Capture, Label & Report Using MoticNet

Are you looking to network your classroom? The digital era has brought technology to everything - even science! MoticNet is designed for and inspired by the success of digital microscopy and technology in science classrooms. MoticNet allows digital microscopes to be linked so that one teacher can have full and instant access to any student at any time.

If you've already networked your classroom, take a look at this video to touch up your skills on using MoticNet to capture, label and report in you classroom! If you haven't used MoticNet before, the possibilities really are endless. Integrating science with technology and even incorporating literacy, MoticNet helps you provide your students with a well-rounded lesson. Check it out!

Take Your Technology Outdoors!

When's the last time your children or students wanted to go outside just to enjoy the great outdoors and what it has to offer? If you can't recall a time, that's okay; with these innovative ways to take the technology today's youth is attached to outdoors with them, the learning process has now gone digital! While a growing number of young people are expressing a concern and interest in their environment, those same students are feeling increasingly more disconnected from it. Cue technology. Technology can help students "plug into nature" by empowering them to observe and collect data about their local environment.

As part of Greening STEM: Taking Technology Outdoors, National Environment Education Week (EE Week, April 14-20) will highlight the growing opportunity to engage today's students in learning about the environment around them, with new technologies that enable scientific research and develop 21st century skills. Score!

Here are some ways to take technology outdoors:

• Mobile Devices: With access to a camera, the Internet and a GPS, smartphones and tablets make it easy to gather, organize and submit data from observations. Apps can be downloaded for little to no cost that make engaging students in a particular aspect of study even easier. Check out the top 10 apps for taking tech outdoors.
• GPS Units: On their own, GPS units are great tools for getting students outside and engaged in environmental field research and service-learning projects. Take a look at what other educators are doing with GPS.
• Digital Cameras: Students can use digital cameras to document their local environment, track their progress on science projects, collect evidence and present their findings to their peers in class. Not to mention, since so many digital cameras come equipped with a video recording mode these days, students can even shoot videos of what they see.
• Digital Weather Stations: Say hello to the meteorologist inside you. With a digital weather station, students can add weather conditions to their study of a certain environment. Imagine having a few minutes at the beginning of each day to take a look at the weather station in your classroom or home and discussing what the weather conditions could mean or patterns that arise.
• Water Quality Monitoring Tools: Monitoring water quality is a real-world and hands on application of STEM that also enables students to become stewards of the water resources in their area. Fancy, tech tools like electronic probes and infrared thermometers add accuracy and a level of excitement to the process.

To learn even more, visit National Environmental Eduation Week's website or STEMblog.

Cheers to Computer Science Education Week!

Here's to Computer Science Education Week! Celebrated last week, CSEdWeek is designated as the second week of December to honor Admiral Grace Murray Hopper's birthday, December 9, 1906, as well as her extraordinary contributions to the computer science field. Hopper was a visionary in the field of computer science and her engineering in programming languages and computer system standards laid the foundation for advancements in computer science from the 1940s - 1970s. Last week, 3,398 people signed the pledge for CSEdWeek.

So what does it all mean? The Triangle Coalition for Science and Technology Education collaborates with various organizations and individuals for better STEM education and put together the facts last week. Here's some of what they found.

The Association for Computing Machinery, one of the core partners of CSEdWeek, has assembled a collection of statistics on the nation's computer science education and job outlook:

• 150,000 job openings in computing annually
• 1/2 of all STEM jobs will be in computing in 2020
• 22% job growth expected in computing by 2020
• $78,730 earned on average by computing professionals in 2011
• 19% of high school students took computer science courses in 2009, down 6% from 1990
• 9 states nationwide award "core" credit for high school computer science courses
• AP computer science exams comprise less than 1% of all AP exams taken

They added that jobs in computing are among the fastest growing and highest paying of almost any other profession. Despite these opportunities, the computing field faces a shortage of skilled workers and difficulty in keeping students in the pipeline. With significant barriers starting at the K-12 level, the number of students exposed to computer science is declining each year, and only a small percentage are receiving a rigorous education in the subject.

I know what you're thinking, what about the breadth of computer science jobs in the future? What's the story where you live? Well, the National Center for Women & Information Technology (NCWIT) has gathered key computing education and jobs indicators by state and congressional district and assembled them into an interactive map and other easily accessible tools. Individuals can use the data to understand their local situation and to advocate more effectively for changes they would like to see in their schools, colleges and universities. Find out how your state or district ranks in computer science education and jobs at www.ncwit.org/edjobsmap.

To check out resources, events, articles and more about computer science education, visit www.csedweek.org.

Active Explorer Moves STEM Learning to the Field

Active Explorer, a new mobile platform that aims to spark student's interests in the science, is taking STEM education to a whole new level. Now, smartphone in hand, students can leave the classroom and make science discoveries in the field. The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) partnered with Qualcomm's Wireless Reach initiative and mobile virtual network operator Kajeet to create the program.

This new program is what every science teacher has been hoping for. If you want your students engaged in what they're learning, there's no better way to do it than through self discovery. With Active Explorer, educators are able to log in to their computer a create a "quest" that asks their student to collect certain data with the program on their smartphones. Students can take pictures, record audio and video, create a map, make sketches or even write notes based on their observations. After they're finished collecting all their data, a mere push of a button will upload their data to their teacher and their own web account, enabling them to create slideshows, posters and e-books to share with classmates.

Active Explorer was piloted with eight teachers and 120 students across grades 4 and 7 in four Washington D.C. schools this October. District Administration reports that the program's easy-to-use design doesn't require teacher training and that it's intended for after-school use, when students are most likely to make real-world connections beyond the classroom. That's not to say that Active Explorer can't be used in the classroom, though! Active Explorer can also be integrated into classroom activities.

The program, was created to increase student interest in STEM and to keep the U.S. competitive in global education. Active Explorer also resembles what those in STEM careers are doing more and more frequently these days: using mobile platforms to collect their data.

Active Explorer runs on Android phones, which must be provided by the school district, but is free to download. You can learn more about the program at its website, www.active-explorer.com.

Race to the Top District Winners Announced!

Earlier this week, the Education Department announced the 16 winners of the Race to the Top school district grants (RTTD). 61 Finalists had been announced recently out of an original 372 districts that turned in applications in November. A total of $400 million was due to go out, and winners ranged from $10 million to $40 million for a period of four years, depending on the population of the given district. The winners included urban and rural districts, small districts and large consortia, and public and charter schools. The only large, urban school district to win was Miami-Dade (FL), which also just won the Broad Prize.

Education Week reported that U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan said the winners' circle includes "a really good mix" of both districts that are already education-reform leaders, and districts that have not received as much attention.

The winners, by order of total mean score, are as follows:

• Carson City, NV (208.33)
• New Haven Unified, CA (207.67)
• Miami-Dade, FL (207.00)
• Puget Sound Consortium, WA (205.33)
• Guilford County, NC (205.33)
• Metropolitan School District of Warren Township in Indianapolis, IN (205.00)
• IDEA public schools, TX (203.00) [charter schools]
• Charleston County, SC (201.67)
• Harmony Science Academy consortia, TX (201.67) [charter schools]
• St. Vrain Valley, CO (200.33)
• Galt Joint Union, CA (199.67)
• Iredell-Statesville, NC (199.67)
• Middletown City, NY (199.33)
• KIPP, DC (199) [charter schools]
• Green River Regional Education Cooperative, KY (197)
• Lindsay Unified, CA (196.33)

Congratulations to all of these school districts!

Read Education Week's full report.

40 STEM iPad Apps for Kids

With the need for students looking towards a STEM career path growing, it's no surprise that technology has figured how to do their part. With iPad apps that revolve around STEM appealing to children, there's a whole new way for them to learn without even knowing it.

These apps are great for giving your child practice, repetition and reinforcement: something that will definitely come in handy during the upcoming holiday breaks!

Categorized by math apps and science, technology and engineering apps, this site is a great tool for parents and educators a like.  Check it out!

Today's Education Means Twitter School

That's right, I said it: Twitter School. We all know that social media is paving a way for itself in the classroom, and it was more obvious than ever before at the Advancing Improvement in Education Conference this month in Austin, Texas. As fifteen-year-old Adora Svitak stood in front of nearly 3,000 teachers, principals and administrators and gave them the tools they needed to implement Twitter and Facebook into their schools, the social media sphere rejoiced.

Svitak acknowledges that students today "live, work and play" social media." She also noted to her audience that when the characteristics present in social media don't exist in the classroom, it's easy to tune out.

Taking note, first-time Twitter users in the audience learned how to sign up and began tweeting - thanking Svitak for her presentation, hashtag and all.

Svitak wrapped things up by saying, "Any good teacher knows how important it is to connect with students and understand our cultures. That could start with something like pursuing Reddit and knowing popular memes...Social media has definite benefits for education."

To read more and look at the to must-have apps for successful high school students, click here.

"Keeping the 'T' in STEM"

In 1994, Laura Reasoner Jones started an after school club called Girls Excelling in Math and Science (GEMS Club) to encourage girls to engage in STEM activities and spark their interest in STEM career fields.  Over the past 18 years, Jones says they've had a ball and the girls have thrived.

This year, Jones wants to do something she hasn't done before: motivate girls to embrace technology as creators, not users. Since it's been easy to offer experiences and activities in the other three STEM components (science, engineering and math) Jones wants to focus her energy on breaking down the barriers that keep women and young girls away from technology.

Jones explains that early exposure to IT can build confidence in girls, and encourage them to pursue future educational opportunities in the field. Even better, careers in IT are plentiful, high-paying and meaningful.

Despite the facts, enrollment and participation in computing classes has been dropping steadily since the 1980s, and fewer and fewer women are graduating with computer science or IT degrees. There's two problems here: girls are missing out on great career opportunities, and the world is missing out on their talents and perspectives as women.

Jones says that there are several resources we can look at to overcome this dilemma. The National Center for Women and Information Technology offers educators 60 downloadable ideas, including Computer Science in a Box, which teaches the premises of computing without the use of machines. Then there's Alice (alice.org), a program that encourages children, particularly girls, to explore computer science and programming.

While the programs Jones mentions may spark an interest in IT, a girl won't really be enticed unless she feels comfortable in the area. Jones encourages everyone to look around the computer lab/room where girls learn. If the room looks like a locker room or "man cave," educators may want to consider transforming the room to a place where girls and boys of all cultures are welcome with posters of successful men and women alike. 

We can all work together to make technology inviting and not intimidating for girls - let's do it!

To read more of Jones' commentary, click here.