Recent articles
All educators should be prepared to incorporate assistive tech
09/21/2018
Topics: Assistive and adaptive technologies
By age 3, most children are expressing themselves using complex language structures. They’re using hundreds of words, combining words and using prefixes and suffixes to change meanings. These children are also using language to make requests, comment and even protest.
Language…
Librarians are key to education's digital transformation
09/21/2018
Topics: Learning spaces, Literacies, Makerspaces
It’s a syndrome seen at so many schools. As school districts face shrinking budgets, some are tempted to find savings by cutting library staff. After all, the reasoning goes, with so many resources available via laptops, tablets or phones, who needs librarians anymore?
We all do, argues…
Open licensing is changing the way teachers find, use instructional materials
09/21/2018
Topics: OERs
On a cold January day, a teacher from Ethiopia braved the snow to visit Mountain Heights Academy in Utah.
He wanted to personally thank the faculty for making their curriculum openly available online. Unable to afford instructional materials for his all-girls school back home, he’d…
Partner to amplify advocacy efforts at the highest levels
06/19/2018
Topics: Advocacy and funding
When efforts to streamline teacher licensing in Massachusetts recently took an unexpected turn, a cadre of organizations, led by ISTE affiliate MassCUE, united to support educators. This effort is an amazing example of how partnerships in the education community can have a real and lasting…
Use advocacy, storytelling to grow learning initiatives
06/19/2018
Topics: Advocacy, Advocacy and funding
Advocacy, in education and elsewhere, involves working individually and as a group to influence decisions within political, economic and social systems and institutions. But advocacy involves more than providing testimony to your local, state or federal elected officials to influence…
WHAT WORKS: Program turns teachers into STEM researchers
03/18/2018
Topics: Digital Citizenship, Gamification
Cybersecurity is the digital Wild West, and students at College Station High School in Texas are preparing for it by creating a virtual network and using it to practice stopping simulated attacks – just like real-world cybersecurity researchers do.
Science and technology…
MEMBER VOICES: Janice Mak says it's possible to bring CS to all students
03/18/2018
Topics:
Computing has transformed the way we do business, organize our personal information, conduct research, think about our health, socialize, listen to music, read books, heat or cool our houses – and yet it’s a subject that only one in four schools teach.
This led me to ask…
MEMBER PROFILE: Amy Tran is creating the school of tomorrow
03/18/2018
Topics: Education leadership
In a corner of their high school fabrication lab, Amy Tran’s students are building a model of London. But this isn’t just any London.
It’s a futuristic smart city where garbage- collecting robots use sensors to navigate the streets, smart lights turn on and…
ISTE STANDARDS SPOTLIGHT: Take steps to embrace the Learner standard
03/18/2018
Topics:
In June 2017, ISTE released the ISTE Standards for Educators, a road map for guiding students to become empowered learners. Formerly known as the ISTE Standards for Teachers, the Educator Standards have changed drastically — as have teaching and technology — since the last update in 2008.…
WHAT WORKS: Teaching digital citizenship without devices
12/15/2017
Topics: Advocacy, Digital Citizenship, Education leadership
Over the summer, a group of preteens attended a camp to learn how to communicate online. They explored computational thinking concepts, practiced using social media and developed their media literacy skills.
And they did it all without a lick of technology.
…