook Tech Tip #33: My Desktop Icons are Messed Up 10 Digital Tricks to Add Zip to Your Roadtrip Edublog Nominee Happy Thanksgiving Week 18 Thanksgiving Sites For Your Students Subscribers: Your Special is Available How to Teach Digital Citizenship in 6th Grade Tech Tip #32: My Taskbar Got Moved to the Side Check Out My Post at TeachHUB Weekend Website #116: Google Street View Locations Be Featured on Ask a Tech Teacher How to Teach Digital Citizenship in 5th Grade Tech Tip #31: What’s Today’s Date 15 Ways to Get Your Geek On Weekend Website #115: Minecraft How to Teach Digital Citizenship in 4th Grade Tech Tip #109: How to Open 2 Gmail Accounts at Once Yes, I’m Resilient, but I Wish Computers Were More Dependable Weekend Website #114: 55 Digital Citizenship Links What’s Trending on Ask a Tech Teacher How to Teach Digital Citizenship in 3rd Grade Top Tech Tips of All Time Dear Otto: What Keyboard Curriculum is Best? Weekend Website #113: Digital Passport Book Review: 16 Holiday Projects How to Teach Digital Citizenship in 2nd Grade Tech Tip #108: Three-click Rule Dear Otto: I need more guidance than the curriculum offers. What do I do? Weekend Website #109: Google World of Wonders How to Teach Digital Citizenship in 1st Grade A Virtual Tour of America–Via Biplane Tech Tip #107: Got a Tech Problem? Google It! Dear Otto: Is Keyboarding Not for Cool Students? Weekend Website #112: Nanoogo How to Teach Digital Citizenship in Kindergarten Is Keyboarding Dead? Tech Tip #91: Internet Problem? Switch Browsers Dear Otto: How Do I Prepare for an Unknown Tech Future? Weekend Website #108: Wowzers Do You Make These 9 Mistakes What’s a Digital Portfolio and Why Should You Use it? Tech Tip #106: Fastest Way to Add a Period When Typing on an IPad Dear Otto: What Are Good Guidelines for Younger Bloggers? Weekend Website #107: Google Search Education Will Texting Destroy Writing Skills? How to Use iPads in Your Classroom Tech Tip #105: Create Shortkeys for any Windows Tool Dear Otto: What are Options on Digital Portfolios 16 Great Virtual Field Trips Book Review: 38 Web 2.0 Articles That Will Turn Your Class Around Tech Tip #104: Need a File on Your iPad? Here’s an Easy Way Our Children Remember… When is Typing Faster Than Handwriting? Check out my Article over at Cisco 5 Great FREE Programs for Students Book Review: K-8 Keyboard Curriculum New to technology? Follow my classes 25 Most Common Problems Your Students Will Face Happy Labor Day 7 Great Labor Day Websites Book Review: 98 Tech Tips Let me Plan Your Tech Curriculum–for Free Tech Tip #30: Menu Command is Greyed Out Dear Otto: What’s a good student email program? Book Review: How Technology Can Jumpstart Your Classroom Weekend Website #106: ZimmerTwins Do Your Children Need Computers for School? Now Available: K-8 Keyboard Curriculum Tech Tip #103: Need Email Accounts for Registration? Here’s a Fix Dear Otto: What’s a good program to create an online ezine? Book Review: Common Core SS K-5 Lesson Plans Weekend Website #105: Voki New to technology? Follow my classes Back to School–Tech Makes it Easy to Stay On Top of Everything Tech Tip #102: Doc Saved Over? No Problem 50 Ways to Tell a Story (and Each is Unique) Weekend Website #112: The Babakus Dear Otto: My computers are old. What do I do? Check out my Article over at Cisco Tech Tip #28: 5 Ways to Fix a No-Sound Problem–For Free Now Available: 35 Extra Lessons for the SL K-6 Technology Curriculum Weekend Website #104: Animoto Subscribe to my Blog–Get Special Gifts Every Month Book Review: 19 Posters to Decorate Your Technology Lab Tech Tip #27: My Taskbar Disappeared Dear Otto: What About Carmen San Diego? Weekend Website #103: Screenbird Book Review: My Evernote Why do Educators Use Pinterest? Tech Tip #26: My Mouse Doesn’t Work 10 Passwords Everyone Uses (And You Shouldn’t) Great Resources for Educators–Check it out Book Review: 55 Tech Projects for the Digital Classroom Website Review: Chegg The Elephantine Impact of Technology on Education 19 Free Posters For Your Tech Lab Tech Tip #25: My Keyboard Doesn’t Work Dear Otto: What Online Images are Free? Book Review: Sixth Grade Technology Textbook Weekend Website #111: 40 California Mission Websites Have You Noticed Our New “Great Websites?” 5 Great Tech Ed Blogs You May Not Have Heard Of Tech Tip #24: How to Open A New Word Doc Without the Program Dear Otto: How Can I Highlight a Document Subscriber Special: Huge Savings on Bundles Book Review: Fifth Grade Technology Textbook Weekend Website #110: 89 Resources for Teachers Use the SL K-6 Technology Curriculum? Want More Lessons? I Can Do That Happy July 4th! Tech Tip #23: I Deleted a File By Accident Dear Otto: What’s a Good Comic Creator Book Review: Fourth Grade Technology Textbook Special Ends June 30th–98 Tech Tips FREE With Blog Follow Weekend Website #102: Interactive Simulations 9 Steps to Tech Savviness This Summer Now Available: Grade-level Bundles of Common Core Lessons Tech Tip #22: Quick Exit from 97% of Programs Dear Otto: Should Students Space Once or Twice After a Period? Book Review: Third Grade Technology Textbook Weekend Website #101: Electrocity Dear Otto: What Can I Use Besides TuxPaint/KidPix? What’s a Tech Teacher Do With Their Summer Off? Tech Tip #21: How to Make a Small Webpage Window Big Now Available: 98 Tech Problems From the Classroom: and How Students Can Solve Them Weekend Website #100: CybraryMan Math How to Teach Internet Safety in K-6 Book Review: Second Grade Technology Textbook Tech Tip #20: How to Add an MS Word Link Dear Otto: How Do You Teach Adults to Keyboard? Weekend Websites #99: How to Research Check out my Article over at Cisco Now Available: KEY TO ALIGNING K-5 CLASS WITH COMMON CORE STATE STANDARDS Tech Tip #19: How to Activate an MS Word Link I’ve been Nominated for the Fascination Award App Review: 5th Grade Math–Splash Math Worksheets Dear Otto: Where Can I Find Kid-safe Images? The Truth About Teaching in America Tech Tip #18: 10 Best MS Word Tips Happy Memorial Day Weekend Website #98: Smithsonian Wild Pre-Order: KEY TO ALIGNING K-5 CLASS WITH COMMON CORE STATE STANDARDS Summer Keyboarding Class–Here are the Details Tech Tip #17: What’s Today’s Date? Book Review: First Grade Technology Textbook Weekend Website #98: TED-Ed How to Adapt Lessons to Common Core State Standards Connect Classrooms With Skype–How it’s Done Tech Tip #16: Quickly Email a Doc Book Review: Kindergarten Technology Textbook Weekend Website #97: Timed Test Arcade How to Align Technology with Common Core State Standards Ask a Tech Teacher is Interviewed Tech Tip #102: Doc Saved Over? No Problem Great Apps Now Available Weekend Website #96: Embedit.in 16 Ways Educators Use Pinterest What About Teacher Tech Training–Part II Tech Tip #15: Save Early Save Often–Always Dear Otto: Why Can’t I type into a PDF? Half a Million Hits–Wow Weekend Website #95: AIRR Math Changing Education Paradigms 10 Things My Blog Taught Me Tech Tip #14: Did Your Desktop Icons Disappear? Apps for Education Weekend Website #94: 9 Websites to Teach Writing Communicate the Web 2.0 Way Ed-Tech Readers’ Choice Awards–Final Call Tech Tip #13: Powerful Right Mouse Click Dear Otto: What About Teacher Tech Training? 107 Favorite iPad Apps for K-8–Plus 1 Weekend Website #93: 24 Third Grade Websites on Landforms How Do I Decide What to Write About? 107 Favorite iPad Apps for K-8 Tech Tip #12: Wrap Text Around an Image Monday Freebie #34: How to Teach Dolch Words with KidPix Weekend Website #93: 18 Natural Disasters Websites Google Summer of Code–They’re Hiring What’s Trending on Ask a Tech Teacher Tech Tip #11: How to Show the Entire Drop Down Menu (Office 2003) Dear Otto: How Do You Keep Students From Playing with Settings? Weekend Website #92: 43 Language Arts Websites for 3rd Grade Should Tech Teachers be in the Classroom or the Lab–Follow Up Wikipedia vs Britannica–the Results May Surprise You Tech Tip #10: How to Undelete With Two Keystrokes Monday Freebies #39: Google Earth Board Weekend Website #91: 16 Word Study Websites for 2nd Grade 13 ways Twitter Improves Education Grants for Classroom Management Software–Take a Look Tech Tip #9: Hide Your Screen Quickly Dear Otto: How do I protect my lab? Weekend Websites #90: Free Audio Books What Every Parent Should Know About Computers and the Internet Should You Dump Twitter? Google Docs on WordPress Tech Tip #8: Print Part of a Web Page Monday Freebies #40: Wonders of Google Earth Weekend Website #89: Rubrics for Web 2.0 Tools 21 Reasons Why You Know You’re a Teacher Do You Skype? Dilbert Does Tech Tip #7: Make Backgrounds Transparent Dear Otto: Should Lefties Use Right Hands for Mousing Around Weekend Website #88: Drive a Ship 29 Steps to Internet Safety for Kids Ed-Tech Readers’ Choice Awards Tech Tip #6: The (Horrid Annoying) Publisher Drawing Canvas Monday Freebies #38: Introduction to Google Earth Weekend Website #87: Volcano Explorer You Know You’re a Techy Teacher When… How to Integrate Web 2.0 Tools into the Classroom Tech Tip #101: The Internet Button Monday Freebies #37: Use Oregon Trail to Teach Westward Expansion 62 First Grade Websites That Tie into Classroom Lessons Do Teacher Ed Programs Prepare Students for Technology Needs of the Classroom? Should Tech Teachers be in the Classroom or the Lab Tech Tip #5: What to do When Your Taskbar Disappears Monday Freebies #35: Sponge Activities for Vocabulary Building Curious About ChromeBooks? Watch These Product Review: Just Air Case for Ipad Great Websites Updated! Google Apps Support Bloom’s Taxonomy–Take a Look My G+ Stream is a Trickle Tech Tip #4: Zoom In and Out Monday Freebies #36: My First Report Where Tech Can Take Students 62 Kindergarten Websites That Tie into Classroom Lessons Book Review: Facebook for Business in 10 Minutes Help Students Stay Organized with Wikis Tech Tip #3: Turn an Address into a Link Monday Freebie: #33: Grow Your Story Weekend Website #86: Periodic Table of Videos Dear Otto: What iPad Apps Do You Recommend? Top 13 Web 2.0 Tools for Classrooms Tech Tip #2: The PrintScreen Key Monday Freebies #32: Color my Grammar Weekend Website #85: 11 Sizzling Space Sites What Should You Expect of Younger Keyboarders? How To Successfully Start a 1:1 Technology Program Tech Tip #1: Insert Key 6th Grade Technology Textbook is Here! Monday Freebie #31: A Title Page in Word Top Ten Websites of 2011 2011 in review 2012, I Resolve… 10 Most Popular Tech Tips in 2011 Monday Freebies #28: My Storybook Web 2.0 Tools in Tech Ed Weekend Websites #84: Planet in Action Product Review: MindMaple 10 Hits and 10 Misses for 2011 Introducing: Tech Tip Tuesday Monday Freebies #19: My Bookcover in KidPix Happy Holidays! Tech Tip #100: Top Ten MS OfficeTips Monday Freebie #27: Internet Skills for K-8: Blogs Weekend Website #83: Bookmarks4Techs Product Review: Live! Cam 32 Science Websites for Fifth Graders Tech Tip #99: Top Ten Internetting Hints Monday Freebies #25: Intro to PowerPoint–with KidPix Pictures Weekend Website 40: NORAD Santa 6th Grade Tech Textbook Almost Ready Edublogs Nomination: Best EdTech/Resource Sharing Blog Tech Tip #98: Speed up MS Office with Quick Access Toolbar Monday Freebies #13: Great Online Art Sites Weekend Website #82: NASA City Read My Latest ‘Innovate My School’ Article Managing the Second Grade Classroom Tech Tip #96: Open a Program Maximized Monday Freebie #12: Create Simple Shapes in Excel Happy Thanksgiving! Ask a Tech Teacher Featured Tech Tip #97: How to Add Zip to Your Slow Computer Monday Freebie #10: Drawing in Photoshop Product Review: Luna Projection Camera Organize Your Teaching With Wikis Nominations For Edublog Awards Now Open! Monday Freebies #22: A Holiday Flier Weekend Website #81: A Web Whiteboard What Should You Expect of Younger Keyboarders? Keyboarding for Youngers? There are Three Sides to the Story Tech Tip #95: Find the Programs You Use Quickly Monday Freebies #24: Holiday Newsletter Weekend Website #80: 73 Sponges for Classroom–by topic Buy 3, Get 16 Holiday Projects Free Make ‘Passports’ to Encourage Keyboard Skills Tech Tip #94: Shortkey for Find Monday Freebies #23: A Holiday Calendar Weekend Website #74: 41 Websites for Teachers to Integrate Tech into Your Classroom Using Skype in the Classroom Unlocking Social Networking for Schools Tech Tip #93: Auto-fill for Internet Addresses Monday Freebies #21: Another Holiday Card Weekend Website #73: 3 Programs to Teach Architecture in First Grade Couldn’t make the Radio Interview? Here’s What We Covered Tech Tip #92: Rollback Windows Updates Monday Freebies #3: Make Your Own Wallpaper Weekend Website #65: Noodle Ask a Tech Teacher Takes to Radio Tech Tip #91: Internet Problems? Switch Browsers Monday Freebies #20: How to Make Wallpaper Weekend Website #75: Solar System Scope Classroom Management 101: Use Wikis Easi-Speak Digital Microphone is Simple Tech Tip #90: Don’t Be Afraid of Mulligans Monday Freebies Weekend Website #72: 62 Favorite 1st Grade Websites Do You See Youself in This Video? Tech Tip #89: Use Keyboard Shortcuts With Students Are You As Smart as a Fifth Grader (and more) Weekend Website #71: 5 Great FREE Programs for Kids #42: Where Did I Come From? Tech Tip #87: Image Your Computer How to Organize the First Grade Class Weekend Website #68: Live Like Bear Grylls #99: How to Teach Internet Basics to Kids Tech Tip #88: 20 Techie Problems Every Student Can Fix I Love my Kindergarten Class Wiki Our Children Remember… Weekend Website #69: Free Online Classes From MIT et al Read My Latest ‘Innovate My School’ Article Back to School–Tech Makes it Easy to Stay On Top of Everything Tech Tip #86: Back up Your Computer 5 Great Labor Day Websites Weekend Website #66: What’s Your Carbon Footprint School’s Back–Do Your Children Need Computers? Tech Tip #85: Browser Problem? Switch Browsers Free Ebook Anyone? Can I Ask a Favor? Weekend Website #67: 20 Websites to Learn Everything About Landforms The Secret to Teaching Tech to Kids: Delegate Tech Tip #18: Ten Best MS Word Tips–How Did You Survive Without Them A ‘Typical’ Tech Lesson Plan Weekend Website #64: Khan Academy How Do You Use Twitter in Education Tech Tip #84: How to Find the Follow-up Folder in Outlook Why Some Kids Always Seem to Know the Answers Weekend Website #63: Teach Keyboarding How to Balance Teaching and Independent Discovery Geek Tweaks Going On Big List of Great Kids Websites Updated Tech Tip #83: How Do I Use a ‘Read Only’ Doc? #81: Problem Solving Board Weekend Website #62: Teach Parents Tech 19 Free Posters For Your Tech Lab Book Review: 55 Technology Projects for the Digital Classroom Tech Tip #80: My Internet Stopped Working 31 Human Body Websites for 2nd-5th Grade Book Review: Disrupt Class–Yes, That’s What I Said Weekend Website #60: Google Tools and Bloom’s Taxonomy I Got An Invite to Google+ Tech Tip #82: My Picture’s a TIFF and the Program Needs a JPG Are you as Tech-Smart as a Fifth Grader? Weekend Website #53: EasyBib What’s Trending on Ask a Tech Teacher Book Review: Fifth GradeTechnology Tech Tip #78: Use BCC to Hide Email Addresses Discount on Technology Curriculum Weekend Website #61: Brainy Widgets from Wolfram Alpha Come Visit Me on Innovate My School Book Review: Third Grade Technology–32 Lessons Tech Tip #69:Make your desktop icons Big or Little A Note to Readers From My Publisher Weekend Websites #58: 12 Music Websites for the Non-Geeks in Your Class ISTE Debrief: Don’t Hide the Internet from Today’s Kids Book Review: Kindergarten Technology–32 Lessons Tech Tip #77: Laptop Frozen? Here’s Another Solution Weekend Websites #59: 62 First Grade Websites That Tie into Classroom Lessons Book Review: 1st Grade Technology–32 Lessons Tech Tip #79: Saving Your File so Everyone Can Read it 23 Websites to Support Math Automaticity in K-5 Weekend Websites #79: 57 Kindergarten Websites That Tie into Classroom Lessons Book Review: Fourth Grade Technology–32 Lessons Tech Tip #76: Laptop Frozen? Here’s What You Do Five Great Summer Websites Your Kids Don’t Want to Miss Weekend Website #52: 7 Sites About Coin Counting Book Review: Second Grade Technology–32 Lessons Tech Tip #75: What’s My IP Address #54: Sponge Activities in History Weekend Websites #78: 46 Online Math Sites for 4th/5th Grade 6 Hi-Tech Tools for Writers #11: Photoshop Actions and History Brush Tech Tip #81: I Have Office 2010; Everyone Else Has 2003–They Can’t Read My Stuff Book Review: Digital Forensics With Open Source Tools Weekend Website #77: Blackle #10: Drawing in Photoshop Tech Tip #74: The Gadgets Menu Bar Thank You 41 Websites for Teachers to Integrate Tech into Your Classroom Tech Tip #73: Alt+??? Brings up which Menu Command? Blogger Humor Weekend Websites #56: 23 Websites to Support Math Automaticity in K-5 #47: Tour the World—with a PowerPoint Slideshow How I Doubled My Business in a Year Tech Tip #72: How to Move Pics Around in Documents #42: Where Did I Come From Weekend Website #55: Science for Fifth Graders How Fast Should Kids Type Dr. Seuss Discusses Packet Pockets Tech Tip #71: Visit Foreign Language Google Search Weekend Website #76: 46 Math Websites for Tech Integrated Classrooms What are Your Favorite Summer School Keyboard Activities Tech Tip #70: Save Energy While Searching 20 Common Computer Problems and Solutions (a Third Grader Can Do) Weekend Websites–Where’d My Newsletter Go! Weekend Website #54: 20 Great Research Websites for Kids #55: Keyboarding in the Classroom Tech Tip #68: Check History in Your Browser #54: Sponge Activities in History Weekend Website #53: 41 Websites for Teachers to Integrate Tech into Your Classroom #30: A Cover Page in Publisher Tech Tip #67: How to Add Accents and more What Every Parent Should Know About Computers Weekend Website #51: 17 Story Sites for First and Second Grade College Students Then and Now Tech Tip #66: Zoom In/Out of Websites #47: Tour the World—with a PowerPoint Slideshow Weekend Website #50 Visuword What Did a Hard Drive Look Like in 1956? Tech Tip #65: Google Street View Tech Tip #64: Reset Default Font 6 Kindergarten Keyboard Basics Weekend Websites #57: 28 Websites to Teach Tech to Kindergarten-First Grade 17 Story Sites for First and Second Grade Tech Tip #63: Don’t Like Double Space Between Paragraphs? #42: Where are my Roots? Weekend Website #49: Tux Paint Help! I Need Your Input #39: Google Earth Board Tech Tip #62: Email from Word (Or PowerPoint or Excel) How to Teach Keyboarding in Lower School Weekend Website #48: Wolfram|Alpha for Educators 20 Best Keyboarding Websites Tech Tip #61: How to Get Youngers to Use the Right Mouse Button How to Teach Problem-solving With Oregon Trail and Win7 Weekend Website #47: Online Keyboarding #37: Use Oregon Trail to Teach Westward Expansion Tech Tip #60: How to Add Shortcuts to the Desktop Bill Gates to Visit Pomona College on March 10 Weekend Website #46: Computer Lab Favorites Lots of Great Lesson Plans Tech Tip #59: Shortkey for the Copyright Symbol Another Hans Rosling Extravaganza–Health vs. Wealth Weekend Website #45: Google Art Project #48: Sponge Activities for Geography Tech Tip #58: Show all Your Tools on Toolbars Weekend Website #44: Mission US 5 Best Tech Skills You Learned in Elementary School Tech Tip #57: How to Create a Chart Really Fast Photoshop Anyone? Weekend Website #43: Google Search Book Review: Savvy Cyberkids at Home Tech Tip #55: Find a Lost Shortcut #41: Where is That? Twitter Buzz On Super Bowl Sunday Ads Weekend Website #41: Spanish Help #30: A Cover Page in Publisher Tech Tip #56: Force a New Page Google EBooks is a Year Old. How are they doing? Weekend Website #42: Yuckiest Site on the Internet #40: Wonders of Google Earth Tech Tip #54: How to Auto Forward a PowerPoint Slideshow 3 Ways Twitter Makes You a Better Writer Weekend Website #40: Many Eyes #35: Sponge Activities for Vocabulary Building Tech Tip #51: Copy Images From Google Images Just Another Day In Computer Lab Weekend Websites #39: Big Huge Labs 3 Steps to Keep the Internet Child-Safe Will All Twitter Users Please Twand Up Tech Tip #45: Your Screen Upside Down? Weekend Website #38: DSpace@MIT 10 Top Click-throughs from Ask a Tech Teacher 10 Hits and 10 Misses for 2010 Tech Tip #46: The Easiest Way to Explain Right and Left to (Little) Kids Ask a Tech Teacher 2010 in Review 2011, I Resolve… Weekend Websites: Best Sites of 2010 10 Most Popular Tech Tips in 2010 Weekend Website #40: NORAD Santa Tech Tip #48: Quickly Switch Between Windows 3 Programs to Teach Architecture in First Grade Weekend Website #37: Microsoft Dreamspark #36: My First Report How Blogs Make Kids Better Writers Tech Tip #53: How to Pin Any Program to the Start Menu Can Technology Help Teachers Plan? Weekend Website #36: LearnItIn5 What Happens When Technorati Gives Me Authority? Tech Tip #52: Roll Your Computer Back to a Problem-Free Date Weekend Website #35: Dance Mat Typing #38: Introduction to Google Earth Tech Tip #22: Quick Exit from 97% of Programs #33: Grow Your Story Weekend Website #25: Online Schooling Tech Tip #50: The Easiest Way to Outline Favorite Animated GIF’s Buy a Book Get a FREE PDF Weekend Website #34: Block Posters #30: A Cover Page Tech Tip #47: Tool Tips ASCII Art for the Beginner Weekend Website #33: Wild on Math #15: A Holiday Letter in Word Tech Tip #49: The Fifteen Second Slideshow #35: Sponge Activities for Vocabulary Building Weekend Website #32: SqoolTube #39: Google Earth Board Tech Tip #44: Clean Your Computer Weekly Profile of the Non-Voter Weekend Website #27: TED Weekend Website #31: Elementary Tech Teachers Ning Tech Tip #43: Back Up Often #28: My Storybook Weekend Website #30: Breathing Earth Tech Tip #42: How to (Re)Set Your Homepage #27: Online Blogs for Your Classroom Weekend Website #29: Storybook Maker Tech Tip #40: Where Did Windows Explorer Go? #33: Grow Your Story Weekend Website #28: Bing Maps #32: Color my Grammar Tech Tip #41: Repair Your Computer With System Restore Tech Problems Date to the Middle Ages #80: Study Better Together With Excel End of the Week Laugher #7 Weekend Website #7: Free Flash Tools for your Classroom What’s it Like to Be a Blogger? Tech Tip #38: My Desktop Icons Are All Different Life is a Computer Program Weekend Website #26: Tagxedo 7 More Great Mouse Skills Programs Tech Tip #39: My Computer Won’t Turn Off How to Solve the Hardest Computer Problem Weekend Website #24: Office Web Apps Tech Tip #21: How to Make a Small Webpage Window Big Weekend Website #22: Webspiration Tech Tip #37: My MS Word Toolbar Disappeared Tech Tip #36: The Internet Toolbar Disappeared FREE Lesson Plans for K-8 Technology Weekend Website #23: Fourth Grade Class Wiki Weekend Website #21: Test Your Typing Speed Tech Tip #35: My Program Closed Down Social Media Explained With Two Maps What Should You Include on a Younger Child’s Computer Weekend Website #20: Kindergarten Class Wiki Tech Tip #34: My Program Froze Weekend Website #19: First Grade Class Wiki A Good Peer Review–Huzzah Tech Tip #33: My Desktop Icons are Messed Up 25 Tips for Not-so-Techy Folk Weekend Website #18: Second Grade Class Wiki 8 Simple Fixes if Your Computer Won’t Work Tech Tip #19: How to Activate a Link in Word What Do You Think of Facebook in Schools? Weekend Website #17: Third Grade Class Wiki Who Reads Blogs? Tech Tip #20: How to Add A Link to Word E-book Sales Surpass Harcovers Weekend Website #16: Fourth Grade Class Wiki Dr. Seuss in the Digital Age Tech Tip #32: My Taskbar Got Moved to the Side Weekend Website #15: A Class Wiki What About Our Kids Endangered Minds Tech Tip #31: What’s Today’s Date 5 Google Earth Projects for the Web 2.0 Classroom Weekend Website #12: Wacky Faces Tech Tip #18: No Excuse for Spelling Errors #79: Excel Turns Data Into Information Weekend Website #14: The Internet Start Page Is Technology Good for Our Younger Children? Tech Tip #30: Menu Command is Greyed Out Weekend Website #13: MS Office #13: Great Online Art Sites Tech Tip #29: I Can’t Find My File Here’s One for the Tech-ed Naysayers Weekend Website #11: Google Moon Tech Tip #28: 5 Ways to Fix a No-Sound Problem–For Free Where Would You Like to Go Today? Weekend Website #10: Google Mars Thirty-two More Ways to Use Spare Classroom Time Tech Tip #27: My Taskbar Disappeared Nineteen Ways to Use Spare Classroom Time Weekend Website #9: Talking Pets Tech Tip #23: I Deleted a File By Accident Weekend Website #8: Virtual Surgery Tech Ten Commandments–the Christian Version Tech Tip #26: My Mouse Doesn’t Work Weekend Website #7: Create Flash Class Tools Online #43: How to Teach Geography with KidPix II Tech Tip #25: My Keyboard Doesn’t Work #44: How to Teach Geography with KidPix I Weekend Website #6: Cool Tools for School (and Homeschools) Ten Best Keyboarding Hints You’ll Ever See How to Make a Cover Page in KidPix Tech Tip #24: How to Open A New Word Doc Without the Program #34: How to Teach Dolch Words with KidPix Weekend Website #5: Get Tricky With Wikis #73: How to Graph in Excel Tech Tip #17: Don’t Know the Date? No Problem #26: Create a Storybook in KidPix Weekend Website #4: Hangman This School Has Spirit! The Geek Lifestyle: Can You Relate Tech Tip #16: Email That Document #2: How to KidPix II Weekend Website #3: Spybot 18 Great Poetry Websites #1: How to KidPix I Tech Tip #15: Save Early Save Often Weekend Website #2: Zoopz #109: MS Word Skills Assessment for Grades 3-8 Tech Tip #14: Desktop Icons Disappear? How to Use Second Life for Teaching Weekend Website #1: Jing Tech Tip #13: The Powerful Right Mouse Button Ask a Tech Teacher–A Great Review Weekend Websites (They’re Wonderful) Hackers Love April Fool’s Day Tech Tip #12: Wrap Text Around a Picture #110: Publisher Skills Assessment for Grades 3-8 End of the Week Laugher #5 The First Female Geek: Ada Lovelace #51: History Trifold in Publisher–Grades 4-7 Tech Tip #11: How to Show the Entire Drop Down Menu #50: American Revolution Magazine in Publisher Tech Tip #10: How to Undelete Kids Use Computers More at School Than Home #53: Colonization Trifold Brochure in Publisher #52: Indigenous Cultures Magazine in Publisher Tech Tip #9: Quickly Hide Your Screen #49: California Missions Project–in Publisher End of the Week Laugher #4 #74: Mastering Excel (for Beginners) Tech Tip #8: Print a Selection off a Web Page #102: 23 Favorite Keyboard Shortcuts #103: Know Your Computer Hardware Tech Tip #7: Transparent Backgrounds Tech Support and Teachers: Like Two Foreign Languages End of the Week Laugher #3 #3: Windows Skills: Make Your Own Wallpaper #105: Top 30 Geek Speak for Fifth Grade Tech Tip #6: The (Horrid Annoying) Drawing Canvas What I Wish I’d Known Before Starting WPP Online End-of-the-week-Laugher #2 #99: Internet ABCs for Elementary Schoolers Tech Tip #5: Reveal a Program #100: How to Web 2.0 Accessorize Your Classroom End-of-the-Week Laugher #1 #101: Don’t Print Homework–Email it! 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Total Firefox Downloads Just Shy Of 1,000,000,000 (yes, 1 billion)

My friend, Chris, over at Tech Worthy does a great job of keeping up to date on the latest news. Something I should do better–but why when I have him to lean on? Here’s a post on my favorite browser Firefox (I dumped IE years ago when it became too darn temperamental):

Mozilla’s Firefox browser is about to hit a major milestone: 1 billion total downloads. As you can see on this Twitter account (updates every 15 minutes or so) and this one (updates every million reached) set up to monitor the download numbers, it just crossed the 999,000,000 threshold earlier today. Judging by the rate at which it’s increasing, it could hit the milestone as early as tomorrow. You can see a simple, but pleasing live download counter here.

And Mozilla is preparing for the big day with a new site (not live yet), called http://www.onebillionplusyou.com, which will go live on Monday. There, you’ll find information about the one billion downloads Firefox has seen. When the browser hits the milestone, more information should also be available here.

Firefox has made a major dent in Internet Explorer’s marketshare over the past few years. The latest numbers put IE’s share just over 54%, while Firefox approaches 30%. That’s pretty incredible when you consider that just a few years ago, IE had over 90% marketshare.

This one billion number is obviously for all the versions of Firefox, since it was launched in 2002 (though the Firefox name officially took hold in 2004). The most recent major version, 3.5, launched exactly a month ago today. It zoomed past a million downloads very quickly, and had 5 million downloads after day one — a huge number, though not quite as huge as the Firefox 3.0 launch.

Take THAT Internet Explorer

Why People Blog–You’ll be Surprised at the Reasons

Not for shopping, which those who should know consider to be the killer app for internet use. The top reasons: to learn, have fun and socialize. Sounds like a teachers dream. Look at this:

Marketing 101

I know computer training is pretty dry. But I figure if I get enough of you over here, you’ll stay. Especially when you see some of the amazing stuff you can do with computers, like hacking… For help, I went to the professionals…

Have you met Cheru at Alphainventions? I think we need to hire him to solve the health care crisis, here in America, though I think a few other people have dibs on him first. Here’s how he markets his website:

The huge truck got stuck under the bridge, and many men tried to get it out for hours and failed until the creator of alphainventions.com told them let the air out of the tires to set it free.

I spent twenty minutes reading his website just because his wisdom is so refreshing. OK. go see it yourself. I know you’ll agree.