Intel Education Accelerator

On Thursday, November 10th, I had a chance to attend to the Intel Education Accelerator showcase. This is a division of Intel that invests in startup companies that are creating new technology for schools. This year's cohort includes eight companies - you will probably start hearing about them in the coming years. I was impressed by some of their presentations and I wanted to highlight them for you.

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As a former History teacher, one of the coolest companies I saw was HSTRY. This company built a platform that helps teachers to create interactive timelines. When I was in the classroom, I was constantly looking for a product like this where both students and I could create timelines on a computer - I even attempted to build my own timelines using programs like Word or PowerPoint, but ended up more frustrated than happy with the final product. This company, though, has a fairly simple user interface to help teachers and students create timelines that incorporate pictures, animated gifs, and video! And it is adaptable to many different subjects: History (of course), Government, Language Arts, Novel Studies (Book Reports), Science, Mathematics, and many more. They have numerous examples on their website and it would even be worth it to upgrade to the paid version.

Note: This company has renamed itself Sutori.

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PrepFlash creates a new way for students to study. Instead of having to create flashcards on 3x5 index cards by hand, PrepFlash allows anyone to create online flashcards by simply snapping a picture of the text that they want to remember, then they can eliminate words for fill-in-the-blank, make it into a TRUE or FALSE question, or create a multiple choice question. You can also make flashcards based on a website, uploaded PDFs, or pasting text into their website. Though this seems to be a very cool tool, please do note that in their Terms of Service they specifically state that children under 13 years old are NOT allowed to use the site - maybe this will change in the future, but it is probably because they are not FERPA and COPPA compliant (these are laws that address how companies handle information from minors).

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SAM Labs has built a number of small, wirelessly connected blocks that allows students to built things without the mess of wires. The blocks include buttons, sliders, lights, sensors, and motors. The app allows you to connect the blocks together in various ways so that you have an almost boundless number of possibilities to move, illuminate or create sound. They have a number of kits available as well as ideas on their website. This would be perfect for a MakerSpace within a classroom or school.

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KiraKira is a company that was created in order to help girls become passionate about STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts & Mathematics) education. Though it was created for girls, it can certainly be used by any gender. There are lessons to teach about design and engineering, and there are tools to help students develop their own projects. If you do not have access to a 3D printer, you can pay the company to print out your creation and mail it to you! Pretty cool site to teach about engineering and design concepts.

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These are only half of the companies that are in this year's cohort. Check out the Intel Education Accelerator site to learn about the others, or click on the links above to check out the companies you might be interested in.

Passwords Revisited: Keeping your keys safe

In the past four hours, the EdTech team has handled numerous phone calls and emails about students' accounts being "hacked" - one student lost ALL of this Google Drive files and another student had someone send inappropriate emails to teachers and other students. Though we were able to recover the lost files and track the inappropriate emails, these experiences teach us the importance of password security. No one - students nor teachers - should give out their password to anyone else (though there may be exceptions for spouses of teachers and parents of students, students should never have access to other peoples' passwords - there may be an exception for TK-1 classes that use a common class password, but this should not be shared outside of the classroom). Always think about and treat passwords like the keys to your house - would you hand off your keys to anyone or leave them laying around for anyone to pick up? Neither should we leave our password available and visible for anyone to see and use. Our previous post: Passwords: the key to your life or the bane of your existence? dealt with this issue.

If you are in need of trying to change your students' passwords or having the students change their own passwords, you can use the directions in the How-To from EdTech folder, under the Google Account Management folder. We currently have a number of trainings in this folder including Student's Resetting Their Own Password and Resetting a Student's Password/Locating Roster Groups.

Remember, you can ALWAYS ask your EdTech Learning Community Specialist to come in and train your students about these concepts and processes as well.

Bernal Learning Community: Steve Harmon
Davis Learning Community: Bruce Neff
Herman Learning Community: Sergio Rizzi

Making a Difference as an Instructional Coach

David Kimball from Linden Unified School District (located east of Stockton) wrote a Google+ post about making a difference in his district as a Technology Instructional Coach (similar to the EdTech Team in Oak Grove School District). Read it below (or use the link to read it on Google+).

Making a Difference - Google+ post

As an EdTech Instructional Coach, it is experiences like this that truly make my job worthwhile. If you know a fellow teacher who is technology reluctant, remember the EdTech team at Oak Grove School District - this is why our jobs exist!

Bernal Learning Community: Steve Harmon

Davis Learning Community: Bruce Neff

Herman Learning Community: Sergio Rizzi